Tangled Branches: Cultivated

A rainy day – phew! Everything is happening so fast in the garden now; I feel like I don’t have time to look at the flowers, much less photograph and write about them. On Thursday, we finally got a load of shredded wood mulch delivered after waiting 6 weeks for it. Had we received it 6 weeks ago, things would be a little less hectic now, but better late than never – just like this Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day post.

And really, there’s not all that much in bloom at Tangled Branches South. We continue to focus on the kitchen garden but I’d be unhappy without flowers, so I add them as time and space permit. You’d think mid-April would be mid-Daffodil-Season, but mine are just about finished. Still blooming are ‘Dottie’s Dream’, ‘Salome’, some of the Rinus Rim Mixture.

Narcissus 'Dottie's Dream'

Narcissus 'Salome'

The tulips are just about at peak bloom. I don’t have any of the big ones, they’d be a bit later than these. Currently blooming are T. clusiana ‘Tinka’, T. clusiana ‘Cynthia’, Lily-flowered tulip ‘Mona Lisa’, and Lily-flowered tulip ‘Ballerina’.

Tulipa clusiana 'Tinka'

Tulip 'Ballerina'

Continuing on with some dramatic colors (Ballerina is a very attention-grabbing orange), we have a red pulsatilla. Now I may be a bit delusional about this – maybe it’s really more of a wine-red or reddish-purple – but it was sold to me as red and so that’s what I’m calling it. You can see that the fresher flowers are more red and the older, more purple.

Pulsatilla vulgaris

I was captivated by the colors of these pansies/violas a few weeks at Strange’s Garden Center in Richmond, VA. They’re ‘Nature Mulberry Shades‘, and the flowers range from purple to purple-orange to browninsh-orange. (Note to photographers – check your camera settings before starting to shoot. I left the camera set to ISO1600 and that caused these photos to be grainy. I plan to post more pictures of these violas to better show the range of colors, and I will check the camera settings first.)

Viola 'Nature Mulberry Shades'

We have various violas popping up everywhere, including the gravel driveway, but this one happens to be in the pea gravel around the porch. It’s a descendant of ‘Bowles’ Black’.

Viola (offspring of 'Bowle's Black')

I once planned to have a pool of early-flowering blue bulbs around a pair of trees in the crook of our driveway, but one of the trees died in a drought. The bulbs, however, are very happy with the dead tree roots and this Ipheion ‘Rolf Fiedler’ has filled in to an almost solid mat of flowers, now a little past their prime.

Ipheion 'Rolf Fiedler'

And lastly, ending this post the way it began, with subtle color and beautiful form.

Japanese Maple 'Omure Yama'