Hi Karen, those are some nice photos you have there! I really like that passion flower. I grew one of them once from seed, overwintered it indoors the first winter then planted it out for the second winter and sadly it didn't make it :( I do want to try it again though as maybe the location just wasn't right. It did send out some runners though :)
The red one is also amazing!
That Jasmine is going to be so nice once it grows up, and the smell will be wonderful!
I actualy have one of the rose of sharons, they're fairly common here and seed all over the place if you let them.......I want to get one of the large flowered ones though. Here they need to be planted fairly early in the summer though so they can be established before the winter. I've seen some really nice dark red ones.
Thany for the tour of your garden! I just moved a couple months ago so all my plants are in pots but once it gets planted I'll have to get some photos!
Steven
Dormant Tropicals
Steven,
I think the hardy blue passionflower should be okay in your zone as it is rated as hardy to zone 5a. However, having said that, I lost or had die back to the ground several plants that should have been fine in my zone. One of them is an English walnut tree which should have been hardy clear up to PA. But it has died back to the roots two winters in a row now. The tecoma stans, Night-blooming Jessamine, plumbago also should not have died back to the roots. So, unfortunately, what should be isn't always what we get. The tag on the red passionflower says it is hardy to 10 degrees, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed on that one.
I especially like the Roses of Sharon with the flowers that look more like the tropical hibiscus. The two I have now are much smaller flowers. I have some seeds for those, so when I get the time I'll give them a try and see how it goes.
By all means, when you get it all planted out, post photos. I would love to see them.
Karen
I had a tecoma stans I started last year and brought it in for the winter, then forgot to water it so it went dormant and them refused to sprout out so I ended up tossing it and will just have to start another.
The large flowered hibiscus are beautiful....I dhould get one for my new garden...not that I don't have enough plants to fill it already. I want to try to NOT overplant my new garden as it can end up getting a weedy look if plants are just shoved in all over the place :)
My plan for the new garden is to plant in spectrum like a rainbow so each section of colour leads into the next.
Steven
Karen--if it makes you feel better, I'm in zone 9 and can't get Tecoma stans to live through my winters, I've killed them several times now. Plumbago I only tried once and it died, and while night-blooming jessamine usually makes it, we had a nasty winter 2006/2007 where we had a week where temps got into the high teens-low 20's overnight for a week (unusual for us but maybe not for you!) and that killed it too. I think with some of these plants, they can handle short bursts of cold temperatures, but when they have many nights of cold temperatures that becomes too much for them. My version of zone 9 is kind of hard on many plants because while we rarely drop much below freezing, we have many, many, many nights that are fairly close to freezing, so the cumulative effect of all those cold nights makes it so that I can't grow some of the things that people in Florida and Texas can where they get an occasional cold night but most nights are much warmer. I don't know your climate very well, but since you're in zone 7, I imagine you may be in that same situation as me where you have frequent nights that are close to freezing.
ecrane3,
Well, the tecoma finally started sending up new shoots. They're not very tall yet, but there are many of them. I couldn't believe that the new shoots didn't appear until just a couple of weeks ago. I was sure it was dead until one of the dogs dug up a very-much-alive main root. The night-blooming jessamine came back, too. It is about four feet tall now and has blooms on it. The plumbago is still very small but it's there and alive.
I thought that the San Fernando Valley/Glendale CA area was zone 9, but I guess not since you're in zone 9 and you sure have colder weather than that area does. In the SFV neither the jessamine nor the plumbago die back in the winter. Here we have maybe two-three nights at a time near or below freezing several times during the winter, but very few nights down to the high-teen/low 20s and then usually only one night at a time. Most of our cold nights are high- to mid-30s.
Karen
Some parts of southern CA you're getting into zone 10, or at least borderline between 9b and 10 compared to my 9a, plus I have some funky microclimates in my yard because of being on a hill which may contribute to my problems too. The Cestrum was a freak occurence because of the really weird winter we had 2 yrs ago, we never have temps in the high teens/low 20's, I think that's a once in a blue moon sort of thing here, and it was just bad luck that it happened the year I had just planted all my new landscape! The one I planted last year in the same place came through winter just fine. But the Tecoma I tried again this past year when we had a normal winter and it still didn't make it, plus I killed one at my old house too which was just a little north of here and slightly warmer in the winter.
ecrane3,
I didn't realize that the zone for the SFV was that high. I thought that area of So. CA wouldn't get into zone 10 except at the beach. Live and learn. I sure understand about the hill. I lose one entire zone here because I am about 15 miles out of town and up in the hills at about 800-900 foot elevation. Downtown Tuscaloosa is easily and 8b, but we are 10 degrees or more colder than that here. Of course, there's the compensation in that it is also that much cooler in the summer. I keep reminding myself of the cooler summer temp while I am covering stuff up with frost cloth in the winter.
Karen