Bloom day scans – Page 29

December bloom day scan

I broke down and did a quick scan this morning during the lull between the storms. Lunaria and bittersweet. Lots of my favorite grasses and perennials still standing in their tan and brown glory. But little in the way of bright colors we associate with ‘blooms’.

Belated bloom day scans

This morning, I finally had a chance to get out into the garden with enough light that I didn’t need a flashlight to see what was there. Were it not for the recent cold (seasonable, actually) weather, I thought I might actually be able to scan some things that most reasonable people would actually consider blooms. But all I found really were materials suitable for dried flower arrangements, which I usually put together over the Thanksgiving holiday, anyway.

So, this may be my final bloom day scan until March — unless we have another mild winter and we have snowdrops in January like last year.

Ornamental grass wrapped in thunbergia, lunaria, milkweed, ironweed, motherwort, bittersweet.

Heuchera, clematis, milkweed(?) seeds that happened to drift in during composition.

In lieu of bloom day scans

A few years ago, I attended a lecture by Felder Rushing, who is neck-and-neck with Piet Oudolf in the race for most influential gardener in my life.

At the beginning of his presentation, Felder wanted to point out that not only were we crazy plant people, but we were strange even by standards of gardeners in general. He asked for a show of hands to a series of questions starting with, How many of you grow more than a dozen varieties of a single species of plants? More than half gardeners in attendence raised thier hands

The question that really got me was, How many of you have ever given a tour of your garden by flashlight?

Well, honestly I haven’t. But I wouldn’t hesitate to.

If I wanted to do my usual bloom-day scans, I would have had to use a flashlight because light is pretty scarce around here before and after work. Bloom day scans will have to wait for the weekend.

Meanwhile, I’ve had a bunch frosty and fall-color pix collecting here over the past couple of weeks. So instead of scans, here’s a chance for my usual pix purge.

Really hard frost (~19 F) last Sunday:

Sunrise has hit the far ridge, but hasn’t hit the garden yet.

Frost patterns in the miscanthus.

Frozen monard dots. (Thanks Piet.)

Jade and the plants soak in the sun as it burns off the frost.

Beads of water after the sun melts the frost.

Morning sun on Solomon’s seal (Polygonatum)

Miscanthus floridulus flowered this year, at least 12 feet tall.

At Cornell, ‘We grow the Ivy.’ It turns red in the fall.

Scans this weekend, if I can find some time…

Garden bloggers bloom day – October scans

Things are winding down, what with a light frost Saturday morning. This month’s scans aren’t so crowded.

Fuschia (it was close to the house and not damaged), Verbena bonariensis, oregano, hibiscus buds, filipendula, thungergia stem snaking up an ornamental grass stem.