The recent mix of rain and sunshine has brought the weeds on prodigously, and I spent today weeding areas of the front garden that were planted up earlier in the year. The Silene maritima and small pink evening primrose that I planted outside the blue garden hut have made nice bushy plants, once liberated from their little plastic pots (not before time) and set in the soil with a dusting of 6X. Once I'd pulled the grass seedlings out from around them I could even see them. The sea campion is a pretty thing, with larger, pinker flowers than the ones I had already. There is a useful smattering of self-sown Galactites tomentosa, which has toothed edged, variegated leaves and mauve flowers and is much better sown direct than when we try to keep pots of it in the plant centre at work. The beach themed planting scheme is coming along, but I'm going to have to weed out the annual poppies, which have been fun in years past, but will overwhelm the smaller perennials.
The turning circle has also grown a fine crop of annual weeds in an alarmingly short space of time, as well as a fresh sprouting of sheeps' sorrel. Pulling those out gave me plenty of time to consider the performance of the shrubs I planted back in the spring. Most have established themselves convincingly by now, throwing out strong new growth and taking up much more space than they did when freshly planted. The experimental, large and slightly tender shrubby euphorbia is making new shoots from ground level, as is the lemon verbena. However the ginger scented rosemary never looked happy at all, nor grew a single centimetre, and then went brown and died, and has already been consigned to the bonfire. It was an old plant that had overwintered at the plant centre, and was not ideal, but was the only one we had, and we haven't had any more since. I guess it was too potbound to grow away, despite regular watering. The only other shrub not to thrive is an Albizia julibrissin 'Rosea' or Persian silk tree that I grew myself from seed. I had two, so planted one in the ground, which has been watered faithfully all summer, and put the other out for the summer in a nice unglazed terracotta pot. Neither is growing much at all, and I can't work out what's wrong with them.
There is a good splash of colour in the front garden from the pots of geraniums and other tender perennials, that are still flowering energetically. I've been fairly diligent this year about feeding them with tomato fertiliser, and I think that's paid off. The dahlias planted in the ground are pretty good, though there are some gaps after the winter. The dark red forms are noticeably less persistent than the yellows and mid oranges. The red one I planted into the dahlia bed out of a pot turns out to be completely the wrong shade of red for the company it's been asked to keep, bright cherry instead of deep dark red, and will have to be potted up again come the autumn. An order with Halls of Heddon beckons for next spring, now I can see what spaces need filling. In fact, I'd better make a rough calculation of how many plants are needed, and keep a note of it, as by next year I won't be able to remember.
The crab apples are starting to colour up, and the rose hips. The Gaura lindheimeri are still flowering, and have been joined by various asters. One of them is a rather nice blue, and I must look at my planting spreadsheet and try and work out which one it is. Bouncing back after the winter is a gigantic form of red hot poker. I grew these originally from seed, and they are nominally Kniphofia rooperi, but since red hot pokers are notoriously promiscuous I should probably just regard it as an unknown vigorous hybrid. The plants are large, the tufts of leaves growing to well over half a metre tall, and carrying big, rather rounded pokers on stout stems. Last winter reduced the leaves to mush, but the plants have come back strongly from the base. They tolerate light, dry soil, root competition from the hedge, and partial shade, and seed themselves fairly generously. Not one to introduce to a small garden full of tiny treasures, but just the thing for a large one. Assuming you like orange, which I do.
And that is enough random jottings on early September flowers for one evening. I'm writing this sitting out on the veranda, and it's getting rather dark to see what I'm typing. My touch typing isn't bad, but I wouldn't say it was good either.
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