In a Vase on Monday: The garden giveth

Although I look forward to the flowers that bloom during our cool season, the transition is always difficult.  The color quotient in my garden drops dramatically as seeds, bulbs, and plug plants take their time to develop roots, shoots, and buds.

I welcome the relatively few plants that flower during the fall months, one of which is Barleria obtusa, also known as bush violet.  I'm surprised that I've never seen these plants in local garden centers.  I picked up my original plant at the botanic garden located roughly five miles from my home years ago during one of their fall plant sales - when they had such sales, as well as an in-house propagation unit staffed by volunteers.  Perhaps my biggest disappointment with that botanic garden, where I was once a volunteer, is that both the plant sales and the propagation unit have been abandoned.

I selected a single stem of lisianthus (Eustoma grandiflorum) to flatter the bush violets.  Planted as plugs early this year, I was surprised that the lisianthus produced new flowers as temperatures cooled, especially as the plants took a hit during September's heatwave. 

Back view

Top view

Clockwise from the upper left: Barleria obtusa, Centaurea 'Silver Feather', Correa 'Ivory Bells', Eustoma grandiflorum, Lavandula multifida, and Vitex trifolia

I collected a grab-bag of other flowers to fill a second vase focused on the few pink flowers currently found in my garden.

Two bulb flowers, an Amarine and a Lycoris, provided the starting point

Back view, fleshed out with stems of Leucadendron and Plectranthus scutellarioides (aka coleus)

Top view

Clockwise from the upper left: Amarine belladiva 'Emanuelle', Lycoris springeri, Plectranthus scutellarioides 'Florida Sun Rose', Leucadendron salignum 'Chief', Pelargonium hortorum 'Dynamo Hot Pink', Persicaria capitata, and Eriocapitella hupehensis (aka Japanese anemone)

It remains very dry here.  Last week's rain didn't materialize and there's nothing auspicious in the ten-day forecast either.  It's windy too, which makes the garden even drier and the marine layer isn't expected to pay us a return visit until at least Wednesday.  However, in the meantime the garden soldiers on with the assistance of our irrigation system and spotty hand-watering.  According to my records, November 5th marks six months since our last real rain in early May, which measured only 0.17/inch.  I'm not expecting the bounty of rain we got during the last two "water years" (measured from October 1st through September 30th of the following calendar year) but something along the lines of "normal" rain would be much appreciated.

For more IAVOM creations, visit Cathy at Rambling in the Garden.

All material © 2012-2024 by Kris Peterson for Late to the Garden Party

In a Vase on Monday: Nearing the end of the road

Another very warm weekend with bouts of wind caused more dahlias to keel over, and the prospects for seeing dahlias through the end of the month have grown dimmer.  There were plenty to fill vases this week, though.

My first arrangement was put together on Thursday.  My appointment with a tree service was set for 8am that morning and a pretty pink Lycoris was directly below one of the trees to be trimmed.  I cut it to keep it out of harm's way and decided to combine it with some dahlias in a vase.

Lycoris springeri was accompanied by the cheerful blooms of Dahlia 'Breakout'

I filled in the back view with stems of Dahlia 'Romantique'

Top view

Clockwise from the upper left: Dahlia 'Breakout', D. 'Romantique', Lycoris springeri, Prunus ilicifoilia, pale pink variety of Zinnia elegans 'Candy Mix', and another noID pink Zinnia

 

The rest of my flowers were cut on Sunday.  I've ignored Dahlia 'Belle of Barmera' for awhile so I focused my attention on those flowers.  The choices were thinner than I'd expected as the wind had taken out many of the taller flowers and others are now showing signs of the same deformities that have afflicted many of my 'Fairway Spur' Dahlias.  I ended up with a shorter, squatter arrangement than I'd envisioned.

I used a clear rectangular vase to hold the short-stemmed dahlias

Although I designated the other side of the vase (shown above) as the front, I think I like this one a little better.  I placed it on our dining room table where it's visible from both sides so it doesn't much matter.

Top view

Clockwise from the upper left: Cuphea 'Honeybells', Dahlia 'Belle of Barmera', 2 mutant flowers of D. 'Fairway Spur', Leptospermum 'Copper Glow', Zinnia elegans 'Benary's Giant Salmon Rose', and Z. e. 'Queen Lime Orange'

At long last Dahlia 'Iceberg' made an appearance last week so I wanted to use its flowers this week.  I'd originally planned to pair it with Dahlia 'Enchantress', which hasn't received the attention it deserves this season; however, only one flower proved to be suitable for inclusion in a vase so Dahlias 'Lavender Ruffles' and 'Mikayla Miranda' were called upon as substitutes.

I lost 2 buds when I cut the stems containing 2 'Iceberg' Dahlia blooms for this arrangement and I'm not sure I'll get any more before it comes time to pull up my tubers to make way for the bulbs, plugs, and seeds I plan to grow during our cool season.  The mildew on the dahlias' foliage also gets worse with every passing day.

I'd originally tucked one 'Enchantress' Dahlia bloom below the flowers of 'Lavender Ruffles' but it looked crowded so I removed it.  It's in a tiny vase in the kitchen window (not shown).

Top view

Clockwise from the upper left: Dahlia 'Iceberg', D. 'Lavender Ruffles', D. 'Mikayla Miranda', noID vine, Prostanthera ovalifolia 'Variegata', and Zinnia elegans 'Benary's Giant Purple'.  The noID vine resembles the foliage of the Pandorea jasminoides several feel away so it may be a seedling.

 

Dahlia 'Lady Darlene' had three flowers in full bloom so I cut those for a small vase to fill the spot on the kitchen island.

The blooms were just too pretty to allow to wither in the heat.  The Leucadendron 'Wilson's Wonder' foliage was recycled from one of last week's vases.

 

Our forecast shows an ongoing warm trend until the coming weekend when temperatures should drop back down into the more comfortable mid-to-low 70sF (23C) again.  Hopefully, they'll stay there.  Whether cooler temperatures will give the dahlias a late season boost or hurry their decline along remains to be seen.

 

For more IAVOM creations, visit Cathy at Rambling in the Garden.

All material © 2012-2023 by Kris Peterson for Late to the Garden Party

In a Vase on Monday: Summer sulk

We've reached that point in the year when the garden enters its sulky phase - or maybe it's not the garden so much as the gardener.  Early summer blooms like the Agapanthus and Shasta daisies are just about done while my dahlias and zinnias are taking their time again this year.  There are still flowers to be cut but not much to inspire my inner florist.  I'd been eyeing the flower stalk of a Hippeastrum, one of several bulbs I planted in the ground last fall in the hope they might naturalize in my garden, but it wasn't quite ready for take-off.  So I focused on the ever-dependable Grevillea 'Superb', which blooms year-round.

The Dahlia 'Dark Side of the Sun' I purchased by mail order a couple of months ago offered a single flower so I placed it front and center.  The plant has deep chocolate-brown foliage, which I believe accounts for its name.

Back view: Succulent Cotyledon orbiculata adds its bell-like blooms

Top view: The color of the 'Pink Meidiland' rose petals matched the styles and stamen of the Grevillea so I threw in a few of them

Clockwise from the upper left: Agonis flexuosa 'Nana', Cotyledon orbiculata, Dahlia 'Dark Side of the Sun', Grevillea 'Superb', Rosa 'Pink Meidiland', and Tanacetum parthenium

On my spin through my garden, I noticed a smattering of blooms on Grevillea sericea, which I haven't used much, if at all, in the past year so I let it guide me in assembling flowers for a second arrangement.

Although the Grevillea kicked things off, the colors in Lycoris sprengeri 'Electric Blue' led me to add blue flowers in addition to the pink ones

Back view

Top view: The Lycoris buds start off pink but the flowers develop blue color as they age

Clockwise from the upper left: Angelonia 'Archangel White', two shades of Eustoma grandiflorum (aka Lisianthus), Prostanthera ovalifolia 'Variegata', Scabiosa columbaria 'Flutter Rose Pink' and 'Flutter Deep Blue', and Lycoris sprengeri 'Electric Blue'

Last week's Amaryllis belladonna and a couple Lisianthus were still in good shape so I popped them into a small vase with foliage I'd cut for the first arrangement and elected not to use. 

The foliage I added to the Amaryllis and Lisianthus is Leucadendron 'Jubilee Crown'

We've been lucky thus far in the sense that it hasn't been really hot here, although it's been unusually humid.  Monsoon rains and flash floods have plagued areas to the east of us but all we've received in terms of rain was 2/100ths of an inch almost two weeks ago.  There's a chance of rain this morning but I'm not counting on it.  It would be nice, though.

For more IAVOM posts, visit  Cathy at Rambling in the Garden.

All material © 2012-2021 by Kris Peterson for Late to the Garden Party