Garden Updates

Last week I had started to put together a post on evaluating how my containers are doing, one month after being planted. Unfortunately, my photography let me down and I couldn't seem to get any good photos to back up my words.

So the "containers" section of this post will be mainly a couple of photos that did turn out nicely. And the rest of the post will highlight some other things that are blooming in the garden now.

Dahlias and a Pink Happy Thought



Violets



Pink Petunia



A couple of people mentioned the lamb's ears in a previous post. I thought I'd show another view, and talk about how I decimated this clump. Back at the end of May, it looked like this:



The clump was taking over far more space than was available for it. So I removed about 60% of it, leaving this:



In the end it didn't look too bad, even from the front:



Now you can see that although there is a nice amount of bloom, there is a section at the back with only leaves.

Blooming Stachys from the Front



I don't like to show too much of this view, because by the time the end of June rolls around, the elm tree is in such bad shape with cosmetic damage caused by insects.

Oh, and as another follow-up, I wanted to confirm (for Sigrun) that yes, 'Splish-Splash' hardy geranium did not come up white this year, but purple with white detail.

EDIT: Actually, I had two of this plant. The one I gave to my mom for her garden this year is white!

'Splish-Splash' Hardy Geranium 2007



Also, 'Rozanne' has finally become the plant I remember, with a profusion of beautiful blooms that I hope will last into October as they did last year.

I find I prefer certain types of hardy geranium ('Rozanne', 'Johnson's Blue' and 'Ankums Pride') because the flowers spread out among the foliage. Other varieties seem to have one stem with blooms surrounded by foliage. I don't like that as much.

'Rozanne' Hardy Geranium



Oh, and finally, I wanted to show that 'Tequila Sunrise' coreopsis is now blooming.


Photos belong to kbgardenblog.blogspot.com and may not be used without permission.