More purchases, plantings, and today’s wishlist

08/09/2007 Agastache Acapulco Salmon PinkOn Tuesday, dear hubby and I took a trip to the local Home Depot. I was intent on building on the idea of his tree ring by grabbing 16 red/charcoal foot-wide retaining wall stones. I also needed some new gardening gloves and gave me a good excuse to check out the plant selection. Sadly, no blue salvia in stock. I did find two trays of Agastache Acapulco Salmon & Pink in full bloom. I took one home and got it planted yesterday.

I discovered that the Salvia Hot Lips in the side yard had gotten so big and rangy that it overwhelmed a neighboring purple salvia (along with a black ophiogon, artemisia, and the only other existing anemone). I quickly dug up the purple salvia–okay, more like violently uprooted–and transplanted it to the middle bed. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like it’s going to survive the move, having lost much of its rootball. It hadn’t been too healthy to begin with after living in the shadow of its leggy neighbor.

So I’ve been toying with the idea of putting crocuses in the yard, except that I learned that they are considered annuals in Texas. Having learned my lesson with tulips, I’m not about to invest in a single-year show. So other ideas have crept onto my white-and-blue wishlist of the day: more muscari, more irises (dutch and dwarfs), white daffodils, white callas, allium caeruleum (azureum), nepeta (catmint) racemosa or faassenii, black leaf plants such as heuchera and ajuga and penstemon digitalis Ruby Tuesday. I’m also growing fond of Agastache rupestris and a agastache coccinea x rupestris hybrid called Firebird.

Speculation of the day: those salvia greggi reds in my front yard–could they be Furman Reds?

Reviewing an old order

3/9/2007 Tulipa bakeriI emailed High Country Gardens yesterday to request a copy of my November invoice, which they gladly sent to me.

  • Tulip Bakeri ‘Lilac Wonder’ x1
  • Muscari Botryroides ‘Album’ x4
  • Muscari Armeniacum x4
  • Tulipa Humilis ‘Alba Coerulea Oculata’ x2
  • Allium Christophii x2
  • Allium Karataviense ‘Ivory Queen’ x1

To my knowledge only the Tulipa humilis was the no-show in my garden this year…the one I most wanted to see in bloom. The Tulipa bakeri was kind enough to put out 2 blooms before disappearing into the ground altogether (picture taken 3/9/07). The white flowering muscari and allium weren’t nearly as spectacular as their darker colored counterparts, Ivory Queen proving to be a shorter, ground hugging allium than Christophii. The alliums however do make for interesting dried subjects, their preserved spiky heads still linger in the garden today….

The painter’s touch…a Calla lily in bloom

On the 24th of May, I put in an order for six calla lily bulbs at PacificCallas.com. After the spectacular Mango Calla lily bloom in the front yard beds, I thought the Calla a good candidate for the blue & white beds in the back. The Vermeer Calla lily is a study in white and purple, an unusual bicolor that caught my eye. After 2 months in the side yard, the Vermeer callas are showing off their first blooms. Absolutely fantastic!

Site update: WP 2.2.2 and WP-Simpleviewer

  • upgraded to WordPress 2.2.2
  • widgetized sidebar for this theme (Almost Spring by Beccary)
  • installed and active WP-Simpleviewer galleries
  • reactivated WP Database backup (because it looked like it was turned off) and performed backup
  • went through entire site and re-classed images to utilize imageleft and imageright alignments in the new theme layout
  • added WP-Slimbox plugin

In previous update, installed and configured Cforms2 contact form plugin for WordPress.