Why I Oughta...

This is the fourth dahlia tuber posting this year.  First 17.  Then 15 more.  Then six to get to 38 .  Today, I'm showing the location of four other ones (three that are new and one was a replacement for a dud) to get my total up to 42 dahlias. This post is going up in mid-June, but back in late May, I added four more dahlias to three spots in the garden. Three (in purple) went in the Pizza Oven East.  One went IB2DWs down by the sidewalk (also in purple): 42 Tubers in:  27 new (to me) with 15 legacy dahlias (Melina Fleur x 5, Ivanetti x 2, Mystery Fox x 2, Ivanetti x 2, Wizard of Oz x 2, Sweet Nathalie, Pooh). Now with 38 tubers in the ground, here's the latest recap:   28 new (to me) or trialing with 10 legacy dahlias (Melina Fluer x 5, Ivanetti x 2, Sweet Nathalie, Wizard of Oz, Pooh). I have now planted a number of multiples:   5:  (1) Melina Fleur 4:  N/A (0) 3:  (2) Burlesca , Great Silence 2:  (12) Crichton Hon...

One of the shortest, but brightest bloom seasons in our garden is peony season.  It lasts just a couple of weeks, but it shines bright.  This post is going up in mid-June, but these photos are from the end of May.  Our peonies started to bloom in the last week of May and peaked right before the end of the month.   After a few years of lackluster peony seasons, I moved all of them out of the back beds into the Kitchen Curved bed near the patio and along the driveway in the IB2DWs bed.  Both locations with *more* sun than just about anywhere else in our garden.   That's led to some better blooms.  Including this year when the Sarah Bernhardt peony planted IB2DWs has put on it's best show to date.  Here, below are a few of the flowers on this one pink herbaceous peony: And blooms from the Duchesse De Nemours White Peony that I planted in Spring 2021 : The season doesn't last long (and this year, I didn't preserve any in the fridge like I di...

Back in May, I posted the details of a new (to me) Korean Maple tree that I planted in our backyard:  Alpenglow Korean Maple from Iseli Nursery and their Jack Frost Collection .   Previously, I have planted a pair of Korean Maples in the garden:  A Northern Glow Korean Maple in the Island Bed up front .  And an Arctic Jade Korean Maple in the backyard along the southside border . Despite having a great first season ( and fall show ), that tree suffered something and didn't come back this year .  Good to their Warranty, the fine folks at The Growing Place in Naperville honored their one-year guarantee and let me bring back the Arctic Jade carcass.  More on that tree in a future post. They didn't have any Arctic Jade trees in their inventory, so I decided to try something else as a replacement:  North Wind Korean Maple. That name sounds familiar, right?  (at least it did to me.) And that's because last November, I wrote a "Getting to Know" post...

I posted two different sets of photos and details of the dahlia tubers that I've stuck in the garden in various spots.  First was 17 tubers.  Then, a post showing 15 additional ones .  That made my total:  32 dahlias in the ground.  25 new (to me) or trialing with 7 legacy dahlias (Melina Fluer x 3, Ivanetti x 2, Sweet Nathalie and Wizard of Oz). This post is going up in mid-June, but back in late May, I added six more dahlias to three spots in the garden. These six, plus the previous 32 = 38 dahlias in the ground.  So far.  Here's an annotated plot of the locations with the latest ones in green:   South Sun Wall 33. Pooh This is a spot that I've grown Melina Fleur each of the past two seasons.  Last year, these Pooh dahlias got pretty tall, so being close to the fence might give me more support options. Under The Elm 34. Blue Wish This was the largest of the dahlia plants left in my home nursery (my patio), so in it went.  Without rabbi...

I planted two large, mass plantings of Titan Halo Annual Vinca in our front porch bed and down in the the front of the Island bed in our front yard.  76 + 36.  That left eight remaining plugs that I decided to plant at the front of the IB2DWs bed along the driveway.  You can see the eight small flowering annuals taking their spot in the mulch bed below: Repetition, right?  This year, I went with two large mass plantings.  Maybe next year, I'll add a third and really plant up the IB2DWs bed with the same annuals in the other two. Like everything else I've posted recently, this photo is a month old.  

I planted a four-pack of Nicotiana (Saratoga Mix) annuals over on the southside of the house in the cut flower garden bed.  Actually... these are in the 'newly expanded' bed that I completed earlier this Spring (March) with my typical 'lazy method' of smothering the turf and amending the top with a mix of Composted Manure and Municipal Biosolids.  I've grown Nicotiana over the years - including the Jasmine variety - in this same sideyard bed .  In 2024, I direct sow'd them.  In 2019, Nat's Mom gave us a couple of plants .   This year, I bought a small four-pack of Saratoga Mix - which appears to be a combination of flower colors: I picked a front-of-the-border spot and staggered the four small plants about a foot-apart.   They're now mixed in amongst the Disneyland Roses and all of the various dahlias that I planted over there.  These are filling in a spot close to the front of the border: This post is going up in mid-June, but these were pl...

Just like the other plugs from Garden Club, I finally got around to planting out the Silver Dollar Eucalyptus plugs back in mid-May.  This post is going up a month later, but these have been planted since mid-May.  These arrived in early April and I up-potted them to slightly larger pots and nursed them along first indoors then moving them outdoors. Seven of the eight original ones made it to planting day.  I put six in one Greenstalk planter and the remaining one in another. Below are a few photos showing that planting process: I recently bought a few more eucalyptus plants from a small nursery along the Illinois/Wisconsin border and I'll post about those in the coming days.   Last year, I grew one of these in a patio container and it performed *fine* - I was able to get some clippings for arrangements.   I included in my 2026 to-do list the idea of using the Greenstalk for accent plants (exactly like this): 9. Accents, too.   Speaking of ...