Wednesday, May 27, 2009

...news from the garden

the last thing I needed was another tomato plant...



however, my demons got the best of my "better nature"...
when I found not only the long-sought...
"Charlie's Mortgage Lifter"...
but also my absolute favorite...
"pink Caspian"...

two lovely heirloom varieties I adore...
and, I did have a bit of room...



I've also planted cilantro...
and filled-in the basil...
who seem to love it there...



and then there are the flowers...
for the back, driveway & front porch...



the eggplant has begun to bloom...



and the parsley & dill are giving it a "go"...



my "black tartarian" cherry tree gave me about 6 cherries this year...
the rest were knocked off by the wind & hail, etc...
these were breakfast...
last year, I had enough for most of a pie...



the beans are growing, moment by moment...
this one is now a foot longer than the top of the pole...
and has doubled back...



I planted several tomatoes with set fruit...
one fell off in the mini heat wave...
these are doing well...



a couple of days ago...
these cherry tomato blooms appeared to be setting...



only yesterday, the same setting blossoms...
now show tiny tomatoes at the center...
[click on photo to enlarge...]



the silk oak trees I have in both yards...
[aka,"Australian Oaks"]
are now blooming...
the golden combs drop sticky blossoms everywhere...



here's one at 12x zoom from the back yard...
the dark clusters are open seed pods...
I have a "number" of seedlings if anyone's interested...



I really enjoy sitting in the back yard...
watching the blooming pom. tree blossoms dance in the wind...



everyday, there are more open...



this is also when I rescue Japanese maple seedlings...
there are always "volunteers"...
and often, if I can find a hardy one soon enough...
[before it gets too hot...]
I can eventually cultivate them into a small container...

I had a lovely, "mini grove"...
complete with rocks & moss...
until we had the heat storm & it was 115˚F...

sigh...

these however, have promise...
having survived the initial transplantation...

2 comments:

The Calico Quilter said...

I see you bought some Blue Daze (Evolvulus) for the flower pots. I used to plant that every year because I love blue and there are so few truly blue flowers. Recently, I've gone more the lavender/pink route. You also have Blanket Flowers. I used to have an enormous patch of Gaillardia around my mailbox two houses ago. Two problems: the deadheading was neverending, and it made for a lot of bumblebees around the mailbox (the mailman didn't appreciate it). I don't know how big they were supposed to be but mine were almost 3 feet tall! I used to attend to the deadheading every morning while waiting for my husband to get ready for work. If I didn't trim all the old blooms off, it stopped blooming altogether. Your vegetable garden is impressive. Does it produce enough to feed you the whole summer? Are you into canning?

catsinger said...

...hi Calico...
I guess that you are seeing the lobelia [Crystal Palace & Midnight Blue]as the Evolvulous...never heard that name before... or the "blanket flower" either...
the picture shows several varieties of marigolds, begonias, coreopsis and
cosmos as well as the white allissum & blue lobelia... there's also blue & mixed salvia that's already planted...
as well as zinnias... I have one "goblin" gallardia that's going elsewhere... our bumblebees are not the stinging kind so they don't bother me...
I also find "dead-heading" tiresome,
but a necessary evil, none the less...
I've never tried canning... I have frozen things like tomato sauce & berries before... I've also made pickles... the last garden I had was mostly critter food...
I'm hoping for better results with this one...