thanks for the encouragement.

Show Us Your Landscape and Garden Photos - August

The link is to last year's New England forums August photo thread. The first post has links to the previous 2 years, also. I don't know how informative last year's is because of the drought, but three year's worth should have something useful.

Good idea, brilliant in fact!

Something is odd here. There was a long, useful post and it is gone. If the writer deleted it, I can't imagine way. If Houzz did that's even weirder.There was nothing offensive or inappropriate. just a houzz glitch>

mad gallica, did you see it when you posted?

Marie, I missed the long useful post, but one easy option is to divide things, or buy perennials, but keep them in pots in the shade to recover, and then turn that area into a potted plant highlight. You’d need lots of pots, but for me it would be easier than trying to plant in the ground where you can’t control sunlight. At least with pots you can keep them close and easy to water after division. I have several hostas in pots mainly because I haven’t figured out where to put them and I figured they might as well make the house entrance pretty in the meantime! Here’s an example that I just put together yesterday. I bought these small golden ferns as houseplants but have not planted them. Stuck them in a pot with extra annuals that didn’t fit into other annual arrangements. These astilbes were given to me by a friend and I don’t know what to do with them yet. Hosta in back in pot, waiting for its place (who knows?), begonia that serves as houseplant in winter, Gold Heart Dicentra. It was absolutely dumb luck that the red color of the astilbe perfectly match the annual with the ferns. In fact, I didn’t even notice it until yesterday when I put together the arrangement. Anyway, long way of saying pots might be easy. The astilbe are in standard black garden pots, which you could easily hide behind prettier pots.

I don't like the idea of dividing perennials in July. I'd use pots of wave petunias in a lovely shade (I like the blue ones) to add color then solicit advice from your friends on how to use the new space from the conifer's loss. Gardeners love to talk plants and it will be a great conversation starter. Just clean up and add color pots - then bake cookies.

Marie, I did see the post. It was from a professional designer in California. While I didn't think it was technically spam, it did strike me as a bit spammy, so I'm not shocked that other people flagged it for deleting. I'm also not sure how useful I thought it was. There were a lot of suggestions on where to waste money, and unrealistic timelines on how fast things will grow back/fill in in a cold climate. So one of the reason I posted those links was to bring the thread back to reality. Also, I think they are useful, and one day I really need to go through them and look for things that bloom in August and September. My garden currently pretty much ends around July 4th, and I go inside for the rest of the summer.

Thanks MG

i am suffering with a bad summer cold (which is keeping me from the garden on a 90*day) so i read the long…useful? post quickly before i fell asleep again! perhaps i confused long for useful?

You are a more discerning reader than i am (at least now)

what signaled spam? i Contractors post here all the time with useless advice.

Do you have indoor plants? How about bringing them outside just for your event and strategically place them near where you’ll sit?

Everyone’s gardens are a work in progress so the garden club members will understand!

Set a beautiful table with pressed linens, nice dishes and an arrangement with flowers and ferns cut from your garden. It will be delightful!

Also- ask for potted plants from your neighbors and friends to borrow for the day! Even plants like to take a mini vacation ha ha ha!

The post was a bad combination of rah-rah non-information and a commercial link. I just remembered that including links to your website is considered a no-no.

Marie Tulin - I hope you’re feeling better…! We’ve never hosted a ’Garden Tea’ but were - many years ago now - in the local Horticultural society’s garden tour. That made us a bit nervous but was a good incentive to speed up adding new garden areas (e.g. the north alley was all grass the year before the tour…) and do things like tidy up edging and thoroughly weed the beds and paths. You can tell who are the ’real’ gardeners visiting by what they talk/ask about. It turned out to be a very pleasant experience so I hope you enjoy it too too.

As for late blooming plants, I always aim to add those to the garden - spring, June, and earlyJuly are the easy parts :-) One of the reasons I have a number of hardy hibiscuses is because they are late bloomers. Ditto re the hardy mums I have that start off white-flowered and fade to pink. Some roses are good for late-season flowers. I like the ’Pink Beauty’ potentilla shrubs - which are members of the rose family without thorns! They bloom from early summer to fall with deeper pink flowers when it is cool, fading to almost white in the heat of the summer, going back to deep pink as temperatures cool down again. Pay attention to what blooms late in your area and add them if beeded. And then there are the things with interesting fall fruit and/or foliage… I’m sure all of that is something that is familiar to you when you are feeling better! Have fun!

Hi Marie! Sounds like fun! If you don’t want to sweat that huge area ahead of time, you can pose it as a question to the garden group to get their thoughts on the ”blank slate”. Might be a lot of fun to put all your garden heads together to see what ideas pop up.

I think most gardeners realize there are always areas in a garden that are works in progress. They will swoon over every other area in that gorgeous garden of yours!!

I definitely thought of that, Susan.

i dont think i can pull it together in any meaningful way.

my might be better spent cleaning the place up

Few gardens look good in August - you're a hero for hosting an August garden walk. Try to relax and enjoy spending time with your gardening friends.

Hello All

thank you all for your thoughtful suggestions. I am raring to go this morning but we had sheets of rain yesterday and obviously everything is soaked. i dont want to step on the soil.

My beautiful Russian Hollyhocks are splayed and flat.

I’ve never grown them before and did not know what i was missing. That clear sunny yellow in such quantity is like nothing Ive ever seen.

To answer a few questions:

i have one houseplant a decrepit Christmas catus that doesnt even bloom.

I’d have to think more about a ””staging “ project” i dont have many pretty pots or even clay ones. ( ive could certainly go on freecycle and find some)

if there was a way to raise pots high enough it would be fun to do that in tempoary spots……but i have more pressing thins to do with my plants.

My husband used to be able pull off projects in his wood shop . unfortunately after his strokes he cant. i really miss having that “service“ available

o be continued.

To raise pots off the ground, I set a large empty one upside down on the ground (like a stand) and a medium one on top of it.

But Cecily,

Yes. That would work in a small area but this is a big space. i could perhaps do that with plants that are waiting to be planted in fall.

i had reconciled myself to ”come see it as it is” then got hostess with the least-ess anxiety.

Is the soil fairly level in the large space where the conifer stood? Could you throw down some mulch, move a couple of benches or Adirondack chairs there and call it a seating area?

Adjacent to it is a sitting area with wrought iron table ttc.

wish i could say ”bingo you’ve got it!”

I have to agree with other posters here - used potted plants, whether annuals or perennial - and I do like Sarah's idea of borrowing them! I have a lot of potted stuff (remnants of my old 250+ pot ghetto) and when my daughter hosted a party in May I brought over several pots of annuals and hostas and some other things to place around her new and small gardens. (And they're not even in fancy pots but the plants looked good so no one noticed lol!) I get you would like to have some height variations but IMO a beautiful pot at the same level as everything else is better than a blank spot.

Do you have any garden art you can place? Or borrow or buy something? A well-placed bird bath or fancy trellis? Perhaps some little tables with cut arrangements on them (especially in shade) in the empty spots? And I think cecily did kind of get bingo, lol - if you put seats and tables with flowers it might look like you purposely expanded the seating area just for them! Oh! Perhaps a big umbrella or canopy - it will look like you planned to have lunch IN the garden lol! A canopy with a table and chairs under it, surrounded by your garden!.... Hey, I'm trying here lol!

Either way, I agree real gardeners will be more intrigued by your need to redo the garden and love to help you figure it out, than be disappointed by the current condition. Clean up and dead head, set a beautiful table, have plenty of comfortable seating and cold drinks, and everyone will have a great time.

Good luck and most importantly, HAVE FUN!

:)

Dee

Want to express appreciation for all the ideas shared here. THE POTS HAVE IT!

i do have a couple of huge ones i could carefully place and pack to the gills and sky with all these annuals that are over grown from too much rain. One of our biggest area nurseries had tables and tables of sunpatiens at half price .

i love King Tut and Baby Tut papyrus. once i built a fun arrangement witth them in a big copper birdbath. maybe time to polish up that birdbath too.

If anyone else had had 6 inches of rain in 4 weeks you can imagine the weed crop thats sprouted even in heavily mulched areas. Time for a topdressing or a flamethrower.

Yea! I think it’s an easy and beautiful solution. Pictures when you’ve finished, please!

Garden update

What a day of weeding!

finally cleaned out the dead leaves of hellebores, alchemilla and lambs ears. sprayed phlox and ninebark with milky water for mildew control.; walked up an down and up and down stone path looking for self seeded portacucas to transplant; came up short, will have buy a couple of six packs

; weeded my poor showing of epimedium transplants, cleared a patch ground ivy from the lawn (completely unnecessary but i needed to be semi prone and take a snipping break. )

decided once again that the iron furniture would stay white,green and rusty instead of getting a makeover and i am lying on the bed so tired my muscles are twitching.

i forgot to say i cut back geranium magnificum and cassia marylandica ( hard job) and felt discouraged trying to figure out where to place phlox p. Glamour Girl. i find it a challenging color. And, finally, admitted the new rose will die if i dont get it in soon.

like by Monday.

An honest day’s work

Marie

Truly, an honest day’s HARD work! You’re getting a great deal done.

As for glamour girl, that shade of pink works well with warm yellows in my garden. I have it with calendulas that always self seed. It is actually a favorite shade for me!