09 Summer - Poppies

Here are several photographs of poppies. The pink ones are Shirley poppies, which are about two-feet tall with flowers the size of your palm. The others are cabbage poppies and grew to three feet or more, with flowers the size of your hands cupped together to catch water.

I think they have done very well this year, because it has been sunny and warm much of this spring and summer.

090622 - Candy Tuft

Here are several more photographs of the candy tufts in bloom in the backyard.

The flowers get as large as a silver dollar, while the plant can reach almost two feet tall.

090622 - Love in the Mist

Here are three photographs from yesterday of one of my new favorite flowers. I purchased one plant from a nursery last year, and it readily reseeded all over the backyard.

090622 - Backyard

Here is a photograph I took yesterday of the backyard. I was standing near the gate looking up the hillside.

You can see the bald spot near the top right, where we pulled out the echium, which had grown much too large, expanding across the trail and making it dangerous to pass by.

In its place, I've planted three canterbury bells, one of which is an unusual perennial and a pale whitish purple. I plan on growing amaranths and asters there, as our summer takes hold.

090622 - Sweet Peas

Here are several photographs of sweet peas I took yesterday evening after watering the gardens.

It has been a nice June so far, a little windy in the evenings, but warm and sunny most days.

Most of these sweet peas came from one packet of winter sweet peas, my favorites the white ones with purple tips.

090528- Candy Tuft

I don't think I have a favorite flower - They're all my favorites! - but if you asked me right now which one am I the most excited about, I'd have to say the candy tufts.

In the photo showing the staircase and waterfall, you can see the candy tufts have taken over the bed with the flowering cacti.

At the bottom right of this photo, you can see part of a long, narrow bed just above the lemon tree. It was here where I first encountered candy tufts, which sprang up spring, 2008, from a mixed-seed pack I tossed into this bed when it was clear the pocket gophers had decimated the gladioli.

I love the intricacy of the flowers and its color range from white to pink to dark purple, and I must say I was thrilled and Phil was annoyed by how massive the plants grew when started in early winter, 2008. Phil was annoyed because we literally had to wade through the plants to spot the anemones and ranunculus also in this bed.

090528 - Cactus Flowers

Raccoons find water sources like fountains irresistible, so Phil and I have learned to live with their noise and digging at night.

What we couldn't get used to is their wandering through the garden beds on their way to the waterfall, so we placed nearly two dozen cacti as a barrier between the waterfall and the beds.

Ever resourceful, the raccoons soon found a way to dig up the cacti and toss them into the water, where they let them float and soak up water like sponges for a day or so before eating them from the bottom up.

So, Phil and I saved up and bought a very large, very heavy cactus from a big box nursery. To our amazement, it has bloomed during our cold, foggy spring, its flowers the size of teacups.