Out There In July

Lilies



Filipendula



Hydrangea



Barb Wire Roses



Liatris



Spirea



Rudbeckia with Aster



Loosestrife and Fritillary



Daylilies. They're growing on me.



The window over my bed.



Sun and Moist Clouds

Vegetable Love

The two Michel(l)e's on opposite coasts are agreeing that good bone structure can help a vegetable garden in the overall landscape design of the larger garden. This is particularly important with the increasing interest in edible landscapes in the front yard.

My "front yard" is still kind of wild.



I can get away with a bit less formal structure in my front yard roadside vegetable garden. The split rail fence does give a sense of enclosure. The unmowed wildflower meadow that surrounds it also screens the vegetable garden from view at road level, at least this early in the season.



The tee pee for the pole beans mimics the telephone pole and wires. Repetition of form is an element of good landscape design.



When people drive by they have a choice of looking at the mowed to the nub hillside of grass on one side with a fancy gate or the rickety wooden fence backed by a sparkling display of thousands of flowers. It is a major contrast of taste and style.





I think my style lies some where in the middle.



The vegetables are quite happy in their neat rows, mulched with wood chips and surrounded by wildness. A new kind squash is getting big. The tag wandered off. I know it is a winter squash, one that stores well, maybe Hubbard?



'Painted Lady' pole beans replaced the early radishes.



I couldn't help myself and I planted another row of sweet corn on the 4th of July between the rows of cucumbers. Ninety two days from seed, the package said. That puts harvest around the first of October. It's possible. Down the road, one farmer just seeded his corn last week. If the coons or the cold don't get the corn, I might.



The plants look bigger in the garden than from across the road and up the hill. So far we have eaten, a few radish before they bolted, three kind lettuce, two kind spinach, sugar snap peas, yellow squash, banana pepper and cucumber.



That's just the beginning.

Nymphaea And Company

In the vicinity



of a pond.

Playing With The Sky

When I am exhausted.



The Original Sky



Variations







How do such long summer days end so quickly?

The Beginning Of Exuberance

I showed you theirs. Now I'll show you mine.



The second half of a roof is formed.



A dried in cabin looks possible in the near future.

Haywood County Garden Tour

Part II
Link to Part I

The second half of the garden tour begins in Junaluska Meadows, a neighborhood of newer homes set on large acreage in former pasture lands. In this setting a garden must be built from scratch.

The promos I saw and read online said a master gardener would be at each location to answer questions. I expected one. Imagine my surprise when already at each garden there had been three or four master gardeners. They were there to answer questions, direct traffic and staff information tables that often included photos of the gardens in various stages of development.



I learned from one of the master gardeners here at the Hunziker garden that the Haywood County program was close to 100 volunteers strong.

The view from this garden looks out over the Haywood County Agricultural Fairgrounds.



Miscanthus sinensis 'Morning Light' I do believe. So this is what mine will look like when I stop chopping them up into smaller pieces and dividing them. Add a little Ironweed, Chicory, sedge and banana and were done.



All this needs is a soapy film and a small compressor blowing some air through the lips..



I was sidetracked by this Sumac growing wild, while walking to the Russell garden, next on the tour, from my car. I need me some of this to go on the slope behind my Miscanthus.



A slight commotion around the corner from the master gardener greeting folks turned out to be another box turtle. Turtle love must be in the air.



This garden was decorated with a collection of old tools and farm implements that were placed throughout the garden.



Lots of perennial flowers were blooming in the sunny beds.



Yikes! The yellow and red combo disaster. Or were Dahlias considered the lone exception? I must have some male pattern color blindness or something. I am not sure I find it so offensive.



A big rock put to use.



The front beds were filled with an assortment of well spaced and manicured flowering perennials.



I took the south to north route, so this final garden was closest to home for me. Our last stop is the M3 Ranch and the Matheison garden.



We were shuttled from the entrance parking area up to the barn were the Highland cattle were and main house.



Nice view. Looks like another development on the near horizon.



A very large and steep hillside above the house was the main garden feature.



An extensive well mulched shrubbery covered the hill.





In the center, the main attraction.



The sound of the crashing falls.



The fifth annual Haywood County Garden Tour now ends.

The master gardener I spoke with at the Hunziker garden had told me their main focus was gardening information for homeowners. Seeing the other prominently displayed sponsors and mention of landscape companies it was obvious this tour was geared to that market.

I'm spoiled. I need more than that. Living on this wild incredible mountain, I was hoping to see gardens that I could get lost in. I wanted some hints on how to co-exist with this wild exuberant abundance. I wanted to see the forest turned into living art, a space that beckons you in to stay. I saw mostly tidy manicured suburban, I've pulled all the weeds, tamed and subdued gardens. That is a feat for many and is not to be frowned upon. It just isn't for me or this mountain that will be my new garden.

So it will be my task to create that garden to get lost in. One day it may be able to inspire a kindred spoiled soul.