Tangled Branches: Cultivated
happenings in and around my zone 6b gardens in northern Virginia and in central Virginia
Monday, September 17, 2007
Anniversary/Bloom Day/Photo Tour
In two weeks, we'll celebrate the first anniversary of our retirement cottage in central Virginia. That is, it's supposed to be our retirement cottage, but the spouse is dragging his feet on the retirement thing. We'll continue to stay there on weekends for the foreseeable future, but neither garden (NoVA or CeVA) gets my full-time attention. Nevertheless, I'm pleased with how the vegetable garden (dare I call it a potager?) turned out this year. So, trying to kill 3 birds with one stone, this is an early anniversary "neighborhood" photo tour of how the garden looked a week before Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day. I posted these pictures on Picasa last week, but didn't get around to writing anything here.
| I cleared a garden space out of the abandoned field at the front of the property. We've kept a small border around the garden mowed, but all around that is "weeds" and a few trees. This is the back row of the potager, looking toward a willow oak tree beyond. |  |
| The flowers in the foreground above are Nepeta transcaucasica 'Blue Infinity' and Dianthus 'Rainbow Loveliness' |  |
| The misty morning left jewels behind. |  |
| Stepping around that back row, and looking across it back toward the house, the center of the potager is home to a sundial - a gift we received many years ago from friends we've lost track of. Flowers in this picture include Verbena bonariensis, Agastache foeniculum, A. foeniculum 'Golden Jubilee', 'Marvel Bronze' Amaranth, Salvia farinacea 'Evolution', Tagetes lucida, and Salvia farinicea 'Strata'. |  |
| Just behind us, in the "weeds", is this pale blue morning glory. |  |
| Continuing around the back row and looking down the path in front of it we see tomato plants covered in plastic deer fence. I know it's ugly. Next year I'll try to come up with a better solution. Bordering the tomatoes are rosemary, rue, bronze fennel, Achillea 'Summer Berries' (was hoping for brighter colors from these), and the previously seen Salvia farinacea 'Evolution'. That sequence of plants repeats in a mirror image on the other side of the central path. |  |
| Turning to the right, instead of following the path above, we're distracted by my new favorite butterfly - the Common Buckeye. |  |
| The butterfly flew away and we continue on the path on the southeast side of the potager to look back at the center from another angle. Some of the plants visible here are 'Striped Roman' tomato, 'Papri Sweet' pepper, 'Chile Grande' pepper, 'Mexican Cinnamon Spice' basil, Thai basil, Salvia farinacea 'Strata', Tagetes lucida, 'Serrano Tampiqueno' pepper, sweet marjoram, and 'Sweet Petra Dark' basil. |  |
| The sun has completely burned off the mist, leaving a brilliant blue sky. We're thinking another cup of tea would be good about now, and so we leave the potager and head back down the path to the driveway and the house. |  |
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5 Comments:
Great photos, especially the buckeye butterfly, how do you get them to sit still???
Iowa Gardening Woman: Thanks! I seem to have good luck with butterfly photos. Now if only I could translate that to hummingbirds.
Very lovely photos and great tour of the gardens. We have enough trouble keeping up one garden, I don't know how you manage two.
Ki: Well, honestly, I haven't been managing it very well this year. I plan to start moving plants to the central Virginia garden as time permits. The larger woodies will stay put and I'll probably plant low-maintenance ground covers around them and call it a garden.
Beautiful flowers and photos!
Love the web shot..
Cat
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