Return of the Roses

So where were the roses? The roses didn't go anywhere, but they suffered the yearly attack of the Japanese Beetles. This year, I tried a different approach in caring for the roses during the invasion.

These are Knock Out™ Roses, which means they are pretty tough and bloom for a long time. As soon as I saw the first beetle, I cut off all of the blooms and a foot of foliage on all seven of the rose bushes. It wasn't pretty! Without the blooms, new buds and new growth to attract the beetles, there were fewer of the pests.

When the beetle population dwindled to just a few, I started up the drip irrigation for an hour a day (we're on a well) until we had a good rainfall. Just prior to the heavy rainfall, I fertilized the roses. Within two weeks of this boost, the roses are now producing new foliage and plenty of buds.

In past years, I've tried picking and dunking the beetles into a bucket of soapy water every morning. It's unpleasant work, tedious and is rather disgusting to do before breakfast!

I've tried organic sprays, too. That required mixing and spraying in the evening when the temperatures were cool. I had to reapply the spray every few days, especially after a rainfall. It worked fairly well, but since the mixture couldn't be sprayed on the blooms, I had to cut those off anyway.

This year's method was the easiest. While the roses looked bad for a month, they have completely recovered and will bloom until Thanksgiving.

This method of beetle protection was without stress, at no cost and definitely organic. I'll always be looking for better solutions. The only other thing that I could think of was to cover the roses with a fine mesh netting. Maybe next year?

Photo and words by Freda Cameron; Location: home garden; July 2009

Garden Inspiration: Black and White Flowers

I never thought about combining black and white flowers until I visited the Giverny Musée des Impressionismes in France. The garden worked well as a separate garden room within low walls and hedges. The space was tranquil and not jarring as I would have expected with such contrast. I liked it, but the flowers weren't labeled, so we have to guess as potential candidates for this color scheme.

Obviously, some of the "black" flowers are very dark red or purple enough to look black. There were many white and black tulips, black pansies, white forget-me-nots and what looked like varieties of shasta daisies and erigeron.

The trick to finding the right white and black flowers is probably in identifying plants that will bloom at the same time and with the same growing conditions with regards to soil, water and light.



What went through my head was the meticulous planting of the interspersed black and white tulips! The gardeners had to keep track of the separate colors. They most likely measured the distance between the bulbs in order to establish the meandering design.

Planting annuals in bloom would be easier for establishing the design, but planting enough to create the masses would be a tedious task. These gardens (I'm guessing) were probably planted by volunteer gardeners.

Getting out of our own gardens to see the creations of others gives us new ideas. Do you have a black and white flower garden? Do you want one? If so, what plants have you/would you select for your garden?


Photos and story by Freda Cameron; Location: Giverny (village), France; May 2009

Zinnias - An Annual Event

This is the first summer that I've sown zinnia seeds. The success rate and beauty of these annuals has convinced me that these are great flowers for the garden and for cutting. Zinnias have earned their way into my garden from now on!

I've focused on the taller varieties such as Benary's Giant Purple and Giant Lilac as well as Lilac Emperor Cactus Flowered and a few other miscellaneous types.

The tall varieties that are 30-36 inches tall fit in well with perennial salvias such as 'Black & Blue' and 'Mystic Spires'. The zinnias are also easy to mix with other plants with spire-shaped blooms such as agastache 'Heather Queen' and 'Purple Pygmy'.

This year's color scheme has been based on deep rose/magenta to light pink and purple blooms. I also have a few of the green blooms and have recently sown Giant White (not yet in bloom).

As sometimes happens with seeds, there is one "stray" in the mix, but it is such a pleasant golden yellow/orange zinnia that I want to use it in a mass planting.

I will mix hot colors of zinnias in the butterfly garden next summer. I've not had a problem with deer eating the zinnias, but the seedlings must be protected from rabbits until the flowers are tall enough to be out of reach.

Since early May, I've been direct sowing the seeds about every two weeks in the cottage garden and even out in the deer resistant garden to see how quickly they germinate and bloom. I try to sow the seeds right after, or right before, a good rainfall. Keeping the seeds moist in full sun works well for starting the zinnia seeds.

With annuals this pretty and this reliable, I may move a few perennials from one of the cottage garden beds to make room for more zinnias. Next year, I won't be so tentative about when and where to plant the zinnias! I want huge mass plantings for more impact instead of a scattering here and there.

One more thing... I love to photograph these blooms!


Photos and words by Freda Cameron; Location: home garden; July 2009.

Beware an Email Scam

Over the last few months, I've received the exact same message from folks who have my email address. The message was roughly "I'm stuck in England without my wallet, please send cash." Since I had a long career in information technology (IT) I knew a scam when I saw one.

While the spam scams look like legitimate email accounts of people you know, these are actually spoofed addresses. I know how to look at the full message header of an email to see the real addresses. These emails did not come from the person or the email address that you recognize!

In other words, if you reply to that scam message, you are not replying to the real owner of the email! You are replying to a hidden email address. Then... they have YOUR verification that your email address is real. To email the REAL person about the email, you need to create a separate email message and tell them.

DO NOT REPLY to the spoofed email! Delete the message. Write a new and separate email message to the owner of the account to tell them what you received. They can change the password to their account and inform their email provider.

Since the address looks like a legitimate email address, if you mark it as spam, then you won't receive the emails from the real owners of the addresses.

How does a scammer/spammer get your email address? Typically what happens is that someone opens an email that contains an attachment or image that unleashes a malicious program. That program "reads" the entire contact list stored in the address book... first names, last names and email addresses. The program collects the data and sends it back to the spammer/scammer who is then able to then "write" emails to every address collected.

If you get a scam email, it doesn't necessarily really mean that the owner's email account was hacked. It could be that their email address was picked up in someone else's contact list. What could also be happening is that one of the social media websites (forums, chat rooms, etc.) could have been hacked to obtain all of the email addresses.

What does the scam text inside the email message say?

†††
Hello,

How are you doing? Hope all is well with you and your family, I am sorry I didn't inform you about my traveling to England for a Seminar/conference.

I need a favor from you as soon as you receive this email, I misplaced my wallet on my way to the hotel where my money, and other valuable things were kept. Can you urgently assist me with a soft loan of $2,600 US Dollars to sort-out my hotel bills and get myself back home. You are the only one I can trust with this, please can this be between us? You have my word; I will refund you as soon as I return.

I will appreciate whatever you can afford, I'll pay you back as soon as I return I promise, Let me know if you can assist, to enable me send you the details to use in sending the money through western union.

With gusto,

†††

Whenever an email sounds suspicious, it probably is.

When I first starting seeing this scam, I removed my email address from my blog. That's why my "Drop me a note" widget is missing from my blog. It is also a possibility that a "bot" crawled the blogs looking for standard email addresses and the email tag within the html source code of the web pages.

I don't know if anyone has received one of these from my email address, but just in case... I'm not in England either. I'm home!

Freda Cameron

Garden Fresh Meals

I could just sip from this hummingbird feeder, but I'd rather have garden fresh meals. My gardener works very hard to grow flowers just for me, so let's see what's blooming in my garden.


I have to start my day early in the morning. I'm very methodical as I check out all the blooms before the competition shows up. More hummingbirds have been trying to move into my garden lately, so I have to sit up in the top of the trees where I can stand guard over my food source.


My gardener grows salvia in so many different colors. She has red, white, purple, dark blue, light blue and these magenta blooms. Because the deer don't eat the flowers that she grows for me, there's plenty of nectar available here.


Although I love all of the salvias, the one called 'Black & Blue' is my favorite! My gardener knows this and is growing fifteen of these cobalt blue salvias just for me. Don't those flowers look delicious?


There are also several pretty colors of bee balm (monarda) growing in this garden. Those are tasty, but they don't bloom all summer long. It's a good thing that my gardener grows other flowers for me. Her husband keeps the hummingbird feeders filled when there aren't many flowers in bloom. My gardener recently deadheaded the monarda. Maybe they'll bloom again. I noticed new buds forming on the plants today.


Of course, my gardener grows a lot of hummingbird mint for me, too. I've noticed people call it agastache. It smells so good. I can't decide which flavor I like the best, but the 'Purple Pygmy', 'Salmon & Pink' and the 'Heather Queen' have perfect flowers for sipping nectar. The agastache blooms all summer long and lasts until I migrate south in the autumn.

If more people would grow hummingbird food, maybe I could have this garden all to myself!


Photos and words by Freda Cameron; Location: home garden; July 2009

Wrong Label - Buy When Plant is in Bloom!

I didn't learn my lesson! Two years ago, a friend and I both bought gaillardia 'Golden Goblin' that turned out to NOT be that yellow blanket flower. I shopped the same nursery several times this year and came home with more 'Golden Goblin' in small cell packs without blooms.

Those plants started blooming this week and they are NOT yellow! I have to move them out of the bed they are in and move them to the hot colors of the butterfly garden. Again. I still haven't moved all of the other blanket flowers from the first mislabeling mistake.

This is a rant of mine. I've been bitten by the mislabeling of plants too many times. It's difficult to dig up plants and take them back to a nursery for replacement. Should I? Would you? I've contacted mail order nurseries in the past and gotten replacements. They were very nice about it and didn't want me to return the plants.

These mislabeled gaillardia were purchased as small cell packs of four plants for less than one large plant. While I'm upset about my waste of time and garden space, that's not a significant amount of money to go get replacements - it would be a two hour roundtrip and I know that I'd just spend more money on other plants.


Does 'Golden Goblin' really exist? Yes. I bought a few of those plants in bloom (for $4.99 in large pots) at another nursery this year. The blooms are lovely, especially with the deep blue salvia 'Mystic Spires'. It was worth the higher cost to get the correct plants!

Gaillardia 'Golden Goblin' and all other varieties of blanket flower have been deer and rabbit resistant for me, planted at the top of the garden edge along the meadow within easy reach of all critters. This perennial is a lovely soft golden yellow color through-and-through. GG is rated for zones 3-9 and is a bit more than 12 inches high in my garden.

Back to the garden... I have gaillardia to move!


Photos and words by Freda Cameron; Location: home garden; July 2009

Need a Deer Fence Around Your Flower Garden?

You don't necessarily need a fence to keep the deer from eating your flower garden. It all depends upon what you plant and how you plant it.

Yes, deer will eat a lot of plants like hostas, phlox, hydrangeas, daylilies and other favorite flowers. To grow plants that deer like, you do need a fence or a high-maintenance repellent plan. Spraying plants repeatedly with repellents is costly and time-consuming. And, just when you miss an application of repellent, the deer will move in and munch the plants. Do you really want bars of soap hanging on your plants? Do you really like to go through electric wire to see your flowers?

To garden happily alongside deer, give up on what they like and find your new favorites among the many deer resistant plants.

There are lots of colorful flowers you can grow that deer won't destroy. My favorite perennials are agastache, salvia, nepeta and gaillardia. Cleome, snapdragons, marigolds and larkspur are my favorite annuals. Buddleia, osmanthus fragrans, clumping bamboo and crepe myrtle are my favorite deer resistant ornamentals. Herbs like thyme, lavender, rosemary, oregano and basil grow in my gardens. Bulbs include daffodils, Dutch irises, allium and Spanish bluebells.

Deer will sample a lot of plants, so even the most deer resistant plants may have an occasional missing bloom or leaf. However, the deer aren't as likely to do sufficient damage to keep you from enjoying the flowers and foliage of select plants. In times of severe drought or overcrowding of habitat - when no food is available in the wild, starving deer will eat unusual plants in order to survive.

I've also learned that a large garden that is wide and long, with no clear path for the deer to travel is less likely to be entered. I do have stepping stone paths through my garden and the deer know where those are located. However, since I grow deer resistant plants, their efforts to come into the garden haven't been rewarding. What's the point of going to a restaurant if you don't like what's on the menu? The deer have learned that my garden isn't appetizing or filling.

To block the deer path that was established before I started the garden, I planted large woody ornamentals such as clumping (not running) bamboo, ornamental grasses, bronze fennel, rosemary, buddleia and mass plantings of tall agastache 'Blue Fortune' and 'Salmon and Pink'. These tall and wide ornamental plantings have now grown close together to form a "green" deer fence that cuts off their old trail.

Deer do not like to enter an area where they cannot see an exit. They do not like to be trapped or cornered. By forming "walls" with the taller deer resistant plants, I've blocked the view and not given them anything interesting to nibble.

My deer resistant gardens were planted in 2007. I am still adding and subtracting plants for design and weather conditions, rather than the deer.

I don't stress out over the deer in my garden. I can relax and enjoy the flowers.


Photos and story by Freda Cameron; Location: Home Garden; July 2009

Not in France? Enjoy Chocolate Croissants at Home

To me there is nothing more delicious than a pain au chocolat, or chocolate croissant. These tasty croissants are best when freshly baked and enjoyed in France. The locals line up outside their favorite bakery (boulangerie or patisserie) to buy their pain au chocolat on Sunday mornings.

Is it possible to have a croissant culinary experience at home that comes close to the French experience? If you have a Trader Joe's® nearby, then you are in luck! My friend in Berkeley had told me to try the frozen croissants from TJ's.

I was skeptical about the taste and texture since France is one of our favorite vacation destinations and a place where I've consumed many fantastic chocolate croissants. They are quite addictive. Fortunately, I walk so much when in France that I can honestly say that consuming croissants on a daily basis led to weight loss, not weight gain!

To bake the frozen croissants, remove them from the package before going to bed at night. Place them on a baking sheet on top of parchment paper. Let them rise overnight, uncovered. Make sure you leave at least four inches of space between the frozen pastries, as they more than triple in size once they have risen overnight. The next morning, bake the croissants for 25 minutes in a 350° oven. It doesn't get any easier or better - unless you're in France!

Voila! Bon appétit!


No free croissants were received in exchange for writing this story. However, a few were consumed! I'm out walking now. Photos and words by Freda Cameron.

My Favorite Mistake: Hardy Ageratum

It all started with six tiny mail-order perennials. They were so small that I almost needed a magnifying glass to see them. I had read the warnings about these aggressive little plants and that it would be a mistake to turn them loose in my garden. Two years later, the hardy ageratum has spread to a swath that is probably fifty feet long!

And, I like it!

Eupatorium coelestinum 'Wayside' or hardy ageratum, is similar in appearance to the fluffy little puffs of annual ageratum. The blooms are a soft, light blue that won't upset garden color schemes.

Rated for full to part sun in zones 5-8, this ageratum tolerates clay soil, is deer resistant and can handle wet locations such as my rain garden. It is a good height at around 15 inches, making it a nice edger. The stems of ageratum can blacken if the soil dries too much, but it blooms over a very long time in the summer. It is easy to transplant at any time with sufficient watering to get it established. Ageratum is also easy to pull up if it expands into unwanted spaces.

If planting hardy ageratum was a mistake, it's my favorite one so far!


Photos and story by Freda Cameron

Host Plants for Butterflies; Loved By Bees

The garden is buzzing with bee activity as they feed on flower blooms for nectar throughout the gardens. Honey bees and bumblebees are not aggressive. As much as I try to convince them that deadheading is necessary for certain plants to rebloom, they still don't like to give up a bloom. I try to gently shove them away with a gloved hand or tap the plant stalks with a trowel to get them to fly to another plant. The helpful bees are necessary for crops and flowers, so these are welcome guests in my garden.

Foeniculum vulgare 'Purpureum' (bronze fennel) is a wonderful host plant for the Black Swallowtail Butterfly caterpillars. I have four very tall fennel plants in bloom right now. This strong, sturdy and fragrant perennial also makes a great "deer fence" when planted closely together along the outside edges of the garden. The deer may nip a few of the tasty and tender fronds on the sides, but not as much as the human visitors to my garden! When allowed to flower, bronze fennel will reseed in a garden, so be sure to pull the unwanted seedlings in the spring to give to someone else to start a butterfly garden. Bronze fennel is a perennial in zones 4-9.


The milkweed plants are blooming for the bees, but I'm yet to see more than one Monarch butterfly this year. The milkweed plants, both asclepias incarnata and asclepias tuberosa, are ready to serve as food for the Monarch caterpillars.

Milkweed is another deer and rabbit resistant perennial and all parts are poisonous, but not to the Monarchs. The Monarchs use this as protection, since eating milkweed makes the caterpillars and butterflies taste bad to birds! The orange tuberosa is a perennial in zones 4-10 for full sun and lean soil. It usually grows to around 24-26 inches in height. The white and rose blooms of swamp milkweed are perennial in zones 3-8 and prefers to be in moist soil that doesn't dry out. Both plants are late to emerge in the spring, sometimes as late as June here in zone 7, so be sure to mark the locations in the garden.

Where are the Monarch butterflies? Chapel Hill, North Carolina is at latitude 35.94°N, so I can expect to see the Monarch migration here in late September through early October. I usually see the Monarchs as early as August. To find out more about the peak Monarch migration dates, visit the helpful Monarch Watch site.


Photos and words by Freda Cameron; Location: home garden; July 2009

Summertime Blues: Perennial Color

There are so many blue flowers for spring, but what blue perennials can you grow in the heat of the summer? There are quite a few perennials listed as "blue" but they look like purple or lavender to me. However, there are a few beautiful blues among the choices for deer resistant, full sun, zone 7 gardens.

A few weeks ago, I fell in love with a Blue Satin® hibiscus syriacus, which is commonly called a Rose of Sharon. I had to bring this plant home! The foliage is a beautiful dark green that sets off the incredible, large blue flowers. The blooms close up at night and open each morning. I've planted this new addition along the path in the front deer resistant garden. This is a deciduous shrub that can be trained into a small tree and is suitable for zones 5-8. The hybiscus is listed as deer resistant, so I'm putting it to the test! I tucked it in behind a mass planting of perennial blue ageratum, eupatorium colestrum 'Wayside'.

A most unusual azure blue is perennial bog sage (salvia uliginosa) that will grow in water as well as boggy or somewhat dry soil. It is deer resistant and is favored by bees and butterflies. The blue and white flowers seem to disappear as the day goes by, but are blooming again each morning. I've never had to cut mine back for additional blooms, but that's the suggestion for maintenance of this salvia. Bog sage is rated for zones 6-9 and spreads rapidly by stolons that are easy to pull should you find yourself with too much. Like the perennial ageratum, you only need one of these plants to create a mass planting within a year or two.

A hummingbird favorite is salvia guaranitica 'Black & Blue'. I am working on the creation of several mass plantings throughout the gardens. This deer resistant salvia may be sampled by deer, but rarely will I be missing more than one bloom stalk. Since the salvia is fine with being pinched back, there is no harm done. The foliage is very lush and a light green color, making it a nice backdrop for bog sage. If you like butter yellow and cobalt blue color combinations, this is the salvia to use. I'm trying out gaillardia 'Golden Goblin' this year for the first time. If it grows well and is truly deer resistant, then I will add more of this yellow flower around the salvia 'Black & Blue'.

Zones 3-8 with hot, dry conditions may like echinops 'Ritro' (globe thistle). This prickly plant is a beauty in bloom. I like it with burgundy foliage plants such as crepe myrtle 'White Chocolate' as well as rose violet and purple blooms of cleome (a reseeding annual) and agastache 'Golden Jubilee'. Although I've never had this plant munched by deer while it is in bloom, they have eaten the foliage to the ground after I deadheaded the plant. It comes back every year, so this isn't catastrophic. In fact, the foliage gets a bit ugly here in late summer, so the deer do a nice clean up task for me! I'd like to have more globe thistle, but I've had trouble getting this plant established when using small plants. The hardiest plant was purchased in a 6" pot two years ago from a local nursery.

I went overboard and into the deep blue when I brought home six salvia 'Mystic Spires Blue' this year! Once I got these plants home in my garden, they appeared so dark. I still planted three together in the cottage garden, but decided to place the other three far apart along the top edge of my deer resistant garden where I could try to place them with lighter colors such as the yellow/green foliage of osmanthus 'Goshiki' and with yellow blooms of gaillardia 'Golden Goblin' and coreopsis 'Creme Brulee'. I'll have to experiment a bit with this deep blue color. This is supposed to be a shorter version of 'Indigo Spires' (I have one of those in my deer resistant garden, too) and should provide a long bloom season in zones 7-9.

I also grow two varieties of caryopteris that will have blue blooms in late summer. 'Longwood Blue' has silver foliage and a nice, mounding habit and is a great deer resistant, drought tolerant shrubby plant for zones 5-8. I am seeing buds forming on the three caryopteris in my garden. For several years, I've had 'Snow Fairy' in the garden. This one hasn't bloomed very well for me since the first year, but the variegated green and white foliage is nice when used with other plants with dark blooms in blue, orange or red. I am using three 'Longwood Blue' with a mix of agastache that bloom pink, purple and salmon. I have another beside an 'Adonis Blue' buddleia and a salvia 'Mystic Spires Blue' that are behind a mass planting of pale yellow coreopsis 'Creme Brulee'.

On a hot summer day, cool blue is a refreshing color for the garden!


Photos and words by Freda Cameron; Location: home garden; July 2009

Compare Photos: Sun and Clouds

What a difference a day can make! From drought and sun yesterday to cloudy with heavy rains today. This weather change provided an opportunity to show the difference in the way flower colors appear under the two different conditions.

The first photo of agastache mix in the deer resistant garden taken on a cloudy morning shows the true colors of the blue, purple and pink blooms. The foliage colors are accurate in the cloudy photo, too. This is the garden design that I intended!

The second photo was taken around the same time of day, but on a very sunny morning. The golden light from the summer morning sunshine makes the flowers appear orange and yellow and not representative of the true colors.





These photos provide excellent examples of why I like to visit gardens on cloudy days, such as my photos of Monet's Gardens at Giverny, France.

The sun shines on my home garden as soon as it rises in the summer. The summer sun travels straight overhead during the day, making it difficult for me to take accurate photos. Besides the welcome rain, I welcome the clouds as an opportunity to record the true colors of my garden!


Photos and words by Freda Cameron; Location: home garden; July 2009

Staying Alive: Agastache During A Drought

Where's the rain now? After too much rain early in the season, we've now gone weeks without any significant rainfall. Digging in the soil, it is totally dry. Water doesn't soak into the ground in such baking heat in the full sun gardens.

This dry weather is another reminder that planting drought-tolerant plants is the wisest. Agastache is my favorite perennial for these tough, summer conditions. Another bonus is the fact that it is deer and rabbit resistant.

I've added several new varieties this year. My favorite for color is the new 'Summer Sky' PPAF that has blue-purple spikes on dark foliage. The blue comes through better in person than in a photo where it is surrounded by raspberry pink flowers.

The form of 'Summer Sky' is a beautiful, low grower of 20 inches that looks great in a companion planting with agastache of different heights and flower shapes. I like it with the additional companions of echinops 'Ritro' and the annual cleome 'Spirit Violetta'.

I have found only two of these plants at local nurseries. Both are at the top of the deer resistant garden in full sun for ten hours a day. This agastache is rated for the warmer zones of 8-10, but if 'Summer Sky' overwinters well here in zone 7, I'll do my best to add more of this agastache to the top border.



Photos and words by Freda Cameron; Location: home garden; July 2009

A Commotion: Gaillardia 'Tizzy'

Not boring and quite the performer, Gaillardia Commotion® 'Tizzy' PPAF is winning favor in my garden. The blooms are a beautiful, deep orange with such an interesting petal design. This is a fancy blanket flower!

I added three of these blanket flowers for a big punch of orange by the patio in the fragrance garden. Only one week after deadheading, all three plants have produced a great display of perfect blooms. These were in bloom when I planted them at the end of May in a new garden bed with lavender, salvia and agastache.

The second bloom is just as impressive as the first bloom! I used cordless hand trimmers to easily deadhead the plants. Gaillardia 'Tizzy' is rated for zones 5-8 and is drought tolerant once established. The height should be 18 inches, making a clump that is 24 inches wide.

Since I don't have these out beside the meadow, I can't say for sure if these are as deer resistant as other blanket flowers that I grow. Deer can access these perennials, but they have to cross the patio to reach them. That's not an impossible feat for deer as they recently walked past these blanket flowers to reach a tall planter on the waterfall patio where they munched impatiens, heuchera and coleus!

How many times will 'Tizzy' bloom this year? The grower says that it will bloom continuously May through October, if deadheaded. I'll report back later...


Photo and words by Freda Cameron

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Annuals Among Perennials

It has taken me several decades of gardening to finally embrace the idea of growing annuals in the ground instead of containers. I've always been a perennial gardener. I decided to give seed sowing a try this year to help fill in the blanks between perennials. I also bought a few annual plants such as coleus, impatiens, ageratum and angelonia.

If I continue to add perennials, I will have far too many as they mature. I can't really give away plants from my garden because we are in a fire ant quarantine zone. In other words, I don't want to passalong ants with the plants!

The larkspur blooms in May, that sprouted from seeds sown in October, have been great performers. I deadheaded a few for repeat blooms and have allowed others to reseed in the gardens.

The zinnias and marigolds are now beginning to bloom. I've been sowing the seeds every few weeks to continue producing fresh plants and blooms, hopefully up until frost.



The hot colors (yellow, orange, red) of the marigolds are planted in the butterfly garden to fill in around salvia, gaillardia, agastache, crocosmia, and nepeta.

The cool colors (purple, magenta, white, green) of zinnias have been sown in the cottage garden. The rabbits will eat zinnias, so I keep spraying repellent on the young plants once a week.

I don't know why my cleome seeds didn't germinate. I sowed those in the early spring without results. I just planted a few more seeds to try, but I think I'll try sowing them in October this year to see if I have better luck.

If the zinnia and marigold displays work well this year, then sowing annuals may become an annual summer event!




Photos and words by Freda Cameron