In the foothills of the Blue Ridge mountains hurricane Irene left barely a mark in the garden, with only a few inches of rain and a handful of fallen branches that were quickly cleared. Several lightly rooted plants were knocked askew, but I have straightened and tamped them or left them to work it out…
Month: August 2011
The garden in late August
From the first peek of color to the the last fading bloom one crapemyrtle or another will be in flower in the garden from June into September. The white flowering ‘Natchez’ and pink ‘Sioux’ (below) have behaved oddly this summer, blooming sporadically early, but more heavily in early August when they should be fading. I…
You’ve got troubles
I often wonder why anyone should take a few precious moments from their day to read about my troubles, and it wouldn’t be surprising for a reader to request that I stop whining and enjoy the garden. I hope to keep the complaining to a minimum, and though I might occasionally prattle on that I…
Mr. Peabody’s revenge
When I was a kid, or more precisely when I was in my early teens, my buddy Tom was the local giver of nicknames. Old and young were given descriptive names, some benign and others not. The monikers were seldom given with malice, well, I guess some were, because Tom had a bit of a…
The Georgia Botanical Garden – part 2
As my wife and I strolled through the Botanical Garden I pointed out one thing and another to her, a plant’s name or some horticultural curiosity, and to my astonishment, she usually replied with skepticism. I often claim to have planted one of everything in my garden, and of course this isn’t nearly true, but I’ve…
The State Botanical Garden of Georgia
I first visited the Georgia Botanical Garden when my son began grad school at the University of Georgia five or six years ago, and each time my wife and I have traveled to Athens we have stopped by. The tours of the garden were always for a shorter period than I preferred, but I can…
Tallulah Falls
Don’t tell anyone, but I think that I might be getting a tad too old for this. I’m a wreck, tired, battered, and bruised. At the end of last week my wife and I traveled south to the University of Georgia in Athens, Georgia to see our daughter-in-law graduate with her Ph.D. in chemistry, and…
Blooming in early August
The Brazilian native Princess Flower (Tibouchina urvilleana, below) must be cut back and brought indoors to survive the winter in northwestern Virginia, but through the summer there is no more glorious bloomer. The flowers are the deepest, richest purple, and the foliage is velvety to the touch. Though my garden is overflowing with cold hardy flowering plants,…
Gardening in a frying pan
Is it too hot to garden? It is most definitely not too hot for weeds to grow, and brown as the lawn is, the crabgrass and nutsedge are still growing, so there are chores to be done. Temperatures in the shade feel ten degrees cooler, but there are no weeds in the shaded parts of…
Ramblin' through Dave's Garden 