Wordless Wednesday

Time marches on through pictures

If you're like me, you tend to look at your garden once quite a few times a day. And, unless you are harvesting lots of flowers or produce, it can be easy to get a bit down and feel like "nothing is happening" out there. This is where pictures save the day! I try to take pictures of my gardens every two weeks or so. By doing this, I can easily scroll through the old pictures and see the amazing growth that is happening daily/weekly/monthly. As an example, here is a march through the calendar of the vegetable bed, so far this year.

Freshly laid out and only the onions have been planted on 04-25-10.

Now its 06-23-10 . The Winter Squash have just been set out and everything is now planted.

Three weeks later and boy, have the tomatoes taken off ! Picture from 07-13-10.

Exactly 2 weeks later on 07-27-10. Amazing squash growth. You can tell the weather finally warmed up!

And finally, two weeks later on 08-09-10. While I am still not harvesting anything yet, it is getting closer.

Another overcast day..

Another grey, overcast day today. Unlike most of the other days the last two weeks, the clouds never burned off today. It was cool out and I wore a jacket down to the big garden. On the bright side, overcast days are great for taking pictures! Many more dahlia varieties were blooming for the first time.

"Ryecroft Zoe", a variety I have been admiring for a couple of years. I am so excited to finally have it in my garden this year.

"Kathy's Choice". While this is the first open bloom, there are already 10+ other buds ready to burst. It is such an early, prolific bloomer.

"Clearview David". I love how each white petal is tipped in lavender. So pretty in bouquets.

The poms continue to bloom. Here is "Irish Miss" a dark blend.

"L'Ancresse", a simple white ball form. Again, another really good variety for bouquets.

Last, but not least, "Willo Borealis". This might be my favorite pom. I love its violet plum color.

From Volunteer to Star of the Show

As I have mentioned in earlier posts, last year I planted a row of "Gloriosa Polyheaded" Sunflowers up in the vegetable garden. They did alright. They weren't as tall as the package said they would get and they just didn't have a "wow" factor for me. Real estate is too precious in this garden, so they were crossed off the list for 2010. However, last fall some little finch, while cleaning out the heads of seed, must have dropped a few. One managed to survive the cold winter, get itself planted in the soil, and this Spring it sprouted. I was going to pull it out, but soon it got too big and I didn't have the heart to do it anymore. As with so many things in the garden that I am not trying to do on purpose, this volunteer has performed like a rock star. It is now higher than the gutters and covered in 9" blooms. Its stock is like bamboo and it is pretty much smothering the bean tower and tomato plants that are its closest neighbors. Still, it's worth it. Nothing says Summer like Sunflowers, planned or not!

More Blooms

More dahlias are blooming for the first time every day. This morning I discovered that "Tahoma Eldean" had opened its very first bloom. This is another "new" one for me this year. It is a single that starts with dark pink and then blends to white and then yellow in the center. Stunning!

I had three Poms open for the first time. Above, "Pacific Revival", a pom in lavender.

"Lismoore Peggy" a pom in pink. New to my garden this year. I like it!

"Bowen" pom in white. A very reliable bloomer, though it sometimes has some purple specks in its white petals.

"Purple Sparkler" a collarette form in a dark blend of purple and white. Unfortunately, a bug found this bloom before I did. Thankfully, there will be many more blooms to come.

And, no this one isn't open yet! But I really thought that its bud looked pretty at this stage. So much potential ! This is "Ryecroft Zoe" which will open to a 4-6" bloom in orange & yellow.

While the majority of dahlias still haven't opened a bloom yet, they are all starting to really branch out. I have been pinching out the center tip on most plants, encouraging earlier branching and flushes of bloom. It seems to be working well. Pictured above are two plants of "Camano Sitka".

Summer rolls on...

Today the calendar flipped from July to August. As we hit the height of Summer here, the meadows have transitioned along with the calendar. We started back in March, when the meadows were green, short and full of blooming daffodils. April & May turned the meadows purple with blooming wild pacific coast iris. By June, the grass was waist high and accented with hundreds of white daisies. Now they have faded and the meadow grasses have browned and dried. But this brown palate is punctuated with white florets of the Queen Anne's Lace. This member of the carrot family is going strong when everything else seems done for the year.

New Blooms - Day 2

After an overcast, cool morning, the sun broke through the clouds about 2 PM. When I finally made it down to the big garden later in the afternoon I was pleased to discover 3 more dahlia blooms had opened. Pictured above is "Kelsey Sunshine" a collarette form in yellow with white petaloids. This is its first year in release and I was thrilled when a friend and fellow dahlia grower offered me an extra tuber. I had tried to order it this year but it had already sold out.

Also opening up today is "Jacs Sashay" another collarette form. This one is a dark blend of purple & red with white petaloids. It is a bit more purple than the above photo shows. The third variety open today was single blooms on two plants of "Nicole C", a miniature cactus form in orange. It isn't a large plant, but it is already just covered in buds.

The first dahlia bloom of the year

When I walked down to the garden this morning some color at the far end caught my eye. The first open dahlia bloom of the year! Or to be more exact, the first two open blooms of the year. Both blooms were on plants of "Raeann's Peach" a single dark blend of orange & red. Hybridized by Wayne Lobaugh of Chehalis Washington, it was released in 2008. Until I saw it at a dahlia show, I wasn't a fan of the Single form of dahlias. But "Raeann's Peach" has changed my mind! In the sea of green that is the dahlia patch below, you can clearly make out the glowing blooms on the left.

An Empty Nest..Sort of!

Yesterday the last two Barn Swallow babies took flight. The first two babies left the nest last week, but have been returning in the evenings to sleep. The last two chicks seemed smaller in size and didn't appear very interested in leaving the comfort of the nest. But when I came out this morning, the nest was empty.

Then I heard a familiar chirp and found one of the babies sitting on top of the fireplace, not 5 feet from the nest! He even managed to get his parents to feed him there a couple of times.

Then the parents sat on top of the PVC poles of the vegetable garden, chipping back at the baby. I think they were telling him he could fly now and catch his own bugs.

Eventually he did fly away, although both babies kept coming back to the nest over the course of the day. And as evening set both were back in the nest for the night. This learning to fly stuff is exhausting!