Variegated Tropical Hibiscus

Variegated Tropical Hibiscus
Hibiscus rosa-sinensis 'Snow Queen'
(hi-BIS-kus) (RO-sa-sy-NEN-sis)

Since everyone seems to post their Ruby Tuesday on Monday I thought I would too. This variegated version of Hibiscus was living in Manhattan. The heavily white splashed foliage was a nice foil to reddish flowers. It is said that with the leaves change color as they age but I didn’t notice that. I did notice that each leaf had its own pattern of white. The amount of variegation can change with the amount of light intensity. This really should be the perfect summer for tropicals as it has been exceptionally hot. We have been watering all our container plants almost every day and some of them still seem a little stressed out.

It doesn’t look like there is any relief on the weather front for this week so that means a lot more dragging of hoses. The irrigation systems are barely keeping up with watering and the system at the Estate has been running pretty much 24 hours a day. You can really see any problems with the systems right now. If the heads are not delivering enough water it shows up quick. The dry line along the edge of the beds and woods is very apparent right now too.

To check out everything red go to:
Work of the Poet/ Ruby Tuesday.

Mystery Day Dahlia

Dinnerplate Dahlia
Dahlia 'Mystery Day'
(DAHL-ya)
Year of Introduction: 1994

Work of the Poet/ Ruby Tuesday

Wordless Wednesday

NYC Bloodmobile

NYC Bloodmobile
Union Square
Manhattan, NY

Work of the Poet/ Ruby Tuesday

Wordless Wednesday

Red Seedling Daylily

Red Seedling Daylily
Hemerocallis
(hem-er-oh-KAL-iss)

Quite happy to have this one show up in e box of seedlings I bought this spring.

For Ruby Tuesday since it kind of Mary’s neighborhood. Rapid Mon and Jockey N. Terracciano in the 4th Race at Belmont Park Queens, New York. Track was fun. Loved they had no apparent photographic restrictions. After ‘my’ horses finished last in three races in a row it was time to go.


Work of the Poet/ Ruby Tuesday


Number 9 (Call Tiger) finishes 8th, only because there was only 8 horses.

Three Red Daylilies

Hemerocallis 'Atlanta Royalty', 1985
(hem-er-oh-KAL-iss)

Hemerocallis 'Holy Moses', 1991

Hemerocallis 'Joey Langdon', 1970


Work of the Poet/ Ruby Tuesday

Wordless Wednesday

Red Shrub Roses

Red Shrub Rose
Rosa 'Red Corsair'
Synonyms: Korromalu, Roter Korsar, Temptress
Bred by W. Kordes & Sons, Germany, 2004

Work of the Poet/ Ruby Tuesday

Wordless Wednesday

Bodacious Dahlia

Dahlia ‘Bodacious’
Larger


Dutchess County New York Farm
Larger

Wordless Wednesday

Ruby Tuesday

Key West Sunset

Key West Sunset
Key West, Florida
Wordless Wednesday

See more Florida Keys pictures at the New Digital Flower Pictures.com:
Click Here

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Red Bow from Sedona
Ruby Tuesday
See more Ruby Tuesday at Work of the Poet.

Visit our Sedona Album here

Candy Cane Chair

Candy Cane Chair
Sedona

Ruby Tuesday
See more Ruby Tuesday at Work of the Poet.

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Monochrome Water Garden Plants
Wordless Wednesday

Red Mural from Manhattan

Red Mural
Manhattan, NY
Wordless Wednesday
Ruby Tuesday

Two From Central Park, Manhattan

Two From Central Park, Manhattan

Wordless Wednesday

See more Ruby Tuesday at Work of the Poet.

Raspberry Fall Foliage

Red Raspberry
Rubus idaeus
(ROO-bus) (eye-DAY-ee-us)

When I saw this foliage last week it bought Ruby Tuesday to mind. This plant is a pest in the garden but doesn’t bother me when growing out in the wild. The wild berries taste good and the plants offer nice fall foliage color. They can also provide some winter interest with the handsome outlines of the branches. The leaves have medicinal properties.

This is another snapshot from my visit to Manhattan the other night.


See more Ruby Tuesday at Work of the Poet.

Mikado Semi Cactus Dahlia

Semi Cactus Dahlia
Dahlia 'Mikado'

Having missed getting a shot of ‘Mikado’ the last time I visited Planting Fields I was determined to get one this time. It just came out okay and doesn’t really have the electric color that the original flower does. It seemed like a pretty big flower for a Semi-Cactus type. It was very puffy. The plant was doing well and had several other flowers besides this one. I would grow this Dahlia any time.

Since this is a Ruby Tuesday post and ‘Mikado’ is a little orange I thought this plant would cover the red for ruby.


Redbud Hazel
Disanthus cercidifolius
(dis-AN-thus) (ser-uh-sid-ih-FOH-lee-us)

This was just another cool plant in the five acre Synoptic Garden at Planting Fields. The Disanthus was struggling a bit but putting a good show on its few leaves. The Synoptic Garden is arranged by the plant’s scientific name. There are a few plants out of order but that is to have a nicer flow through the garden. There were some existing plantings in the area and some of those were saved but don’t fit in alphabetically. It is a great garden and always fun to explore. The Abelia collection (a plant I am not crazy about) was remarkable and really showed some of the nice cultivars available. I could see some of the short ones in the garden.

Since the Disanthus was new to me I found it immensely fascinating. From looking it up some sites say it is hardy to Zone 5 (USDA) and we are in Zone 6 (warmer). This shrub grows in part shade and still gets its great fall color.

See more Ruby Tuesday at Work of the Poet.

Red Zinnia

Red Zinnia
Zinnia elegans
(ZIN-ya) (ELL-eh-ganz)


Today is a holiday around here. This red Zinnia is for my Ruby Tuesday post. The Zinnias actually did well this year, not too much fungus. It is strange because you would think with all the rain and cloudy days that they would have gotten the powdery mildew. I noticed the Bee Balm didn’t get too much mildew either.

Zinnias are nice to have in the garden. This season there were even a few tall ones that I liked. Normally the dwarf types behave best but since it has been an upside down year the taller varieties also did well. Zinnias are easy to grow from seed and cutting the flowers encourages a lower habit and a lot more flowers.

This is the plant list of what we installed on Thursday and Friday. I hope it turns into a nice garden.

Trees

1 Gold Rush Dawn Redwood
1 Chaste Tree (Vitex)
1 Dwarf White Pine (Pinus strobus ‘Nana’)
3 Thundercloud Purple leaf Plum
1 Kousa Dogwood Clump

Shrubs

5 Doublefile Viburnum ‘Shasta’
5 Pink Rhododendron ‘English Roseum’
2 Pink Rhododendron 'Roseum Elegans’
3 Red Mountain Laurel (Kalmia ‘Carol’)
3 Gold Mound Spirea
1 Spirea ‘Snowstorm’
1 Virginia Sweetspire (Itea virginia ‘Henry’s Garnet’)
1 Weigela florida ‘My Monet’
13 Spreading Deutzia
1 Climbing Rose ‘Joseph’s Robe’
1 Climbing Rose ‘Westerland’

Perennials

1 Purple Clematis 'General Sikorsky’
3 ‘Red Head’ Fountain Grass
3 Dwarf Fountain Grass ‘Little Bunny’
3 Veronica spicata ‘Red Fox’
3 Shasta Daisy ‘Becky’
3 Montauk Daisy
5 Dwarf Purple Coneflower ‘Kim’s Knee High’
1 Rudbeckia 'Indian Summer’
3 Chrysanthemum 12” Hanging Baskets

Gorundcover
12 ‘Goldilocks’ Creeping Jenny
12 Angelina Sedum
1400 Hardy English Ivy

See more Ruby Tuesday at Work of the Poet. It actually starts tomorrow.

Peppermint Twist Garden Phlox

Garden Phlox
Phlox paniculata 'Peppermint Twist'
(floks) (pan-ick-yoo-LAY-tuh)

This Phlox was introduced in 2007, which is probably why I hadn’t seen it before. The flowers are certainly eye candy and the striping is colorful and well proportioned. The couple of plants that were blooming seemed like they were similar but the references I looked up said that some variations and reversion to all pink flowers is possible. The plants themselves looked a little weak and not as tall as most Garden Phlox. That could have been because they were growing in a pot. If they become available wholesale I will definitely have to try a few.

Since this is going to be my Ruby Tuesday post here is an orange/red Daylily. I am not sure if it is reblooming here or just a late cultivar (picture was taken Saturday). It was aptly named ‘Fire King’. It really did look like it was on fire. If they wanted half of the $20 price tag I would have picked up some.


See more Ruby Tuesday at Work of the Poet. It actually starts later today or tomorrow. It is a nice bunch of bloggers.

Coral Sunset Geranium

Coral Sunset Geranium
Pelargonium x domesticum ‘Coral Sunset’
(pe-lar-GO-nee-um) (doh-MESS-tik-um)
Synonyms: Regal Pelargonium, Martha Washington Geranium

We went to Stonecrop Gardens yesterday and one of the highlights (for me) was the Geranium collection. It is an amazing garden and I would highly recommend it for touring. To me it wasn’t like a fancy botanical garden more like the sign says a “plant enthusiast garden”. The amount of different and strange plants they had was huge and they were for the most part set up informally.

While I am not trying to make excuses the light was really bad yesterday. It was pretty much dark out (like a murky twilight) and spitting rain on and off. Even with all that I did manage to get a few good flower pictures, which will be posted later in the week. This picture of the Sumac berries was taken with Ruby Tuesday in mind. I like certain types of Sumac in the garden. They aren’t all bad.


Here is a Zinnia I saw a few weeks ago and keep neglecting to post. It goes with Ruby Tuesday so here it is. The big patch of this Zinnia must have been grown from seed as there were some nice variations in the flowers.


Zinnia 'Swizzle Cherry and Ivory'
(ZIN-ya)

See more Ruby Tuesday at Work of the Poet.

Honeybees and Red Flowers

Honeybee (Apis mellifera)
Purple Coneflower (Echinacea purpurea ‘Tomato Soup’)

Sneezeweed
Helenium ‘Red Army'
Synonyms: Helen's Flower, Dogtooth Daisy

Fanfare Indian Blanket Flower

Indian Blanket
Gaillardia x grandiflora 'Fanfare'
(gay-LAR-dee-uh) (gran-dih-FLOR-uh)

I hadn’t seen this variety of Blanket Flower before so while getting its picture this bee flown into the frame. Neither the camera nor I were quite ready for that but it worked out. ‘Fanfare’ has a remarkable flower color on a compact plant. The flowers seem a little more incised than the normal Gaillardias. It is a sport of ‘Dazzler’ Blanket Flower. If you don’t know what a sport is in botany it is defined as “an organism or part that shows an unusual or singular deviation from the normal or parent type; mutation.”

Blanket Flowers are getting more popular. Earlier this year, on this site, I was lamenting how few cultivars the nurseries were carrying around here. This year there was a lot more to choose from, which is the beginning of a trend, I hope. Until further notice I am considering these flowers as annuals. They just don’t seem to come back for us.

Since it is Ruby Tuesday here is a shot that I have been holding on to for awhile. It is a rare flower since until recently they didn’t think there were any red flowered Hoyas. It is a strange little plant and the flowers are weird and unusual. This picture is from the Main Greenhouse at Planting Fields Arboretum in Oyster Bay, New York. They had several species of Hoya and they were all blooming on the tenth of May. This one didn’t have a proper identification tag but did have a little sign like they use at a steakhouse that said ‘Rare’.

Wax Plant
Hoya
(HOY-a)
Synonym: Porcelain Flower

Autumn Colors Gloriosa Daisy

Gloriosa Daisy
Rudbeckia hirta 'Autumn Colors'
(rud-BEK-ee-a)


Hybrid Daylily
Hemerocallis 'Bess Ross'

Ruby Tuesday
Wordless Wednesday

Red Bee Balm

Bee Balm
Monarda didyma 'Jacob Cline'
(mo-NAR-da) (DID-ee-muh)
Synonyms: Oswego Tea, Bergamot, Firecracker Plant, ‘Jacob Kline’

Normally Bee Balm isn’t my favorite perennial but this year it has turned out nicely and is putting on quite a show. This variety gets tall (48 inches) and spreads rapidly (mint family) but it is easy enough to keep in check and doesn’t seem to need staking. You can pull out the spreading parts and replant them or chuck them.

The flower is really red and I never noticed the red bract like leaves that have preceded the flowers. They are almost as nice as the flowers themselves. ‘Jacob Cline’ can start looking a little ratty towards the end of the season and I often cut it down completely at that time. Same thing if it gets the powdery mildew. The cutting doesn’t seem to hurt it. It seems to grow in part shade also although it flowers less. This flower definitely attracts hummingbirds.


Here is a link to a Wikipedia article on Monarda . It has some interesting information on the uses of Bee Balm.

After a long absence I am doing Ruby Tuesday again this week. I just haven’t had the right shot at the right time. See more Ruby Tuesday at Work of the Poet.