Garden update: autumn has arrived

I am able to write this because we cancelled door knocking for today – flood warnings everywhere in the area – and because the only other task I might possibly have for today is cleaning up my office.  

And then it turned out I had to partially clean my desk because otherwise I could not connect the camera to upload the photos.  I am incorrigibly messy.

The successes

Mailbox garden: snapdragons, mums,
no-longer-blooming balloon flowers, and
owl art.  Am I partial to owl imagery?  Yes, I am.

The stars of this year’s Common Household Gardens were the snapdragons, the coreopsis, the sedum, and the coleus.  I wish I had photos of them from August.  Curses on you, sciatica and mal de débarquement syndrome and the ensuing therapies!  Curses on you, dental work and election work!  Those are my excuses and I’m sticking to ‘em.

Snapdragons

Back in June I thought the snapdragons were done, but they just kept bursting forth in their crimson glory all summer.  They did well right next to the street, below the mailbox.

The sedum has spread!

The yellow and orange coreopsis reflected the sun’s brilliance for months (no photo), but stopped blooming maybe in mid-September.  The sedum looks flatter than it did in June, but it kept spreading as I was told it would.

Two varieties of coleus,
making friends with the bush,
and trying to shake
your hand, too.

The coleus suffered from wealth inequality.  I had doubts it would do well as a potted plant under my care, so I planted all of the coleus (two different varieties) in one pot. They deserved a better distribution of resources.  Partway through the summer they looked like they would be eaten to death by some bug, but both kinds rallied and bloomed and skyrocketed.  Currently it looks like it is reaching out to knock on voters’ doors.  Go, coleus!

The bee balm was lovely in its time, and I hope it comes back next year.  I don’t know if I should cut back the stems or not.  The yarrow did its duty, but it was not as stunning.  I like it because I have a vague idea it hails from medieval times and is medicinal.

Hanging on

The marigolds and the balloon flowers (Platycodon grandiflorus) did okay.  Halfway through the summer the deerabbits ate a lot of the balloon flowers.  After that there were some blooms but they were a shadow of their former selves.  

Pot with black-eyed susan vine and forget-me-nots.

I started “black-eyed susan vines” in two pots, and then also forget-me-nots with the b-e.s.v. in one, and English thyme in the other.  The thyme never showed its face. The vines grew and started to tangle themselves in the nearby bushes but there was nary a bloom until September, one solitary flower that didn’t look exactly like a black-eyed susan.  And yesterday I saw one b-e.s.v. bloom in the other pot, and a few forget-me-nots.  

This is the black-eyed susan vine bloom.   (Blogger is not cooperating on the photo captions right now.)

A truly terrible photo of the forget-me-nots,
in the same pot with the b-e.s.v.

The geranium, a gift from the church music director, kept on plugging away.  It was almost never without a bloom, and there is a hopeful bud on it today.  

Geranium - the gift that keeps on giving

The lamb’s ear, lantana, and verbena still have foliage, but the lantana and verbena flowers were dessert for the local herbivores.  And now that spot is a hellish mess. I am not sticking my hands in there. 

A stew of lamb's ear, verbena, and lantana

The two bleeding heart plants faded slowly, as they should, and there is no indication of them except the marker I put there.  I really must hope they return in the spring, as they should, because they were the last things I planted before sciatica doom.  They will be my rebuttal to aging.

Shall I attempt to bring the potted plants inside before the first frost? The question will be where to put them.  And will they have bugs?

The disappointments

The biggest disappointment were the black-eyed susans.  I planted one from the garden store, and several more that were gifts from the neighbor.  I have a great fondness for these flowers.  And so did the deer. Eaten and re-eaten.  I finally got some rudimentary fencing and bird netting.  The plants managed to survive and eke out a few flowers.  There was still one bloom yesterday.  Meanwhile, in our area I saw numerous successful b-e susans. 

The astilbe was dead before mid-summer.  Sigh. This was supposed to be a great plant for growing in the shade.  Not our shade.

The salmon-colored impatiens did much better
than the white ones.

Almost all the white impatiens disappeared early in July.  Why?

The snow-in-summer looks like it just heard all the news this week and now can’t get out of bed anymore.  Why?  

Snow-in-summer, not looking so good.

Also disappointing are my photos.  It was too dark last night at 5:30 PM but I took the photos anyway.  I was too lazy to retake them this afternoon.

Soldiering on

We bought two mums for cheer and hope. The yellow one, which I put out by the mailbox (where it will catch the rain) is doing splendidly.  The purple one, which I put close to the house, is not.  Today I moved it.

HAVE YOU MADE YOUR PLAN TO VOTE?