April Garden Activity 2016

The plants in my garden are really starting to grow quickly now. The tulips are looking so colourful in my rock garden, next to the house and in the Stackstone bed. The few in my triangle bed have been chomped on. I added some Bobbex the other day but not till after I noticed the damage. 

I think I need some new Bobbex as well. The old stuff might be off, it really smells terrible!

Tiny Creeping Phlox

 The little blue variety of creeping Phlox has really flourished in my rock garden. I think I will divide it and put some back into my stackstone bed as most of it there has died out. I had little luck with getting the pink blooming variety to grow very well.

Earth Day brought a super surprise this year! The tree swallows which normally don't show up till about May 4th, made their first appearance
on April 22, almost 2 weeks early!

First swallow has returned to check out the accommodations Earth Day April 22

 The next day another pair of swallows showed up and claimed the house behind the house. They are smoking at the top of the tree snag and working on decimating our flying insect population.  :)

Grape Hyacinth

 The little grape hyacinths are so cute and looking quite healthy.
The day lilies at the bottom of my rock garden bed are thriving.  The one closest to the steps has to be divided in the next few days. They both get so huge and usually get covered in a mass of yellow lilies. These two plus the one by the pond were originally here when we moved in almost 10 years ago.
The 2 in my triangle bed are about 5 years old and the orange one in my stack stone bed is about 2 years old and still quite small.

Large daylily perennial in rock garden

 The Persian Cornflowers and the tiny Forget Me Nots in the stack stone bed are all growing well.  The Forget Me Nots usually bloom quite early. and the Cornflowers some time after that.

The peony on the east side of the main steps is up and hopefully it will bloom this year. Because it was so recently moved it might not happen yet. The peony next to the house was the first one up and has lots of healthy stems. Hopefully it will bloom again this year. I was amazed that it did bloom last year because I had just transplanted it the year before. Goes to show that my "peony Curse" is over!!

Daffodils are  blooming.





 

Today I cleaned up the rest of my lower rock garden bed. Had to dig out the rogue white daisy babies trying to grow at the lower edge on that bed, They were badly infiltrated with quack grass which I removed. I replanted the little sedums at the front of that bed and I dug up a mass of bearded irises at the front corner. The irises were so crowded and needed to be separated. I put them in a pail of peat moss for now and I'm going to give three quarters of them away.  Most of them probably won't bloom till next year, though.  

I have to dig up/divide a whole bunch of perennials early next week to donate to the Stettler Beautification Committees Mother's Day Plant Swap.  (Thanks Marilyn S for taking them there for me. :) )

Happy Gardening!