We left town last Sunday and have been on a whirlwind road trip to Big Sur, the Central Coast, Santa Barbara, Yosemite and now South Lake Tahoe. In a couple hours we’ll be leaving the beautiful state of California for a day long drive through Nevada, on to Moab, UT and then Summit County & Denver Colorado, before making it back to Wisconsin. Here are a few pics of the remaining plants of our old garden right before we left just for the heck of it (I’m being a bit of a roadtrip photo uploading/labeling slacker right now).
Papaver commutatum 'Ladybird'
All the broken surfboards are on their way to Wisconsin We’re thinking of going with a beach theme for the new nursery.
Pipevine Swallowtail caterpillars
So my caterpillar babies didn’t make it to this size, but wonderful Tim brought over a bunch we released on our vine about a week before we left. I must have spent hours watching them eat away on the pipevine.
Happy Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day! We don’t have a whole lot going on in the bloom department right now, but are crazy excited our Coreopsis gigantea just started to bloom. We had a little gopher scare with it a couple weeks ago. I walked out one morning to find it completely droopy, with two gopher mounds about five feet away and panicked. This freaky California native is one of my favorite plants we have out back. After a good long water it recovered and Matti took care of the gopher.
Lobelia aguana
My favorite new, super rare, orangey-red Lobelia aguana blooms just started to open up in the last few days. I’m in love! Mark D. (aka serialplantfetishist on flickr) picked up this cool Lobelia at a Strybing plant sale and shared the seed love with Annie’s. Check out the online sign for the cool story and more info.
Crassula multicava
I’m not a huge fan of this Crassula, but it seems to bloom continuously… dropping it’s tiny weeny babies all over the place. It’s not terrible or anything, but I have a feeling its days are numbered. Matti and I aren’t big fans of white flowering plants in our garden.
Eccremocarpus scaber 'Tresco Gold'
I can’t believe this dude is still kicking it.
Layia platyglossa
The first Tidy Tips bloom of the season!
Kalanchoe prolifera
This weirdo Kalanchoe known as “Blooming Boxes” is still doing its thing. I haven’t really seen an actual yellow flower peeking out from the box (technically bracts).
Black Petunia
A big shout out to Carol at May Dreams Gardens for hosting the monthly bloom share-a-thon!
Happy Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day! We’ve got tons of cool stuff blooming right now including the tallest plant we’ve ever grown Dahlia imperialis ‘Double White’. There were a bunch of big babies in one gallons at Annie’s that needed a new home, so I took one home not knowing which tree Dahlia it was going to be (we’re usually pretty anti-white flowers). It’s pretty awesome, but I kind of want to try Dahlia tenuicaulis or crazy awesome Dahlia campanulata next year. There’s another shot of it in the container here (it’s kind of skinny).
Fuchsia thymifolia
Maybe a month or two ago I hacked this puppy back pretty hard since it was getting scraggly. Now it’s covered in flowers again. I think this is one of our very first Fuchsias. It loves a good hacking every few months.
Fuchsia denticulata
Quite a few of our Fuchsias are blooming right now and Fuchsia denticulata is one of my faves. Hummingbirds are having brawls and it’s December. The Wisconsinite in me is still in awe that it can be sunny and 65 sometimes even 70 degrees in December. January through March used to be my most hated time of the year and now it’s my favorite. Bring on the rain!
Fuchsia fulgens
While I love Fuchsia fulgens, I’m more excited about the Kalanchoe carnea growing behind the flowers. We started this guy from a stem we picked up on the ground in Santa Barbara last winter. I keep moving it around and pissing it off, but it seems to like the new spot.
Cyanotis somaliensis (Common Name - Furry Kittens or Pussy Ears)
A big shout out to Plants Are The Strangest People for helping us ID this purple poofy flowered thing several months back. I’m pretty sure this plant withstood dog pee in its not so great spot in the yard back in the day, but it now lives happily in a pee free zone. Everything I’ve read says it needs to be in zone 10 or above and I remember it dying back pretty hard after a frost. It’s been a great houseplant for us, too. We picked it up at Lone Pine Gardens a nursery that specializes in succulents and bonsai trees in Sebastopol. Cool place.
Oxalis herrerae
Matti picked up this bizarro Oxalis herrerae at Cactus Jungle last Spring. If we put it in the ground, kept it watered and fed it could potentially turn in to a three foot tall leafy shrub. We like the freaky succulent petiole action, so we keep it abused in a little pot. I wasn’t all that excited about it at first since Annie’s had some pampered plants leafy plants at the time. It’s pretty dang cool.
Eccremocarpus scaber 'Tresco Gold'
It took Eccremocarpus scaber ‘Tresco Gold’ a little longer to take off this year since most of it sprouted from the abundant seed of one crazy floriferous plants from last year. It seems to be lasting later in the season. Snip off the pretty seed heads if you don’t want lots and lots and lots of babies, but they’re easy to spot and pull, too. The hummingbirds go crazy for it. I’m convinced they like it more than any of our Fuchsias.
Anagallis monellii
I planted this Anagallis monellii in a big container last May or June. It bloomed like a little trooper for a couple months, got rangy, hacked it back and it’s coming back. It’s seriously one of the prettiest shades of blue out there, but it’s tough to capture in photos. I severely abused (moved at least three times in a not so nice manner) a different plant last winter that olerated my cruelty no-problem. Annie’s almost always has them available, so I started fresh with this guy.
Kalanchoe marmorata
We’ve had a couple of Kalanchoe marmorata hanging around for at least a year. They haven’t loved life in our garden (honestly, they’ve usually been jammed in sub-prime real estate), but this one finally liked it enough to shoot out some crazy four inch long flower. One of our favorite succulent bloggers Candy got a great shot of it looking happy, but not as spotty at Huntington Gardens this fall. From what I’ve read it sounds like the more sun it gets to more pronounced its leopard spots are.
San Francisco, if I haven’t told you how much I love you lately I apologize. Gardening in Winter is one of my favorite activities, especially after checking the temp in Wisconsin and giggling. I’m going to shut up now and show some more pics of stuff that’s blooming out back. Hurray for December!
Petunia exserta
Froofy Fuchsia (don't really know what hybrid it is)
Helenium autumnale 'Helena Red Shades'
Crassula erosula 'Campfire'
Graptoveria 'Fred Ives'
Lotus maculatus
Okay, I can’t keep my big mouth shut… Back in early October I was walking the dog around the neighborhood with the camera and took a pic of a house using Lotus maculatus as a ground cover in the middle of their driveway. It looks nice, check out the pic here.
Happy September Bloom Day! Thanks to Carol at May Dreams Gardens for hosting the monthly bloom-a-thon. Summer has finally arrived in Outer Sunset. For the first time in several weeks it hit seventy five degrees and was sunny! This little bee was pollinating its little heart out on a cutie mystery mesemb. Anyone have any ideas as to what it is? I don’t even remember where we got it.
Cuphea 'Strybing Sunset' action
Matti brought Cuphea ‘Strybing Sunset’ home from the pitiful pile at work, and it’s made a full recovery. I threw it in there to give Fuchsia ‘Fanfare’ some leggings to cover up some of its skinny leg show.
Linaria reticulata 'Flamenco'
Linaria reticulata ‘Flamenco’ is one of my favorite annuals. I’d even say it’s even in my top five. We planted one last Spring, and it bloomed like a crazy thing for months in a big container. I loved it so much, this time I planted three. It’s well on the way to being a giant ball of red-orange flowery goodness.
Petunia exerta fun
Crazy rare Petunia exerta from South Eastern Brazil is still going strong despite being trampled by a dog. We trample it, too trying to get to plants in the far corner. Greensparrow Gardens‘ blogger Joseph Tychonievich hooked Annie’s up with the seeds for this super unique Petunia. Joseph is so cool he actually tricked his tree dahlia in to blooming using a trash can this summer.
Plectranthus neochilus
Some folks don’t like this funky little groundcover’s herby odor, but I think it smells nice. The purpley flowers aren’t bad either.
Sempervivum starting to get crazy
We’ve got semps in all shapes in sizes, bursting with sea creature like blooms right now. Matti’s been addicted to semps for quite some time, but I was slow to jump on the bandwagon. We had one back in Wisconsin that I loved, but I was weirdly not in love with them when we moved here. I think one might have gotten rotty during the winter. While I still can’t rattle off all the cultivars like Matti, I do love them again.
Impatiens nyungwensis
Matti picked out mega-rare Impatiens nyungwensis, a native to Rwanda from Annie’s last winter/early-spring. It’s loving life next to the beach. We now have two thriving colonies of this hairy little guy, from a couple chunks of plant I shoved in the ground after it was looking sad in a container.
Brugmansia sanguinea
Pretty soon our Brugmansia sanguinea will have some flowers facing the garden where I can take a picture of it without sticking my head next to the fence. This guy has really taken off. It’s covered in buds right now, and getting huge.
Eccremocarpus scaber 'Tresco Gold'
Finally, after quite some time of not doing so much Eccremocarpus scaber ‘Tresco Gold’ is causing hummingbird brawls in the garden. We literally have over ten Fuchsias out back, and the hummers don’t give a crap about them compared their beloved Chilean Glory Vine. Earlier this week I saw my first full on hummer battle above this vine.
Verbena bonariensis and fluttery friend
The butterflies have been digging the Verbena bonariensis big time latey. Anyone know what this one is?
It’s that festive bloomy time of the month where May Dreams Garden hosts Garden Bloggers Bloom Day. At some point I will no longer be amazed that I can not only garden, but things are actively growing in mid-November. Coming … Continue reading →
We’re thinking of going with a beach theme for the new nursery.
