"One of the most delightful things about a garden is the anticipation it brings."

Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Look who decided to show up...

Besides me that is.  Life seems to be getting busier lately and blogging is the first thing that gets pushed aside.  The poor garden has been pushed aside as well.  While I was out taking pictures I was horrified to see how bad the weeds are.  I don't know when they've gotten this bad.  Moss seems to be growing on a lot of the soil, and not in a pretty way when it's mixed with weeds.  As much as I try to be an organic gardener, I'm seriously thinking about grabbing a bottle of round up to at least use on the oxalis.  
But, other than the weeds I found some really nice surprises, including a few that I had completely given up on.

 A Sunflower!!  Not one that I planted, those are no shows, but this one is courtesy of the birds.  It's only about 2 feet tall, but when you only get one it's hard to be picky.

 Penstemon 'Raven' was a $2 bargain last year.  I had just about given up on it.

 Chocolate Eupatorium / Joe Pye Weed finally has buds.  I know these are late bloomers, but still was surprised it was taking this long.

 Zinnias that I planted from seed... in the beginning of July!  Sure took a while, but at least one is blooming.

 Cosmos that were started by wintersowing, that have just now started to bloom.  The flowers are much smaller than usual, but the insects don't seem to mind.  I don't think this is a bee, though it looked much more like a fly.

 How about a Snapdragon that I didn't plant at all?!  It may have reseeded from last year, but I don't remember planting them in this area.

 Aster 'Professor Kippenburg' seems to be a later bloomer.  The other Asters have been in full bloom for a couple of weeks already.

 Salvia 'Black and Blue' that I showed as a bud on a recent post has finally started blooming.

 This was a really big surprise.  I had been seeing red berries around the back yard and wondered what they were.  I was surprised to see that the Pink Flowering Dogwood (Cornus florida) in the front yard was covered in these pretty berries.  I've only seen them on the tree a few times.  I guess that's why all the birds have been hanging out there.

Now I'm not surprised at this one, 'Lady Emma Hamilton' has been blooming her head off still.  The color is just perfect for this time of year.

Hopefully I can start getting around to see what's happening in your gardens now.  I've been missing reading blogs and seeing what's going on.  I appreciate all of the comments that you've been leaving and hope to visit you in return soon.
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60 comments:

  1. Just posted on how I'm contemplating getting P. 'Raven'. If it's a fall bloomer....profound plant covet!

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  2. I have weeds galore myself, plus all the leaves are starting to fall. Need to get busy soon, clean up time, take care, Gina

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  3. Great parade of blooms. How nice that a sunflower showed up unexpectedly!

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  4. How lucky you are to live in a gardening zone that permits the growing of Penstemon Raven.
    Beautiful picture; thanks for the treat.

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  5. I hate weeds!!! Hate them! They are everywhere and I want them to die! Not angry or anything:)

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  6. Wow, the flowers are gorgeous! Love the sunflower.

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  7. What a wonderful gift to receieve... a gorgeous sunflower!! Love when that happens..enjoy..and wow..all your blooms are dazzling me! Yay..always fun to visit here!
    Have a sparkling day!
    Kiki

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  8. I like the new fall look! So vibrant and really gets a reader in the mood for cooler weather. Your plants are looking good. Don't worry about weeds, do like me, soon it will be cold and they'll all go dormant (or so I hope:).

    I'm going to get around to sending you a pic soon so you can tell me for sure if it is lobelia. Whatever it is I simply adore it!

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  9. Oh, I love your plants! They are so healthy looking. I especially love the shot with the bee in it,

    Jane

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  10. I am with you in that yes, the weeds are so strong. Yet, you share here so many delicate beauties. Sunflower, penstemon and salvias are among my favorites.

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  11. Catherine, my Eupatorium Chocolate is not quite as far along as yours and they are pedicting frost for this weekend.

    That Emma rose is beautiful.

    Eileen

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  12. Better late than never! Unless of course your the brugs that were supposed to show up for a September wedding at least! What a year eh?

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  13. A lovely browse around your garden once again. Great surprise that sunflower. I share your love of Cosmos, my self-seeded ones are just the tiniest beings at the moment.

    Many thanks for sharing all that beauty. Cheers! :D

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  14. What a cheery sunflower! All of the flowers you photographed look nice. Pretty colors.

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  15. Wow! That salvia black and blue is something!Your flowers are as healthy as ever even with neglect.

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  16. I love volunteers, my volunteer sunflowers are just about all that is left flowering. A few asters, some straggling cosmos and one rose bloom. But the leaves on the trees and shrubs are turning wonderful red, golds and rusts. Happy gardening and take care.

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  17. Thanks for making my day with a beautiful cheerful Sunflower! I love your garden blooms, the Cosmos are gorgeous and so are the Asters. Lovely post, have a great week Catherine! :)

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  18. Wow, so many surprises. These are all great. My chocolate Eupatorium is just now blooming too. I took pictures today to post sometime. I haven't been doing that great at blogging myself.
    I think I've forgotten to tell you before how much I like your new David Austin rose. It's just beautiful. My roses are wanting to bloom more now that it's cooling down a little.
    The dogwood berries are terrific too.

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  19. What gorgeous color you have for early fall. Hope all is well with you and yours. I have to bring out the big guns every now and then to get those pesky weeds under control.

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  20. Your Lady Emma Hamilton is such a beauty. Always love this peachy colour. For a moment I thought it was a peony.

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  21. Now we both FINALLY have sunflowers. I'm not sure if mine are the ones I had or the ones your girls gave me but they're nice and they're getting big. Would you believe the little ground cover phlox I bought for the front bank are blooming? Now that ends a weird summer!!! Jeff says summer is back for a while so maybe I'll get to see the Dahlias open. Oh and the Zinnia you gave me looks like yours - just ready to open.
    Meeting an old friend from up north today so better go get ready to go. Your flowers are still showing off!

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  22. The only bloom I'm still waiting on is my passion flower. Last year it bloomed in Mid August, this year, still nothing. But it's vining all over the place, so I know it's healthy. Actually, it's threatening to take over the whole garden in it's flowerless state. Argh!

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  23. Just wanted to thank you for viisting my blog and your gracious comment.

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  24. Goodness how I love sweet surprises like yours Catherine!

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  25. Oh deear, I pulled up some plants that I thought were Deadly Nightshade, but having seen your post I suspect they were actually Joe Pye Weed that Monica (a Garden Faerie) sent me - oops!

    I'm loving the colours in your garden and that Salvia is to die for! :)

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  26. Surprises in the Garden are the best! I find it awesome the way wildlife likes to plant seeds for me at times. Almost as if thanking me for providing sunflower seeds year round. The bee looks mighty happy! Is your dogwood young? If so, it may have taken it a while to produce berries. If you have squirrels, then that may be the reason why you never see berries on your dogwoods as well. They love to munch them off the branches of our trees. Pesky little critters….

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  27. Those are some awesome blooms. Love the aster and the color. Stunning rose. Good deal on the Penstemon and what an awesome bloom to boot. Have a good day Catherine.

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  28. Love the asters and roses not to mention the volunteers (courtesy the birds).

    PS..DH suggested tomatoes that mature in 60-70 days. Think he has a couple different ones from Russia if you'd like.

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  29. Well, according to these wonderful pictures there can not be too much wrong in your garden:)
    Have a great gardening week:)
    Charlotta

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  30. Well, according to these wonderful pictures there can not be too much wrong in your garden:)
    Have a great gardening week:)
    Charlotta

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  31. I would love to have your penstemon, I have some pale pink ones and they flowered all summer and are still going strong, so I'm now a real fan. how much water do yours get? Lovely sunflower!

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  32. Our sunflowers are late this year, but it was our fault for planting them late. They're so cheery though, I love having them around. I love the berries on your Dogwood, they look rather festive, and Lady Emma never disappoints!

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  33. Woohoo for those summer-sown annuals! I've had the same experience this year, things seem to be either much earlier or much later in blooming (depending on the plant) than what I remember in the past.

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  34. Your blooms look great and yup, it seems everybody is just so busy these days. Take care!

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  35. Brilliant photos today. They are so fun to look at, almost as if they can reach out and touch us through the computer screen.

    Jen @ Muddy Boot Dreams

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  36. Catherine,

    Glad your chocolate joe is budding! Mine is blooming, but now we are into monsoons! Drought or drench and nothing normal!

    Lovely garden blooms you have shown.

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  37. Isn't it uplifting to find blooms you either didn't expect or had just given up on?! They are all so pretty!

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  38. Hi Catherine. What a pretty penstemone. Great buy too. I just love that Lady Emma Hamilton rose of your. It is good to zone 6 and not 5 or I would have it on my never ending list.The cosmos are are pretty. Looks like a little spider and the bug are fighting for it. Love the asters. I hate mine because they always lay flat. mine are too spindly I guess. Do you pinch them back like you do Mums?
    Have a wonderful week.

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  39. Dear Catherine, I was so missing coming to visit your and inhale your beautiful garden... since aprox. a week I have been trying to access your blog but all the time there was a a big red warning telling it was better not enter cause the possibility of getting a virus!!! So today I could finally be here.
    muchos cariños,
    maria cecilia

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  40. Hi Catherine, so many nice looking surprices you've got there! The weeds are growing like cazy here and I haven't had time to be in the garden the way I juse to (that's a part of life to) I'll better try to catch up a bit this weekend / gittan

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  41. Those are the best surprises! I love finding flowers I never planted, curtsey of the wildlife. When flowers bloom that I had forgotten that I had planted, I feel a little bit like those squirrels running around burying acorns, just to forget about them later.
    We try not to use pesticides either and no mulch, so the weeds can be at bit intimidating at times. Now in September I finally feel as though my garden is looking good again after a hot July and August with nothing but weeds thriving.
    Lady Emma is so beautiful. I wish I could smell it.


    Annelie

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  42. Isn't it great when the birds do their own seed sowing - have you got barley or wheat growing aswell as I have them aswell as the sunflowers just now.

    I loved that cornus tree earlier in the year Catherine with its pink blossom and I never realised that they can produce "hip like" fruits aswell. Considering the blossom you had on that tree there must be a banqueting session going on in that tree with the birds ever day.

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  43. Love the asters especially Catherine. About all we have now is Autumn Joy sedum and some pyracantha berries that the birds are loving! We are getting much needed rain and finally we are out of the 90+ temps.

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  44. Great color on that snapdragon! Don't feel too bad about the weeds; soon winter will be here to snatch them all away, right? At least that's what I'm counting on. :-)

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  45. That Lady Emma Hamliton is just perfect. Your blog always inspires!
    Happy Autumn Harvest to you dear garden friend - Bren

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  46. Dear Catherine, What a number of free gifts! And, perhaps more importantly, what pleasant surprises your free gifts are since they are not, in my experience, usually so welcome. The Rose is looking wonderful for this time of year. A real showstopper!!

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  47. get to know some blogs like yours makes me love more flowers. I expect to know everyday more about them everyday!!!!!

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  48. That sunflower and those aster just light up the entire garden. Snapdragons are always a favorite. The garden looks glorious.

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  49. Just joined your blog. I love all your beautiful flowers, gives me hope that I can grow some like yours. I try to plant something different each year, but not always
    successful, but I keep trying. Antique Rose

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  50. Weeds are bad. Roses are good! Your Lady Emma Hamilton is beautiful.

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  51. Your gorgeous flowers show NO SIGN of fading even this late - no fair! Ha.

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  52. Those are awesome flowers and photos. You might want to post them in Noel's "hot, loud and proud meme" at www.aplantfanatic.blogspot.com. I especially love that blue and black salvia, i haven't seen that color here! How beautiful.

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  53. Your early fall garden looks more like a mid-summer garden. I'd love to have a few surprise re-seeders to show up in my garden right now. It definitely has an end of the season tired look to it.

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  54. Hello dear Catherine,

    Well, I studied all the wonderful photos and I love them. I don't know if one of your commenters already mentioned this, but the "fly" on the cosmos is one of my favorite garden helpers, the friendly flower or Syrphid fly. They are pollinators, but small ones, but their larvae are voracious aphid eaters. Good guys. I adore these small treasures. They hang in front of plants like they're on invisible threads.

    Love to you,

    Sharon Lovejoy Writes from Sunflower House and a Little Green Island

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  55. What a beautiful pictures you made from the flowers! I really love it!

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  56. Wow Catherine, what amazing pictures and wonderful surprises!!! Your garden looks fantastic as usual, the little fly-bee is cute. Your aster looks a lot like the one I'm still hoping will bloom. Your Joe Pye is an amazing colour. Great post!

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  57. sigh... just lovely. I will miss my gardens very much and all the cool things I've gathered. but I am enjoying other people's pics. Jennifer jennsthreegraces

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  58. Hi Catherine - from your photos, your garden is looking pretty good to me. That black and blue Salvia is stunning!

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