Garden glimpses

Fuchsia fulgens took off this year. I had to cut it way back last year, for whatever reason I don't recall. It didn't care one bit. The fuchsias from South America thrive in the San Francisco's cool, foggy climate. You could make your whole garden a fuchsia garden and it would bloom all year.



Chocolate-scented, "winter-flowering" Tithonia diversifolia blooms for a much longer season that the plant tag says, too.



It's a behemoth in the garden, growing big and very fast... Really not appropriate for my small garden. I had a brugmansia here once upon a time, but it got broken and shredded anytime we had strong winds and looked like heck for months afterwards. We have a strong winds every year, so that was a problem for me. Other people seem to have better luck with that plant than I did.



Speaking of things that look like heck... ugh, this lily. Je déteste. I tried to dig it out last year, but couldn't without destroying the whole bed. That bulb really settled in. I have to say it looks okay at a distance, especially with its colors echoed in surrounding plants, like the white Shasta daisies in front of it and the dark red cordyline 'Cherry Sensation' (or 'Cherry Sunrise'..?) behind it.



I think it would even look fine in a different garden, but it's completely out of place in mine... unless maybe I add a few more harmonious companions to help it blend better.

Just so not my style... ugh.



This nameless variety from the neighborhood nursery, otoh, is perfect.



I started this Campanula medium from seed, and it's doing very well. I have some pink ones too.



It keeps on blooming with a little deadheading now and then. Well, I assume the deadheading helps.



Dahlias, also from seed. This one is my favorite this year, although it flowers very sparingly. I gave it some water and fertilizer today. Maybe that will help, if the neighboring Phormium 'Black Adder' and Stipa arundinacea don't drink it down first.



If you've every thought about growing strawberry from seed, I say go for it. These are four Fragaria vesca from seed, going gangbusters. They don't fruit very heavily. Could it be because they don't care for the acid soil in that pot? Maybe I'll try re-potting them this fall.



Growing fennel from seed is not much of a gardening accomplishment. Keeping the anise swallowtail caterpillars that feed on it alive might qualify, however. I've moved a few larvae to a different plant that I cover with bird netting. I hope that helps them from getting eaten. Of course, I'm not sure that they get eaten every year. But something happens. One day, they're just gone and I've never seen a chrysalis. I'm pretty alert to things in my small garden. I think I'd notice a chrysalis.



Dill is another good one for butterflies and caterpillars. I put the dill out late this year and it didn't get very tall. Plant it out in April in San Francisco if you want my advice.



I enjoy all my phallic garden ornaments.



And the non-phallic ones too. This ball needs to go live near a better color complement.



There's a lot of red in my garden, which is a puzzlment considering how apprehensive I am about about it growing too close yellow. Well I have a lot of yellow too. Odd that it feels like all I ever do is add pink.



Do you think blue and purple look good together? Well, that's a lot of red too. I think pink and purple look good together. Not that I'm deeply preoccupied with "what goes together". As long as it's not red+yellow.



Oh, there's another lily.



And a dahlia with some daisies.



And a kitty!

Garden Glimpses

Perfect temperatures today--sunny, cool, breezy. The weather in general has been nice recently.





Here's a picture of the ornament I bought in Santa Cruz last week. I can see the collection of glass spheres and pairing them with longer, thinner objects (remember the birdhouse?). Does that sound too penis-y?



I'm more concerned about having too much knicky-knacky stuff in the garden. Well, it's a small collection now--I only have four things. I'm not going to worry about it yet. One object at a time.



It's well past the point every year where the garden becomes hard to move around in, but I have reclaimed a place to sit. So, if you can get to it, you are welcome to sit down. Funkier, more charming chairs are still on my wish list. I have not seen very many that I like, but I haven't started to look yet either.

Sunny Saturday

Yellow bronze fennel flowers blooming everywhere right now attract lots of honeybees,



while the fennel itself feeds a legion of anise swallowtail caterpillars. New cats seem to appear daily, but I have yet to see a single butterfly.



I wonder where the honeybee hive is. I bet it's the community garden several blocks away, but it's easy to imagine a backyard beekeeper in Bernal Heights too.

The verbena looks a little piqued, but it's still a hummingbird favorite.



You'd think the hummers would be all over the Keckiella cordifolia. Not so much really.



Ideally, I'd like to know the names of all my garden's visitors, but I still have a long way to go. It seems like an attainable goal in the small city garden. We don't get all that many visitors. What little moth is this?



And very common bird are you?



Fact is, I don't even know all the plant names. I think this sunflower came from Botanical Interests packet named Drop Dead Red but I'm not completely sure.



And I can't find the name of this cordyline either. I'm sure the tag is somewhere in my work area; I just can't find it. I went back to the nursery hoping to score another cordyline like this, but they were all out. Sigh. There should be a rule: when you find a great plant for half off, you have to buy two.



New leeks sprouted from seed are progressing well in containers. I'll plant them out in a few weeks. I'd like to have leeks to eat next year. Cream of leek soup, anyone?



I'd love to eat a few grapes one day too. They don't have to be tasty. San Francisco is not Napa Valley. Hmm. That leaf is rather red. Do I detect a hint of things to come?



The ripening Gravenstein apple is perhaps a surer sign of things to come.



I had two, but it appears the tree dropped one of them. I tasted it. Not ripe at all, but still a thrill.

I've decided that I like this dahlia after all.

This year's sunflowers have the same fade.



Umbels are cool.



I like all these verticals.



I got a bunch of Acer circinatum saplings from Raintree Nursery a few years ago. They are much beloved by leafcutter bees. I wish they loved them a little bit less, frankly.



The Montanoa grandiflora's getting really big. The flowers might be way over my head this winter.



Grow little 'Moonlight' rose, grow!



I have coneflower, just like everybody else.



I went on a little seed-sowing rampage the other day: Agave bracteosa, Agastache 'Heronswood Mist', Asclepias curassavica, Shasta daisy, majoram, Phacelia campanularia, Phacelia tanacetifolia, larkspur, Dahlia 'Bishop's Children', Rudbeckia triloba, Sidalcea malviflora, Lathyrus odoratus 'Cupani', Mentzelia lindleyi, Oenothera hookeri

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Keckiella cordifolia is the result of a seed-sowing rampage that happened a few years ago.



So is this Lepechinia.



And this towering Echium pininana.



I collected some seeds today.



My recent rampage included the sowing of more leeks.



And more Asclepias curassavica



And more dahlias. Because they're fun.



Salvia uliginosa really takes its own sweet time making flowers. Kind of annoying.



Artichoke flower, with syrphid fly.



That's it.