Rain garden

17 comments

Another rainy, foggy, Nova Scotia May morning, but the garden doesn’t mind, so why should I? On my stroll, I discovered there were even a few flowers out!

Does anyone know what this is? It didn’t do a lot last year, when someone gave us a few sad-looking, dried-up nursery rejects. It obviously likes its new location though, and the yellow and purple look quite stunning. It’s like a ground cover, and is spreading nicely.

Bonkersbon has now ID’d it as Euphorbia.

Patrick has been hard at work weeding the perennial beds:

Hmmmm…. can’t seem to get these to display in portrait, even though I saved them like that. Sorry about that.

The peonies are looking strong:

And the leaves on the yellow birch around the patio are opening.

The creeping phlox over the sleeper retaining wall to the patio will be a picture when the sun comes out.

All the wild cherry trees are in flower:

And the cruciferous veggies are crucifering nicely.

Potential strawberries:

We have been told that as Patrick put these plants in very recently, this year we should pinch out the flowers and allow the roots to establish. Then next year we should train the runners and allow a crop to develop. Interesting.

The new bird boxes for the swallows, modified to prevent the raccoons from getting their long arms in there, as they did last year with the boxes built like the one in the centre. We thought they were placed more than high enough off the ground (20 feet at least), but no…

The clintonia at the base of a big spruce in the woods has really spread this year:

Now I’m back at the house again, admiring the work Patrick has been doing to tidy up the front beds:

And I spot some colour in there! Forget-me-not:

Miniature pansies:

A tiny bleeding heart – I know they have another name…

Okay, Bonkersbon has been kind enough to ID it for me : Dicentra.

Perhaps tomorrow the sun will shine, but in the meantime the plant roots are soaking up all this moisture very happily.

Until next time,
elke

17 May, 2009
7 likes

Comments

Newfienurse

Great photos. Thanks for the neck stretches. lol.
The front bed is especially nice. Patrick sounds like he earns his keep.

17 May, 2009

Elke

Oh yes he does - apart from the gardening and furniture making, he's a volunteer fireman, expert egg flipper at the monthly breakfasts and designer/chief cook & bottle washer of all the community construction/renovation projects, which has really helped our integration into this small rural community. We are CFAs after all, but we're also honorary 'Covers', a title awarded sparingly, we hear!

17 May, 2009

Lincslass

Lovely blog Elke and I enjoyed your photographs including the neck exercises,you obviously like to keep busy and enjoy life which is good,we are having rainy grey days here as well,lets hope we get an improvement soon......

17 May, 2009

Elke

Re. 'Covers' - I should have written it 'Cove-ers' , i.e., residents of the Cove.

17 May, 2009

Toto

Everything seems to be going very well. Patrick is doing a good job on the borders and you are doing a good job supervising, photographing and blogging. Only one small complaint though. Could you please make up your mind which way round the pics go. I am quite happy to lay down to look at them but then I have to sit up to look at another. I can't take all this strenuous excercise.

17 May, 2009

Llew

A lovely blog. :o)
I think the top pic is some sort of Euphorbia and your bleeding heart..well, it looks a bit different from our bleeding hearts, which are Dicentra Spectabilis. :-) Might just be me though, lol.

I too enjoyed the neck exercises, lol but if you want to prevent them in the future...the site automatically resizes pics to 440 x 330 px (well, 440 on longest side) anything else will either get chopped off or turned to suit. I resize my pics to those measurements, or less before uploading. Hope that helps, hun. :o)

17 May, 2009

Seaburngirl

lovely garden and i dont mind the photos as i have similar problems too. hubby works hard isnt he good.

17 May, 2009

Elke

Thanks for the tip, Llew. Sometimes they load properly,and sometimes they don't. I no longer crop as I know that's an issue. I'm sure Toto will benefit from the exercise anyway :)

17 May, 2009

Michaella

Beautiful gardens and beautiful pictures. Well done to you both!

17 May, 2009

Bonkersbon

Hi Elke..great photos...the bleeding hearts are called dicentras. We have a white one which really lifts the shady border !

17 May, 2009

Elke

Thanks, Bonkersbon - didn't know that. It's so good to have knowledgeable people here to help out. I'll look out for a white one. Most of our plants were gifts from other gardeners' borders, so we don't often know what they are.

17 May, 2009

Bonkersbon

Hope you find one Elke...if it helps the name to look out for is Dicentra Spectablis Alba..........

17 May, 2009

Elke

Thanks BB - alba is Latin for white, right? I'm sure it's spectablis!!

17 May, 2009

Bonkersbon

Spot on Elke...got it in one !

17 May, 2009

Toto

Don't you know that excercise is not good for you Elke?