Mulching, Seedlings and Scarification

Things are almost all done in my existing flower beds now, except for adding the mulch. My helpful husband had shovels a load of mulch into the wheelbarrow for me to use a while ago, but I hadn't finished planting the gazanias and portulaca around the edges of a couple of beds, plus I was expecting that some of my lavatara would probably bite the dust and have to be replaced. (Happily they are all thriving and I am so pleased about that since I planted them all from seed. :)
I even brought a few to Calgary to plant in my daughter's flower bed. Now they all just have to grow bigger and set some blossoms.)

I also successfully grew morning glory vines and a tall variety of mixed Cosmos, which are all growing well, but have no signs of blossoms yet.

Hansa rose bush on the east side of the house

I tried growing snapdragons from the seed pods left in the flower beds over winter by planting them in pots in the greenhouse. ONE sprouted out of the 2 dozen I planted. I had sprinkled quite a number of seeds directly into the flower bed as well and guess what??? I have about 2 dozen tiny seedling that popped up there! I learned something new recently about seeds: some seeds particularly the tiniest ones (and we all know how tiny poppy seeds are) prefer to be sprinkled on the soil and not covered. Some seeds actually need light to germinate. Go figure!

Then there's the process of scarification. No, that's not what you do to the crows and magpies who try to eat the seeds. :)
Some seeds need to be scratched in order to break through the hard coating to allow them to germinate. Lupins for instance... No wonder I had no luck getting any lupins to germinate in the greenhouse! But why did some lupins seed themselves and successfully germinate in the flower bed? Who scarified them? Mother nature!
Lying on the cold ground and freezing all winter cracked the outer coat and they germinated in the spring. Go figure!

Calendulas are another one. I had many calendulas in the flower bed at the front of my house in northern Manitoba. They were there when I moved in and I lived there for almost 20 years. I had calendulas germinate in the flower bed all by themselves every spring. I just helped by leaving some of the flowers to go to seed, then shaking the seeds onto the ground in the fall.

Blue Sage May Night growing vigorously as usual. Liatris near bottom right, coneflower above that. Yellow sedum blooming on left, white daises at bottom corners

The bees are having a heyday with my blue sage and really enjoy the abundant blossoms of May Night.  

My white daisies have all popped open now and they still seem to be quite numerous in spite of the fact that I culled many of the clumps out of my beds... Today I trimmed many of the daisies that were growing tall close to my rose bushes in order to give the roses the maximum amount of sun exposure.
I cut a pretty bouquet of my May Night blue sage, added white daisies, a few early pink columbines and a couple of late purple /white irises. I also included some pasque flower seed pods and a tall grass stem or three. It makes quite a pretty ensemble for my dining room table.  :)

Speaking of lupines, mine are starting to bloom now. I have 2 kinds, one is pink and the other a dark purple/blue. I have a love of flower spikes for some reason. Which is why I love snapdragons, sages, foxgloves hollyhocks and delphiniums.

Pink lupins in bloom

My hollyhocks are growing fat blossoms, but my delphiniums are very short this year. ( Last year they grew, close to 7 feet tall what with all the rain!) I think the reason they are a bit stunted is that I dug them almost all out of the flower beds this spring to remove all the quack grass roots.  Little green caterpillars  have been attacking them and eating most of the flower stems trying to grow. I mostly squished them with my garden gloves. :(

A better idea would be to mix up a spray bottle of Neem Oil and spray everything.  This year so far no worms have eaten my red current bush as happened the last 3 years. I should spry it with Neem anyway just to be sure.

One last thing: sunflowers!
I have dozens of sunflowers that have sprouted in my stack stone bed near the bird feeder, thanks not only to the careless birds, but to the forgetful marmots who live under my gigantic Juniper bush. I thought today that our big orange cat was going to make a meal out of the marmot, but I couldn't stand to watch it unfold, so I left.  I don't think the cat was quick enough, though, as I didn't see any evidence of disaster afterwards.

Thrift perennial growing well on east side of angel bed

Lupines, Columbines and Gaillardia

The lupines have started to bloom in my garden and so have the columbines! These perennials only bloom for about  4 weeks and it is really exciting to see their first blossoms of the season open!

My first columbine is a pretty pink and white variety. The flowers are 3 dimensional and remind me of underwater sea creatures for some reason.   I also have some yellow and white columbines and a pure white one. Some of them are growing in my wild flower bed at the far end of the yard, but this year with all the rain we have had, the grass has grown really tall in that bed and is trying to take over. It will have to be clipped or much of it removed, not a job I look forward to...

(One more thing to add to my 'To Do 'list, Lol!)  Yes, the war with the grass roots and the infernal dandelions never seems to cease!

Columbines (aqueligia) are easy to grow and the flowers also come in blue and a deep burgundy. They prefer some shade, but will tolerate full sun.  Butterflies are attracted to them. The plants get old after about 3 years and it's a good idea to let them seed themselves and start some young ones nearby, the same as lupines.

Lupines have interesting foliage and beautiful tall spikes on flowers in a variety of colors. The leaves are compound leaves with 5 to 7 long 'fingers' on them. The lupine of mine that is blooming is dark pink and the other one in the same bed seems to be purple (judging from the color of the buds so far.)

Lupines are short lived perennials. The plants only live 2 or 3 years and then stop coming up. That's why it's a good idea to let some of the lupine flowers go to seed. That way they will produce new little babies in close to the same spot as the 'old mama' and you will always have lupines. They have a long tap root that grows deep into the soil and so they do not like to be moved once established.  (And neither do columbines for that matter.)  Lupines are members of the pea family and they take nitrogen from the air and return it to the soil, making the soil richer (which is called 'fixing nitrogen').   They are poisonous to animals (sheep and cattle) if eaten in large quantities.

At this time of the year you will often find perennials on sale for a song!  I'm a sucker for a bargain and I bought 2 Robinsom red daisies (also called red painted daisies) and planted them in my wild flower bed. The leaves are very ferny and delicate looking. Not sure if they will actually bloom this summer or not, but as most gardeners, I have enough patience to wait till next year to see them bloom.

I went looking for a coreopsis today, but ended up coming home with a stunningly beautiful healthy Morden rose ( yes, another one!) with beautiful dark red blossoms on it.  I have no clue where I'm going to plant it yet, but my patient husband bought it anyway. (Patient gardeners need to have patient husbands... :)

I also bought a $2 Veronica which gets blue tufted flowers; "Almost free!" as my husband says.  If need be, I'll move some annuals to make room!  Realistically, who knows if they will even survive the winter and amount to anything, but I'm always willing to try.

Last year one of my new acquisitions was 3 blanket flowers (gaillardias) which look like short daisies with light green leaves. My favorite variety is called Arizona Sun and that's exactly what the flowers look like, yellowy red suns!  They also remind me of our orange 'Arizona cat' who we rescued from an abandoned home in Arizona 2 years ago. We named the cat Phoenix and he is the biggest cat that I have every had ( and I have had many over the years!)

Gaillardias are quite drought tolerant once established. That has been an attractive feature for any plant around my flower beds, up until this year at least. (This spring and early summer we have had more rain than most people in this area can even remember!)

 Gaillardias are very slow to make an appearance in the spring, though, so it is a good idea to put a plant marker there once they die back in the fall so you don't accidently dig them up.  The wait is well worth it!

annual gazanias, pink dianthus and gaillardia -Arizona sun 2009