Blooms from July, 2013

Our yard is going to be on our neighborhood garden tour this Saturday, June 7.  I am posting photos from last July 6, so that people can see how different the yard looks at that time.  I hope to also do a post showing August and beyond.  Most of the plants I'm showing here are native to our area, but a few are cultivars.

The Meadow rue is actually pretty tall already, but not this tall yet.

The Purple praire clovers are in bud, so maybe, they will be blooming earlier than last year.  I have both the native kind and the cultivar, 'Stephanie'.

I dug out quite a few Daylilies last fall and this spring to make more room for native plants.  The milkweeds are in bud now.  I see they were in full bloom last July.

Aren't milkweed flowers beautiful?

The Short-toothed mountain mint is not as tall this year as it has been in the past.  Here's what it looked like last July.

The pollinators love Culver's root.

The Golden alexanders seedheads stay looking pretty good all season.  The plants are taller this year, and are blocking some of the plants that were taller than them the last couple of years, including this clump of culver's root.



Some plants are behind usual this year, but others are on time or a bit early.  The Wild quinine will be blooming by Saturday, but maybe not as full as this.

It's another one that the pollinators feed on frequently.



Here's what is probably the tallest plant here, Rudbeckia maxima.  That's Wild senna on the left.  I dug up about 12 seedlings that I will be giving away at the garden tour.

I can't remember the kind of Poppy mallow this one is, but it is a taller blooming one, and not native to here.  The Gray-headed coneflowers on the right were beginning to bloom last July 7.

The Purple milkweed is in bud now, so maybe there will be some color by Saturday.

Here's a wider view, including an aster, 'Jim Crockett'.  It was named for the man whose show I used to watch, Crocket's Victory Garden.  The Purple poppy mallow plants are already blooming.

I thinned out some of the coneflowers this spring, and have moved some other things around, so this area will look a bit different this season.   I'm pretty sure the front ones are Echinacea pallida.  There are still plenty of coneflowers left, though.  I don't remember whether the white blooms are fleabane or boltonia.

Rattlesnake master is one of the bees and wasps, and my favorites. 

Here's a view I seem to like to show.  I've been cutting back the Joe Pye weed, the plant on the left, closest to the house so that it will be bushier and not flop.  I did that last year, too, yet it still got pretty tall.  I recently found the tag, which said it is 'Gateway'. 

I realized I didn't have some that I wanted to show, so these are from July 10 and 11.

I'm pretty sure this is a red admiral butterfly on some Monarda.  This may be  'Pink Delight'.

This is the area to the east of the back yard.  I've been trimming back the goldenrods and asters, so I'm thinking they won't bloom as early as they did last year.  The blue round blooms are Globe thistle.  While not native, they are loved by the bees and wasps.

This is Virginia mountain mint.  Again, the pollinators seem to love white blooms. 

This is clematis pitcheri.  The plant is doing pretty well on the trellis that looks like a bench, and one that is on the structure around the light pole is doing OK.  I keep having to pull out the potato vine that keeps coming up and is a very nasty plant.

Oh, and here is a photo of Wild senna from July 17.  I have 12 little plants to give away to the first people who want them.

We had some pretty strong storms in our area Tuesday evening, and we did not get the worst of it.  I had spent some time tying plants up so they wouldn't get blown about as much.  It must have helped, because there were some I didn't get tied, that were splayed on the ground.  I tied those up today, and they seem to be doing OK.

I hope some of you are here because you came to the tour and wanted to see what things may look like in a month.  Of course, most of our yard is visible from the street, so please drive by and wave at me if I'm out.