Why I Oughta...

 Earlier this Spring, I bought a package of three Orange Nugget Dahlia tubers at big box retail .  They were billed as being compact - less than 30" - and were...well...orange.  So, it was a no-brainer.  I started the tubers inside, but moved them out after the threat of frost had passed.  I planted them in the new 'cut flower' bed on the southside of the house .   From the beginning, these Orange Nuggets were behind my other dahlias - specifically the Melina Fleur and Cornell Bronze varieties.   But, over the past month or so, the plant grew up and out.  And...now - in Late September - is full of blooms and buds.  Below is a look at what these Orange Nugget Dahlia plants look like in the morning: I count seven-or-eight blooms in that photo and a dozen-or-more buds that will open soon.  They're not huge, but nice-sized flowers.  I'd describe them as 'delicate'.    The stems, however...are also 'delicate'.  O...

Up front, in the IBDWs section, I planted a Cornell Bronze Dahlia tuber that I started indoors in a small nursery pot .  I put the sprouted tuber in the ground in mid-June and now, two-months-later it is showing its very first blooms.   This dahlia suffered some rabbit damage early, so I put a chicken wire cage around it in hopes that it would grow up/out and have a big bloom season.   That season of blooms is NOW upon us.  Below, you can see the first Cornell Bronze ball bloom tucked in below the top foliage.  There are more on the way. But, something *else* is happening on this very same Dahlia plant.  For SOME REASON, I'm seeing a purple bloom about to open up - at the very top of the stalk.  Yes...purple dahlia.  On the same plant that is blooming those orange ball flowers.  See below - for a most-certainly purple bloom about to open up: What the what?  Is this a mutation?  A pollinator-caused result?  I have no i...

 For Mother's Day, the kids and I bought a couple of flats of ordinary orange zinnias from the big box store that we planted in some pots for the Moms (and God Mothers) in our/their lives.  I ended up having a few extra and put some in our back patio containers (more on those later), and decided to plant four as bedding plants near the driveway in the original IB2DWs bed.  I picked orange because I like orange and it is the Illini color (of course).   Yesterday, I posted about the one Uproar Rose Zinnia IB2DWs - and that one is much larger/bushier than these.    Below the first photo shows what these orange zinnias look like after a week or so in the ground: I have limited experience with flowers (as I've said in the past), but what I've read and watched online, you can pinch off blooms to (try to) get bushier plants.  So, naturally...I decided to sacrifice these early orange flowers.  I cut them all off - you can see the result below. ...

2024 is the year when I need to continue to remind myself to get more comfortable with flowers.  By that, I mean...I'm a gardener.  But, I'm a foliage gardener.  Because of my full-shade backyard, I've opted for focusing on foliage gardens - ferns, astilbes, shrubs, trees.   Last Fall, I bought a couple of late-season flowering perennials and decided that I needed to do more - specifically in the new IB2DWs (extended) bed that is a conifer garden.  At the end of last growing season (2023), I ran through my normal 'to-do list' grades, but I also wrote up some 'lessons learned' that included 10 things that I wanted to keep in mind including #6 :   6. Flowers continue to be a little bit outside my comfort zone. Change that. I started this Fall, but plenty more room to grow/go. Countertop arrangements need flowers. Try some dahlias, too. I've started down that path - at least in theory.   Back in December, I ordered some Dahlia tubers ...

This year, I planted a couple of flats of Dwarf French multi-color Marigolds that arrived as plugs from the Home Depot as bedding plants across the front of our front-porch bed.  They come in flats of four eight packs and I think I put down a couple of them.  Maybe 60 of them-or so.    Below is a look at their current state - across the front porch bed: They've REALLY put on some size in the past few weeks.  Peek here at this post from mid-June that shows them when I was digging out that front natural edge .   And, for even more contrast, check out this photo below showing Spring-time (right when I planted them) when the tulip foliage was still hanging around: I've planted many things over the years along this front border, but I think I am coming back to these multi-color marigolds.  First...they're orange.  Love that.  Second... they're French - which we first saw at Luxembourg Gardens .   I planted these all the way across t...

Nothing like a deadline to get you to fill your containers, right?  We were hosting a little Easter party earlier this month and that meant that Nat wanted our front porch container full of something.  What's that something this time of year?  Normally...pansies.   Like these:  When I was at the orange big box store, I also saw something more interesting:  ranunculus.  In a spectrum of colors including orange, red, yellow and pink.   I was, naturally, drawn to the orange ones.  Here's how things ended up:  12 pansy plugs in purple (let's call it blue, ok??) and six five-dollar ranunculus interplanted.   Last Summer, I went with pink and green .  

The Orange Double Late Tulip bulbs that I planted in the Fall of 2018 have sprung up and are in bloom while the red-ish Crystal Beauty Fringed Pink Tulips that were planted at the same time haven't flowered at all.  I planted 25 of each at the same time and last year they bloomed (for the first time) at the same time.  You can see that post showing the flowers here .  I count either 23 or 24 of the initial 25 have bloomed this year, so that's a nice year-two-rate. This is the only pop of color that we have in the front yard beds and it comes in early Spring.  Nat was just telling me that she wishes we had more color in the front yard, so that's something we'll have to work on. I posted a photo of these tulips in early March emerging from the mulch .  And, this is the same section that I've covered in the past about trying to 'balance' out the colors by adding yellow to the mix .  I didn't get around to buying bulbs last Fall, but it will be on m...