#fourthage gardens

[fourthage]

05 October 2024

Hit up a native plant sale this morning. Got a couple more shade plants for the front: a huechera (American alumroot) and a fern (Hayscented fern).

Disturbed a baby (?) snake while planting:

Got a few plants for the back too. They joined my to-be-planted collection with the violas and rose. I should be able to get out tomorrow morning to move my barrel planter and get them all in.

[loquaciousquark]

A little out of nowhere, but how are your new trees? I know you were a bit worried a few months back that over what their bark was doing. Was the general consensus right that it was normal maturing and things were okay?

😫 I had such high hopes, but it's all tragedy all the way down!

So for those who don't know, about a year ago I rented a trailer and spent an entire weekend planting two Shumard oaks in my backyard. Dug my holes, put my fertilizer in, watered religiously, etc etc etc. (Digging holes is hard!) Within a couple months I noticed some spots popping up on the bark, which is when I made that post earlier this spring. Unfortunately, as I watched them, the spots got bigger and more appeared, and a few months ago large sections of the bark on one tree just began peeling away. The trunk was still only a couple inches around, but pieces as wide and long as a forefinger or falling off on what felt like a weekly basis. Plus the bark underneath was soft and spongy, instead of robust and hard, so something was already wrong with that tree. The guy from the landscaping service I called said it looked like pressure wounds from some early injuries before I even bought the trees, and because Shumards are so bad at healing themselves the bark just begin flaking off and let in rot and fungus. Plus, that tree also failed to put on any height at all over the 9 months or so I watched it, while the other one put on probably 6 feet, even though its bark did have a couple of injured places as well. (That one, for whatever reason, has already begun sealing well over the wounded places.)

Anyway, I ended up having that new service take out the most wounded tree, move the slightly better tree uphill, and then plant me two more oaks where I wanted the originals and also a Sweet Bay magnolia in the back corner where I lost a tree a few years ago, where it can hopefully block out the view and sound from my diagonal back neighbor. Those trees are doing very well and seem to be prepping nicely for the winter, even though it's been dry as a bone here all summer and I've had to have the hose on a rotating schedule for all four of them!

Bitterly disappointing in some ways, as I was really invested in those original two trees, but maybe one of them will still make it! Just not where I originally put it, lol.

The downside of all of this is that because I had to move the hoses onto the trees and away from my little box garden in the back, my marigolds have been utterly decimated this year. I'm not even going to show you a picture of that back box garden because it's so sad and pathetic and dry and brown. Poor little things.

[fourthage]

I am so glad I put up bird feeders. This week has turned out to be something of a shit show at work and it is so nice to be able to come home and watch birds flit back and forth and know I’m doing something good for the local fauna.

[fourthage]

13 October 2024

Why yes, I have been sitting at my kitchen table all morning watching the birds find the feeders.

From top left, going clockwise: Carolina chickadee, tufted titmouse, downy woodpecker, and (I think) a house finch.

[fourthage]

I just got the shipping notice for my new rose! Normally a thing to be excited about, but I haven’t moved (or emptied) the oak barrel planter yet that it’s going in, and rain is on the forecast the rest of the week. This is going to be messy work.

[fourthage]

15 September 2024

Taking advantage of end-of-season sales, where perennials get marked half-off because they aren’t pretty anymore. Got myself five native plants: three blanketflowers and two purple coneflowers.

Blanketflowers went across the area that’s been open all summer at the bottom of the steps in the back. Only accidentally dug up a couple of bulbs!

Coneflowers went in front of the understairs area. It got more sun than I thought it would - you can see the scorching on the one Lenten rose on the left and on the hosta on the right (compare the front leaves and back - that’s not shadows making the difference). The hope is that when the coneflowers get some height, they’ll block the worst of the sun.

Sun coleuses were very happy this year.

White hibiscus is still blooming away. The red one spits out a flower now and then, but is mostly done.

Other than mulching, the big thing I have left to do in the back is move my oak barrel to the corner so it’s ready for the rose that should come around October. It’s too heavy with the dirt, so I’m thinking I’ll put the chives aside, dump most of it, spread it in the corner, and put the barrel over it.

The trellis will go where the barrel is and I’ll plant my hyacinth bean vine there next year.

[fourthage]

08 September 2024

What a beautiful new layer of mulch. Now that I’ve got that down, I can put in the violas this week. Still need to do the back.

[fourthage]

27 August 2024

Not a whole lot of new things this time of year. I do have a couple of surprises though.

Top row: begonia blooming, first buds on the front yard cosmos.

Middle: Sedum getting ready to bloom.

Bottom: the blue violet I got to remember my coworker by with its first flowers.

And the surprises! My creeping lantana somehow wintered over and came back. (I didn’t realize the flower was out of focus till I got back inside and it is too hot to go back outside and get a better picture.) (also please ignore the obscene number of dandelions I need to pull in the background)

And impatiens from the railing planter last year somehow both wintered over and migrated to the planter below. This one is seriously baffling.

[fourthage]

04 June 2024

My office found out today that a coworker who sits with us died unexpectedly yesterday. It hit me pretty hard. We were friendly and talked a lot about shared fandoms: Baldur’s Gate, Mass Effect, Tolkien, Pratchett, etc. Beyond just liking the same media, we liked them for similar reasons. I had hopes that we might eventually transition to an out-of-work friendship.

He was only a year younger than me, and right now all we know is that he died of natural causes. He had no known health issues.

My mother, bless her, was willing to meet me right away at the garden center when I couldn’t finish the work day. I intended to just walk around and be around green growing things, but Mom pointed out a few annuals that could go where my bulbs had been blooming. I’ll put those in another post tomorrow.

I did get a new perennial for the shade, and I know it’ll make me think of him in the future.

[fourthage]

22 July 2024

And here’s both the red and white hibiscuses blooming together.

Skipper on the Joe Pye weed.

First flowers on the perennial sunflower.

[fourthage]

18 July 2024

First flower from the new hibiscus! I’m loving the bright red. Hope the hummingbird loves it too and pays a visit again this year.

The white hibiscus is not far behind and loaded with buds.

A carpenter bee among Kent’s beauty oregano.

And the three lantanas are flourishing in the heat.

[fourthage]

13 March 2024

First Virginia bluebell about to flower. This is one of the recently purchased ones from my local garden center. The ones I planted a couple years ago are just now putting forth leaves, and the ones that just came in the mail were bare roots and may or may not do anything this year. It’ll be interesting to see if they sync up next year or are staggered again.

Front hyacinths!

The whole stand of tête-à-tête daffodils going at it in the back.

Previously established rock irises and the first of another miniature variety of daffodil (Minnow).

First regular-sized daffodil in the back. I'm pretty sure this is Bridal Crown. Not technically new this year, but new to me, since I missed most of my new bulbs last year while on my New Zealand trip.

Or it's Love Call, in which case it is not new. We'll see when it's fully open.

New-this-year hyacinths (Sweet Invitation)! Can’t wait to see that coral color in full.

The oil painting hyacinth!

[fourthage]

The Crime

The Culprit

[fourthage]

06 May 2024

And they’re off! From top left going clockwise: the mountain laurel, the fuzzy yellow yarrow, the foxglove that self-seeded after it finally bloomed last year, and the dill (planted to be a caterpillar host plant, not for cooking).

I’ve never seen any of my coral bells put up leaves on their stalks like the one of the left is doing. They’ve all been like the one on the right, where it’s just their tiny flowers

Well done, alliums!

Not well done, whatever snapped my giant allium in back. (My money is on the crow that likes to use the bird bath. It probably tried to land on it thinking it was sturdier than it was.)

[fourthage]

01 May 2024 (1 of 2)

Monthly state-of-the-garden pictures. All front bushes finally removed from the front main area. It looks so much better. Side strip is doing its thing. Alliums are up, candytuft and ajuga are blooming, and the sage has buds.

Back of the main bed. You can see the Virginia bluebells dying off on the right of the second picture. This will also be the picture I refer back to at the end of summer to compare how big the coleuses got.

Other than a brief dip back into the mid 50s this weekend, it’s all warm weather on the horizon, so I went ahead and put out the cosmos seeds. Seed packet is held over the area I spread them. The Cosmic Red variety went in the front side strip.

And another partially open allium bonus picture.

[fourthage]

24 June 2024

What’s this I spy on the hydrangea? A hint of pink! The full tricolor effect is coming!