Revisiting my mom's backyard

Here's a photo of what the planting bed we put together just a couple of months ago looks like now that it's filled in. The lantana has grown so much that it needed to be trimmed in a few places. and is starting to trail over the side of the retaining wall on the patio side.

As you can see, my mom hasn't gotten around to removing the tags off the plants...

Lantana

I bought a six pack of this bi-colored lantana last summer when I put together a couple of pots for the windowsills in the front yard. Over the winter they died back almost completely.

They have slowly been growing all season, and have finally started to bloom again, and I've decided to add them to the collection in the front yard to try to attract some hummingbirds or butterflies. (the purple flowered plant behind the black pot is a salvia greggi) .

Puya Alpestris

I bought two of these plants last year at Annies Annuals because of it's promise of interesting teal flowers. I planted them in pots and put them in the front yard. One was in more sun than the other, and it's growth was stunted, so I moved it to the same spot the other was. This year, the one that was not stunted shot up a flower spike, and today that flower spike started blooming.

I'm assuming that the flowers will darken over time into the teal color they are supposed to be, because this one that opened today is a lime green.

The Puya Alpestris is a species of bromeliad native to Chilean Andes and grown as an ornamental plant with unusual teal flowers

Here the info on the plant from annies http://www.anniesannuals.com/plants/plant_display.asp?prodid=1956&account=none

Attracting Hummingbirds and Butterflies

So, my attempts in the front yard have been to attract hummingbirds and butterflies to my house using native CA plant species in three large wine barrels. The plants have been in for two summers and I have only seen on hummingbird visit, and that was last summer.

In a desperate attempt to attract anything to my garden, I went out and purchased some salvias, nicotiana, and verbena, all in bright red tubular forms (the favorites of hummingbirds). to get them to take a look.

I got the verbena and nicotiana from Home Depot, and the two salvias from Tassajara Nursury in Danville.

Chicago Peace Rose

 

I've had this rose in a pot for a number if years,  A couple years ago it died back to just one branch, but it has come back strong this year after I got rid of all the rootstock shoots. This rose does not have a strong scent, but the coloring is goergeous, and it changes over the life of the bloom depending on how much sun it gets.  You can see the right side of this bloom gets more sun, so is more pink.

Veggie Garden Fail

 

So I'm declaring my Veggie Garden a Fail for this year, The only thing I have harvested from the garden is some super tiny cherry tomatos, everything else has either died or failed to produce, and everything is stunted in it's growth. those sunflowers? they are supposed to be 10 feet tall. The corn is only a foot tall, and the artichocke only has the same 3 leaves on it as it had when I bought it. Clearly the cheap soil I bought did not have the nutrients I needed for a lush veggie garden. and the fertilizer I used was not cutting it.

Butterfly Bush

I have two butterfly bushes - one buddlejaceae davidii, and one variety called 'black knight' that I got from a garden tour last summer - this is the one that is shown below. These are also supposed to be big butterfly attracters, but again, I'm not seeing that any butterflies have figured out that they are here.

Butterfly Weed

I have three butterfly weed plants (asclepias tuberosa) two yellow, one orange, they do pretty well, they are my indicator plants - letting me know when the plants in the front yard need water - but they have not really attracted any butterflies in the year I've had them...Maybe there are not enough of them. I'm going to try to plants some of the seeds and make a little field of them. The aphids on these plants must have come with them from the nursery, since they are orange colored (different from any othe raphids in my garden).

Persian Sheild Blooms

The persian sheild bloomed over the weekend.