Last Minute Puttering

I was home early from the Posh Estate today because I am literally running out of weeds to pull. So I got started on the final mowing of the paths in the wild cultivated gardens. I'll finish it up tomorrow. I don't think it will take long. They barely need mowing.

So I putter and meander and edit at a snail's pace. At this point I don't want to do any major assault editing. That generally involves stompage. We don't want stompage for the tour.

The Louisiana iris 'Black Gamecock' is now in bloom. There might be a flower or two of this on tour day. I'm only getting a couple bloom spikes and iris only last about two days.

There may be some lily remnants in another three days.

This is a better picture of the true velvety purple color of 'Black Gamecock'.

My weeds ..... er wild flowers .... however are getting showier by the day. There will be lots of weed flowers for tour day.

I did do one last minute adjustment. The benches on the Great Lawn have never been level and were not very comfortable to sit on. That is a problem when the ground is far from level. One end of both benches had to be sunk further into the ground. Now they appear uneven and sit just right.

The Indian Pink, Spigelia marilandica has a great flower. I'm glad I found it. I hope it likes it here and gets way bigger. You never know about these things until after they come up the following spring.

Two more days to show time and I am puttering around. I should be able to do a little house cleaning. Maybe.

A Present For A New Garden

When it woke up this spring, the Lush emerged as a garden. It's still wild and chaotic and exuberant, but it has become a garden. My planted plants have grown. The editing has had a decisive impact. A garden has been born.

A critical component of that birth is the idea of contrast. Nature has provided a generous number of desirable wild flowers. A great majority of them are of similar form, tall erect herbaceous perennials with narrow linear leaves. Their flowers have more variation.

To stand out in all that sameness a plant must be different. In form, in foliage, in leaf color and size or in flower, contrast with the dominant back ground and near neighbors helps make a garden.

Even the negative space of mowed paths and the Great Lawn are a contrast to the height of the Lush.

So when I bought the garden a birthday present today - any excuse can do - it was a plant of a different leaf form and color. This is Actaea simplex 'Carbonella' or Bugbane. In truth I have been eyeing this plant for well over a year and today I succumbed.

I also managed to get one of the native Actaea racemosa, Black Cohosh into the garden last fall. I will need more.

Contrast in foliage really is critical when great swaths of the shadier parts of the garden have much longer durations of green and less time in bloom.

Big bold leaves can make a big bold impact. I'm liking my new Shredded Umbrella Leaf, Syneilesis aconitifolia. This and the Darmera peltata I added last year will really stand out in the Lush once they gain a mature size.

The long thin blades of the grasses have the same contrasting effect to the abundant narrow leaved native wild flowers. This variegated Feather Reed Grass, Calamagrostis × acutiflora 'Overdam'  even has the benefit of being an early bloomer. The bloom spikes add further contrast in the garden.

Thin white blades in the deep green forest now help screen the cozy cabin from the scenic byway.

The annual riot of roadside wildflowers will have to entertain the travelers until the leaves are no more.

While behind the green curtain, a garden made with contrast keeps evolving.

The Garden Is Here

I am declaring it official. For Bloom Day June 15th 2014, the garden is no longer becoming. I will no longer use that description. Ku'ulei A'ina is now a fully fledged garden. Its seven year birth has been a success. It emerged in the nick of time for next week's Haywood County Master Gardener Tour.

Perhaps the two of them who turned me in after seeing it last July saw something I wasn't ready to admit. There is a beautiful wild garden high on the low spot at the county line.

This declaration in no way means I am done. Decades of refinement lie ahead. I am a gardener.

There are many blooming shrubs now, defined by the fact that they are not encased in a cloak of wretched clinging vines. The native Hydrangea arborescens is free to shine.

Native and introduced self sowing flowers can travel the garden at will.

The native Fire Pink, Silene virginica has settled in. Now I want to see it spread itself about.

The first early daylily has arrived. Hundreds more will follow in the weeks ahead.

One tiny little Kniphofia I bought is now great clumps of many.

Penstemon 'Husker's Red' is still here after moving itself to new locations and losing some of its red.

This is a real garden.

Mixed with the blooming wild things like Whorled Loosestrife, Lysimachia quadrifolia.

And introduced things like a pink Veronica.

More of the alliums I forgot planting are now in bloom.

There is even a deep reddish purple one I wasn't expecting. I did finally discover their origins. The discard bulb rack at Lowes. I found their info in my plant tag bag.

The evicted lily is looking magnificent. I got some discard lily bulbs too. They only have a few tiny buds this year. Hopefully they will get bigger and multiply.

Down by the lake where the wild things bloom.

More natives are being added on a regular basis. Thermopsis villosa, Carolina Lupine is liking the new garden.

Out by the scenic byway a Euphorbia 'I don't know', Miscanthus 'Morning Light' and chicory all set to bloom grow by leaps and bounds. The Lush is back.

Even the vegetable garden is being extra perky in this official first year as a garden. I am suspecting it is mostly about the great dollops of dung I added last fall.

Flowers and bold foliage say garden in the wilderness.

And the exuberant chaos makes it blend in and appear natural.

And when you least expect it things you set loose in the garden show up. I looked and never found any baby Canterbury Bells this spring.

Calycanthus floridus is blooming quite well after getting zapped in the late freeze. I was not expecting that.

Decades of refinement lie ahead. The new Indian Pink, Spigelia marilandica I came home with a few weeks ago are even going to bloom. Now live long and multiply.

I am a gardener. I can thank my father for half of that. And very much for this garden, Ku'ulei A'ina, I now call home.

Flowers Before Bloom Day

Today was the pre-tour of all the gardens for the garden owners and volunteers. You'll have to wait a week for that post. I don't want to spoil the surprise for anyone planning to come on the tour.

The wild cultivated gardens were looking lovely today. They are no surprise on this blog.

Thermopsis villosa/caroliniana, Carolina Lupine has come into bloom.

I planted out four new ones last week. They were grown from seed last fall and survived the winter in their little four inch pots. I've also tossed seed out there in the Lush. I could come across others eventually.

An arrangement with Kniphofia.

The self sowers are welcome by my front steps.

It's getting there. A low mounding tapestry of texture and color is becoming more evident.

I'll keep editing.

My energy vortex transmitter/receiver got a few comments today. Chuckle.

And next Saturday there could be hundreds of visitors wondering and wandering.

Another Peek At The Posh Estate

Oh My!

New Poles More Bottles

One last item on the list, the Blue Pot Art Project was in need of refreshing.

Today it got new poles and more bottles. It is quite interesting in person, but very hard to photograph because the background is all wrong. It is really the wrong sort of background for the BPAP period. A more solid one would really make this fun little project more dramatic.

The hosta are ready.

And the half mile of paths in the ridge top garden got a second whacking. That simple negative space makes the hundreds of hosta that much more visible in the wild cultivated gardens.

A Lily Blooms

One that fell out of the ground and followed me home. Actually this one was evicted from the garden by it's previous owner and I kindly took it in.