3/29/19
Tag: bulbs
Water feature?
I’ve been designing elemental gardens at the edges of the main sacred space, between the Dragons. I’ve been having trouble figuring out what to do for water. What I want is a shallow fountain that will continually circulate water and mist it downward from a trellis-like support above. I’m still trying to talk my husband into that idea.
I set up some temporary bird baths to bring water to the area instead. Then I noticed that the city was cutting down a large dead cottonwood tree at the end of the block. So I asked Jester (who’s time I paid for) and my fired Don to come over and help me get enough log segments out of the ditch under the tree to make a better display in the water feature.
We dug holes to stand the logs in, according to the individual size of each log, added some gravel for drainage and tucked in the logs.
I filled a set of fancy matching pots that I have been saving for the right project with spring bulbs, and then tucked them inside of some larger black plastic pots, adding mulch for insulation between the pots.
The fancy pots will get dug out of the bigger pots and placed on top of the logs. Their flowers reaching upwards and green vines hanging down mimicking water flow. we’ll have to see what it looks like.
After the bulbs faded, I replaced them with annuals. (2016)
Bulbs and Tubers
I spent a lot of time on my hands and knees last fall planting bulbs and tubers. I planted tulips in the front yard:
I planted them around the cupola,
and around the womb of the earth.
I planted them in patches all over the north and south berms.
Since the tulips don’t bloom all summer long, I planted twinkles and drumsticks and kaleidoscope lilies.
And added some purple Iris to Mom’s yellow ones, just for fun.
Adding color
Daffodils and tulips
White tulips planted under the catalpa
The willow garden is really coming along. I planted dwarf stella ‘d oro yellow daylilies at the edge of the rock border, and more of Aunt Judy’s giant orange day lilies behind those. Dark purple salvia, and Russian sage.
The 3 sand cherry shrubs are filling out nicely, and the willows have reached about 3 and a half feet tall. Brian bought a second bird feeder and I painted it to match the first one. I added Golden Spirea, mother’s wort and lovage herbs (because they are prolific and take up space), and two beds of my Mother’s yellow and white Iris.
I have no idea what the name of this Iris is.
Anyone?
Aunt Judy’s day lilies – south bed
The Dragons be gettin all fancy
Last fall I decided to add some bulbs to the Dragon Garden. I planted about 150 bulbs in each of the four elemental dragon beds. After the big pampas grass gets cut back in the early spring, nothing is growing out back, and the Dragons look so stark. Each bed has a different variety of short, early blooming bulbs like snow drops or winter aconite. Then the hyacinth should come up next, followed by daffodils, tulips and lastly the Asiatic lilies. I tried to color coordinate the bulbs with the elemental representation of each dragon. Air should be white and yellows. Fire, yellow, orange and reds. Water, white, blues and lavenders. And Earth, a mix of color.
I planted bulbs that would bloom early spring through mid summer. The mid summer lilies did not come up well, maybe they need another year in the ground, we’ll see.
As fate would have it, some of the bulbs I ordered did not look like their picture, or maybe they were mislabeled. Of course, I’m not going to dig them out and send them back – I think the bulb companies are banking on that.
I used a different on-line company than I have used before, because Breck’s didn’t have all the colors I wanted. Never the less, I think they turned out beautiful.