Wordless Wednesday - Butterfly

Tiger Swallowtail Butterfly (Papilio glaucas)

Black and White Flower

Black and White Flower

Here are a couple of black and white pictures from this summer. The first one is a Datura (I think) or Jimson Weed. At first I thought it was a Brugmansia (broog-MAN-zee-ah) but read that the flowers point down (non-erect) on that genus where the Datura flowers point upwards which this flower did. One of the funny things I read about this plant is it is called Devil’s Trumpet since the flowers point upward toward heaven and the Brugmansia is called Angel’s Trumpet as those flowers point down from heaven. I really want to stress that all parts of both of the mentioned plants are poisonous. Small doses may produce a hallucinogenic effect but often times can cause an overdose and even death. Some towns and counties have outlawed its cultivation. I am not sure which species of Datura this is.

All that said it is a beautiful flower that can grow tall and is perennial in some areas. I had a patch growing that I didn’t think was perennial but produced a new crop of seedlings each year. It eventually thinned out and died off. I wouldn’t mind growing some more in an isolated area of the garden.

These are pictures shot with my Nikon CoolPix 8400 on the monochrome setting. I have the function button set up for the two User Settings and one is color and one is Black and white so it is easy to switch between the two.


This is a water garden I saw this summer at the Staten Island Botanical Garden. This picture turned out more effective than the color version.

Two of my favorite garden blogs are discussing content scraping of garden blogs by other sites. I don’t like it and so far people I have contacted have removed my posts from their sites. I have again gone to the shorter RSS feeds because of the scraping.

Discussion is ongoing here:
annie in austin

and here:
Mr. Brown Thumb

Amur Maple 'Flame'

Amur Maple
Acer ginnala 'Flame'
(AY-ser) (jin-NAY-luh)
Synonyms: Siberian Maple, A.g. var. euginnala, Acer tataricum var. ginnala, A. t. var. aidzuense

Never sure what to call this plant since it has so many synonyms. I have taken to calling it Acer ginnala since it is the easiest. This is an interesting little tree that should be used in the landscape more often. In some areas it is considered invasive but in many years of growing it I haven’t seen any seedlings. Amur Maple is extremely hardy (USDA Zone 2) and can grow in a variety of soils and conditions. ‘Flame’ can get to 15-20 feet tall and needs very little maintenance. There aren’t a lot of diseases or insects that favor it other that the occasional tar spot. I have 4 specimens growing in various areas of the Estate as well as the dwarf variety ‘Emerald Elf’. All have done well although the one in full sun seems to get the best color. That is the real reason to grow this, the great fall color. I wish I had gotten to photograph this about a week earlier because it would show more of the habit of getting red, yellow and orange fall color on the same plant.


I wanted to go out and get a couple of pictures today but the forecast is for some freezing rain. I think I will stay in and maybe get some of the Christmas stuff out.

Yellow Dahlia

Yellow Dahlia

I am not sure which of the ten’s of thousands of Dahlias this one is since it came in the mix. It did well and flowered all summer. I am off to Massachusetts today to put Karen’s brother to rest. We are going to have a big party afterwards and that is the way Dale would have wanted it. He wouldn’t have liked a lot of people moping around about him, no matter I am still going to be very sad.

Garden Phlox (Phlox paniculata 'Franz Schubert')

Garden Phlox
Phlox paniculata 'Franz Schubert'
(floks) (pan-ick-yoo-LAY-tuh)

I don’t feel like I have much to say today other than what a week it was. I am glad it is over in so many ways. Yesterday I was tending to the big rose garden and it was really cold. Not mention all the thorns I stuck by, including a deep one right in the knuckle. Just marvelous. I only got about 2/3’s of the roses done and am going back tomorrow for some more punishment.

This Phlox is a beauty. What can you say about such a classic flower as Garden Phlox? There have been several posts of P. paniculata on this site so use the search or click the label if you want to find out a little more about the flowers.


I saw this striped rose in Ireland and it was very interesting. I used to not be crazy about striped roses but I have been liking them more lately, maybe it is an acquired taste.

Some Foliage From This Year

Some Foliage From This Year

Velvet Centaurea
Centaurea cineraria 'Colchester White'
Dusty Miller, Centaurea gymnocarpa

I had a couple of foliage pictures from the garden this year and since enjoyed growing these plants I thought I would pass them along. This Dusty Miller was great and I tried something a little different with it. Instead of intermingling it with my annuals I planted it separately and was happy that I did. It was quite a splash of color. This plant is much taller than the traditional Dusty Miller I have been growing in years past. It is an annual here in Connecticut but can make the winter in USDA Zone 8. I think I will try some more next year.


Heucherella
X Heucherella 'Stoplight'
(hew-ker-REL-uh)
Synonyms: Foamy Bells

This is still a new plant for me as I planted it in late summer. It was still looking okay when I walked by it the other day so it can take a bit of cold. So far I have enjoyed this plant and I will report back on my experience with it.

Since it is a relatively new plant I decided to look it up and found out that it was developed by Terra Nova Nurseries of Oregon. Every thing I saw said it had much better leaf color and bigger leaves than ‘Sunspot’. Since I have never seen ‘Sunspot’ that isn’t much of a reference to me.


Here is another silver plant called Cut Leaf White Sage (Artemisia stelleriana). You can see it has several other synonyms and common names. The flower buds are beginning to form in this picture and I usually pinch them off as the foliage is much more attractive than the flowers. ‘Silver Brocade’ is nice since it has the rounded leaves and a short (10-12 inches) and bushy habit. It is also more of a perennial that the Dusty Miller. It grows in a wide variety of soils but does require good drainage. This cultivar was introduced by the University of British Columbia Botanical Gardens. That is a wonderful garden if you have a chance to visit.

Synonyms: Ghost Plant, Wormwood, Dusty Miller, Mugwort, Beach Sage, 'Boughton Silver'

ABC Wednesday - Tea Crabapple

Tea Crabapple
Malus hupehensis
(MAL-us) (hew-pay-EN-sis)

This week ABC T post is Tea Crabapple. Crabapples are one of my favorite flowering trees to look at, not to grow. They are affected by a lot of different diseases and insects but nothing beats them when they are in flower. This particular Crabapple is unique in a couple different ways. The upright vase shape and the sparse stiff branching pattern are two ways it distinguishes itself. It gets to about 25 to 30 feet tall and is hardy to USDA Zone 4. Another way this Crabapple is special is that it is not as prone to the troubles that other Crabapples are. The flower buds are deep pink and open as blush pink and finish as white. They are quite showy with heavier bloom every other year. These trees bloom here in late April and reddish new leaves that turn green during the summer follow the flowers. What makes a Crabapple a Crabapple and not a regular Apple is the diameter of the fruit. If the fruit has a diameter of 2 inches or less it is considered a Crabapple anything larger is an Apple.


T also stands for Taos Toy store. I shot this picture through a store window in Taos, New Mexico.


Here is a list of participating blogs for ABC Wednesday.

mrs nesbitts place
hin's photoblog
tech the man
a bit of this a dash of that
Little Rock Daily Photo
photoxication
Kissing the Dogwood
strolling through Georgia
Ruth's Garden Blog
kate isis
photography by kml
AVCR8TEUR'S Blog
Salty Dogs
The Modern Goddess
Simply Sage
author blog
kai
Mollitudes
ten forty
Neva
Ackworth born, gone West
Secluded Habitat
katch photo
Mr. Mapper
The Max Files
Oswegan
Watch me, No Watch me
Peter Miller
Lynette
Andrea’s Thought of the Day
Photowannabe

Wordless Wednesday - California Poppy

California Poppy (Eschscholzia californica)

Purple Beautyberry

Purple Beautyberry
Callicarpa bodinieri var. giraldii
(kal-ee-KAR-puh)


This picture is from Friday. I thought people might like to see the more widely grown Purple Beautyberry. I found it listed under several different names so I just used the one I have always known it as Callicarpa bodinieri. It is a hardy, fun plant to grow and the color of the berries is something that you just don’t see. I actually prune mine down a little in the late winter/early spring to keep them neat and not to tall. They never seem to have any problems or want extra water so the care is easy. I haven’t tried to root cuttings but I have had some seedlings popping up here and there but not so many as to be unmanageable.

Not my finest hour with a camera but I wanted to show the full view of the beautiful berries.

This picture was taken a month ago and is Purple Smoke Tree (Cotinus coggygria) against a nice blue sky and some yellow Norway Maple (Acer platanoides) leaves. Smoke Tree is another fun plant to have and it adds a lot of color to the garden. One of my gardening heroes, Christopher Lloyd advocated planting the Smoke Tree in borders and cutting down to the ground each year. I have done that and it works well I also like it as an open shrubby tree in the right spot. There are several cultivars and I like the ones with the darkest foliage the best. It gets its name from the panicles of wispy bloomed flowers in the summer. They kind of resemble smoke.

I could go on about both of these plants, as they are both worth growing, but don’t really feel like writing. I am just trying to keep up my daily routine for now.

A Few Fall Flowers

A Few Fall Flowers

These are a few more pictures I took in late summer and fall this year. I am still feeling kind of washed out from the events of Friday but the reality has sunk in. This first picture is a pretty little species of Aster that I found growing at the edge of the woods. I have identified it as Aster linariifolius or Stiff Aster. It grows as a wildflower in the Eastern United States from Maine to Florida and Eastern Canada. This one seems to have a washed out color compared to some of the photos I have seen but did have the characteristics of the very thin hemlock type of leaves and the single flower per stem.

Synonyms: Lonactus linariifolia, Flax-leaved Aster


Blue Anise Sage
Salvia guaranitica 'Black and Blue'
(SAL-vee-uh) (gwar-uh-NYE-tik-uh)
Synonyms: Brazilian Sage

This second picture was just a lucky snap of a plant I have seen on a lot of other people’s garden blogs. I have read nothing but rave reviews of its culture. It is grown as an annual in Connecticut and maybe hardy in USDA Zone 7 with a heavy mulching. It gets quite large (up to 6 feet tall) especially in areas where it overwinters. There it can turn into a woody perennial or subshrub. I found the color to be beautiful and the darker color calyx just adds to the overall color scheme. I hope to get some more photos of this one next year and maybe grow a few myself. There are other cultivars available including 'Argentina Skies' and the dark purple 'Purple Splendour'. Every time I look there seems to be more Salvias coming to market, which is okay with me. They are tough plants that seem to bloom no matter what.


This was a funky plant I saw at Wave Hill Gardens in the Bronx. Since there was no sign I am guessing it is some kind of Eucomis or Pineapple Lily. I couldn’t really track it down on the Interent. I did find out that there are a lot of cultivars and species available to gardeners. I have been growing one in Connecticut but it has never bloomed. I think it maybe in too much shade. The foliage is always nice and it isn’t supposed to be hardy as Eucomis seems rated for USDA Zone 7. This was a stunning flower and this picture doesn’t really do it justice. If anyone has any more information on it please post a comment.

This last picture is:


Mountain Fleece Flower
Persicaria amplexicaulis 'Firetail'
(per-sih-KAR-ee-uh) (am-pleks-ih-KAW-liss)

it is a perennial that has some bad relatives but this Persicaria is a nice perennial that is very reliable. I did a post back in October of 2006 if you want some more information.

Old Post on Persicaria

It is starting to snow here pretty heavily and a mixed bag of snow, sleet and rain is predicted. This is the first snow other than a few flurries. I hope the old tale of the amount of snowstorms you will have will be the same as the date you get the first snow. Since it is December 2nd, having two major storms all winter would be great. I am not holding my breath on that though.

I took this picture on Friday morning as I was walking out the truck. I jokingly said to myself that I had moved to Arizona, as that is what the colors reminded of. It was Friday I was looking forward to finishing up a couple of jobs for the year and having a quiet weekend. How can a day so full of promise go so awry?


After working at a house in Bedford Corners, New York I snapped this picture. It only partially captures the beauty of the scene. The Larches were wonderfully lit up by the bright sunshine. In the second picture you can see some of the tall marsh grass that was waving in the breeze.

When I got to the next job we got a phone call saying that Karen’s brother had collapsed and was being rushed to the hospital. When I called the hospital a few minutes later I got the terrible news that he had passed away on the way there. What a shock. At 53 years old Dale wasn’t the picture of health as he drank and smoked too much but still we hadn’t expected anything like this. Dale had just fell in love and gotten engaged to a girl from Australia. Since we had found out only 5 minutes after he passed I had to make some of the hardest phone calls of my life. That was in between trying to comfort Karen and being sick to my stomach. The rest is pretty much a blur.


I didn’t sleep much last night and Karen said I was crying in my sleep, which I have never heard of before. Not surprising as Dale and I were kind of like brothers. I just feel washed out like I have been put through a laundry wringer a couple of hundred times. I still haven’t organized all my thoughts but needed to try a write down a little of what I remember. I was going to say to try and make sense of what happened but upon further review I don’t think that will be possible.

Golden Groundsel

Golden Groundsel
Packera obovata
(PAK-er-uh) (ob-oh-VAY-tuh)
Synonyms: Senecio obovatus, Roundleaf Ragwort

I am glad I looked up this plant up before posting as I have always called it Senecio. A little warning on this plant is that it spreads rapidly, almost a little too much so. I have been corralling it right from the start and have enjoyed the cultivation of this groundcover. I haven’t propagated any in the last couple of years but previously I dug up some of the edges and planted them in some very inhospitable places and the funny thing was this plant loved it. In one spot I planted it in rocks and a few really big Oak trees and while that slowed its spread down a little it has done nicely (it is in pretty heavy shade). I was very happy to have something growing in that area. They also are growing in a very moist area that gets wet when the water table is high. That is the patch these pictures are from.


Groundsel blooms in the spring as these pictures were taken in Mid-May. I usually cut the flower stalks off after they are done blooming to tidy it up. It is hardy to USDA Zone 4 and is semi-evergreen in warmer climes. The Japanese Maple is supposed to be ‘Crimson Queen’ but it seems a little nicer then that. I bought three of them at a nursery that was going out of business. I wanted some low grafted trees and they had them out in a field. The idea was to make them into a groundcover type and I have been fairly successful as the trees are now about 1.5 feet tall and 5 to 6 feet wide. You can see the Groundsel actually grew up through the Maple and bloomed, it has since been removed from underneath.


I am posting this picture because although I shot the Groundsel pictures in May and forgot about them I was attracted to this combination I saw at the NYBG in October. It is an Acer palmatum 'Tamukeyama' with what I think is the yellow leaved form of Licorice Plant (Helichrysum petiolare’). . 'Tamukeyama' has been in cultivation since 1710 and is considered one of the oldest cultivars of Japanese Maple. Many experts consider it to be one of the most sun resistant and best at holding its deep leaf color throughout the season.

Metallic Pyramidal Bugleweed

Metallic Pyramidal Bugleweed
Ajuga pyramidalis 'Metallica Crispa'
(a-JOO-guh) (peer-uh-mid-AH-liss)
Synonyms: Carpet Bugle

I got my computer back and I have another hard drive and some more ram. There are now 3 internal drives with 340 GB of storage and a gig of ram. I also bought a 200 GB external Firewire/USB hard drive so I have plenty of storage space now. I was getting sick of trying to manage my storage space but I should be okay for a while. I got the ram because Photoshop CS2 is kind of a ram hog. It seems a little faster. They also put a USB 2.0 card in for me and that is a lot faster plus it has 4 ports, which is better than the two I used to have. I have been moving a lot of files around and I put in 475 songs (all legal, BTW) that I have been waiting to add to Itunes but couldn’t because of the lack of space. I am listening to some new music as I type this. I now have about 4,000 songs in the library and on my Ipod. Someday I swear I going to listen to every one of them. According to Itunes that will take around 14 days.

Pyramidal Bugleweed makes a carpet of color in the spring.

While moving some files around I found some pictures of one of favorite groundcovers, Ajuga. I like groundcovers because they are often a problem solver, don’t take much maintenance and you generally don’t have to mulch them. This clumping form of Ajuga is slowly (compared to A. reptans) but steady spreading and very hardy. You can see a tiny bit of the foliage in the big picture but it doesn’t do justice to the purple crinkled leaves. They are really nice. Now this is a flat plant that is between 1 and 2 inches tall. The flower spikes are a beautiful color and a little taller at 4 inches. It is a wondrous color of carpet in spring. I started out with about 50 plants from very small pots and there are now several large patches of several hundred each. I use it in between some of the cracks in the stone walks. In general Ajuga is an easy groundcover that grows under a variety of light conditions and in both moist and dry soil conditions. There are a few different species and numerous cultivars available. I noticed that there is a little red Japanese Maple seedling in the upper right hand corner of the second picture. I will have to check that out tomorrow and try and save it. This patch of Ajuga has some Forget-Me-Nots that grow in and around it. Too bad I couldn’t get them to bloom together.

White Eastern Redbud (Cercis canadensis 'Alba') is a handsome, small stature flowering tree.

These pictures were taken on May 20th of this year. I was blown away by the greenness of the different pictures. This is another image from that folder. The Estate has a small collection of Redbuds and one of the best is the White Eastern Redbud (Cercis canadensis 'Alba'). Here is a little blurb about it from the Missouri Native Plants Website:

"Missouri's greatest gift to springtime gardens is the white redbud," wrote the late Edgar Anderson in a Missouri Botanical Garden Bulletin back in the late 1960s. "In bloom, it is beautiful by day, but only those who have seen it in the light of a full moon know the magic it can bring to a garden." The introduction and distribution of this unusual small tree by the Missouri Botanical Garden remains an outstanding horticultural achievement.”

Barbara Perry Lawton
Click here for the rest of the story

ABC Wednesday - S is for Sculpture

Detail of “Grande Disco” , by Arnaldo Pomodo.

ABC Wednesday S is for Sculpture

If you are here for Wordless Wednesday scroll down to the next post. Please consider joining ABC Wednesdays.
“Kiosque L’Evide” by Jean Dubuffet. 1970-1984. Painted Polyester Resin.

“Grande Disco”, Arnaldo Pomodo.

On Sunday I went to the World Headquarters of PepsiCo to visit the Donald M. Kendall Sculpture Garden. The garden is located in Purchase, New York, 31 miles north of New York City. Pepsi’s headquarters is surrounded by 168 acres of rolling gardens and grass. The same person that designed the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC, Edward Durrell Stone, designed the buildings in 1970. Three landscape architects designed the grounds, Russell Page, E.D. Stone Jr. (the son of the architect), and Francois Goffinet. The gardens were laid out to showcase the sculpture collection. I had a wonderful visit and I had forgotten how beautiful the garden was since my last visit several years ago. Like I said about the chewing gum business (Wrigley family) when I visited Catalina Island there must be good money in soda!



Now originally I had about ten pictures of the different sculptures to show but I accidentally deleted the 120 photos I took before saving them. This led me on an odyssey to try and recover the files. I eventually had to download ZAR (it’s a free image recovery program) to my wife’s Dell and while the program did recover many of the 400 photos that were erased when I wrote a CD to transfer over to my Mac something was lost and I only got a few of the photos (about 60) in usable condition. Oh well, I really tried and after several crashes and a lot of spinning I decided to go with these pictures. There is no free image recovery program for Mac that I could find. So I guess in this one case Windows is better. Needless to say I would have just junked the pictures if they weren’t for my ABC post. I am sorry I can’t show a lot of the beautiful pieces of art and plants they have at the garden. I may go back next weekend with a better plan.

This is some of what I recovered ☹


Back to the art:

My apologies to the artist whose pieces are posted here and not identified. The pictures I took of the tags didn’t get recovered. Not that you need a plug from me. These pictures were all taken with the Nikon 50mm/1.8. I used the aperture priority mode and let the camera set the shutter speed. I also used some exposure compensation and a circular polarizer on some shots. It is a wonderful lens and it was purposely the only lens I brought on my trip to the garden. The best way to get to know a lens is to use it.

mrs nesbitts place
hin's photoblog
tech the man
a bit of this a dash of that
Little Rock Daily Photo
photoxication
Kissing the Dogwood
strolling through Georgia
Ruth's Garden Blog
kate isis
photography by kml
AVCR8TEUR'S Blog
Salty Dogs
The Modern Goddess
Simply Sage
author blog
kai
Mollitudes
ten forty
Neva
Ackworth born, gone West
Secluded Habitat
katch photo
Mr. Mapper
The Max Files
Oswegan
Watch me, No Watch me
Peter Miller
Lynette
Andrea’s Thought of the Day
Photowannabe

Captions

Stately trees. Dawn Redwood (Metasequoia glyptostroboides) showing fall color.

I saw that I went over a 100,000 page views last night. Who would have ever thought that. Thanks to everyone, that just goes to show how many people have an interest in gardening, flowers and photography. I have loved all the comments and things I have learned from everyone out there. Keep it coming!

Wordless Wednesday - Irish Boats

Dingle Harbor.

Late Berries

Pyracantha coccinea berries in afternoon sun.

Late Berries

I went out looking for a few pictures yesterday. Obviously there isn’t much left out in the garden. I decided to take a few berry pictures as I feel that is something I am not very good at and haven’t had a lot of success in the past. Most of the berries were on their way out and the birds were at work eating the Crabapples and other fruit.

These were the best I could come up with:

The first picture is Scarlet Firethorn, Pyracantha coccinea (py-ra-KAN-tha). It is a shrub that can be very difficult to work around. It isn’t called Firethorn for nothing, they feel like fire when they stick in! It is a nice shrub for certain areas and privacy screens but be careful where you plant it in the garden. I think it looks best as an espalier. The ability to withstand drought and neglect, a fast growth rate, white flowers and colorful berries are a few of the reasons to plant Pyracantha. It can even grow in shade although you won’t get as many berries.


This tree is another plant with vicious thorns. I take care of several types of Hawthorne and they are just a bear to prune, downright dangerous actually. The Cockspur Hawthorne (Crataegus crusgalli) is a nice little tree that grows to about 18 feet tall and 20 feet wide. Its white flowers in the spring are followed by very glossy foliage for the summer with these fruits in the fall and winter. Another plant to be careful with the site you plant it on. The flowers have a slightly unpleasant odor so it should not be located near the front walk or next to a terrace or patio. If you are not using one of the thornless types don’t plant it near where children will be playing.


I am not sure what Viburnum this is. It is one of the few I have seen with yellow berries. The Estate has a fairly large Viburnum collection and I think I will try and add a yellow-berried type to it next year. This one was planted amongst some of the red-berried Viburnum and it was a quite striking combination. I took this photo in a parking lot and couldn’t get a good angle on the combination shot.

Aromatic Aster

Aromatic Aster
Aster oblongifolius 'Raydon's Favorite'
(ASS-ter) (ob-long-ee-FOH-lee-um)
Synonyms: Fall Aster, Symphyotrichum oblongifolium
I took these Aster pictures during the first week of October and am just getting around to looking at them. I swear I should keep better track of things. It is sometimes fun to look back and see some ‘new’ pictures. There are few more on the roll that I will be posting this week. This first Aster is fairly tall at 36 inches, but it doesn’t flop over. The thing I like best about it is it really blooms late and for a long time. Of course, the color isn’t bad either kind of a blue with the tiniest bit of purple. They are easy to grow and hardy to Zone 4 (USDA). I have found that growing Asters requires good drainage. I think not having the drainage is the number one cause of failure for these plants in the garden, especially in the winter. They can take moist soil but have found them dismal in waterlogged conditions. I usually deadhead to avoid the not true seedlings and get new plants through division. I never knew the common name was Aromatic Aster I will have to test that out next year.


This is a very tall Aster that I don’t know the name of. This picture was shot in a friend’s garden, also in the first week of October. It was pretty and had a lot of flowers. The flower petals were slightly shorter than most Asters giving a slightly different appearance.


Double Japanese Aster
Kalimeris pinnatifida
(kal-ee-MARE-us) (pin-na-TI-fi-da)

This photo didn’t deserve its own post but I wanted to show it as a nice perennial that isn’t grown that much. The flowers are beautiful and bloom in late summer to the end of fall. I have also grown the variegated version of this plant. If you want something different try Japanese Aster. I am not sure why this picture came out wit such a dark background it was shot in the middle of the day.