Early Summer Garden Blooms

Tiger Lily Red

Tiger Lily Pink

Tiger Lily Yellow

In typical Iowa fashion the weather has turned hot and humid. Rain has been strangely plentiful throughout the season so far. Saying strangely because for 5 out of the 6 years I've been in Iowa it always seemed there was a dry spell at some point where the grass turns all brown. Last year that never happened and it so far has gone that way this year up until this point. In the garden now it's lily season! I was very much into lilies growing up but in my "adult" gardens they never really made the cut until last year when it was time to bring back some of those memories. Starting with Day lilies last year and this year trying out some Tiger Lily bulbs added this spring. I decided to get a mixed color bag of which are the type that hang upside down like bells. Surprisingly the mixed bag had every color advertised in the photo ( how rare is that! ) They were planted back in April and now are bursting into bloom. Their tall stature makes it easy to tuck a few almost anywhere! Looking around the neighborhood, Lilies are coloring up gardens everywhere right now with their beautiful shades of orange, pink, white, red just about any color of the rainbow and even some having a combination of more then one. Asiatic Lilies are the ones blooming now and soon to come will be the oriental lilies which are different because they have a wonderful fragrance to go with their blooms something that the other lilies lack. Oriental lilies color shades are not as bold as the other types but come in a nice range of pinks and pastels.

Prairie Rose 6/21/2020

 The Iowa State Flower! This is the only rose in my garden and its a spreading native variety. The blooms are wonderfully fragrant but non long lived only lasting a couple days. This started off as a very un rooted plant transplanted from another area and I really didn't think it was going to survive. Was also thinking this was a goner from the rabbits in the neighborhood but it did make it to flowering!

Flowering Bush Clematis 6/20/2020

Cat mint 6/25/2020

 On the left my bush Clematis is in full bloom last week, Rumors were that this is not a very hardy plant for our area but it seems to be thriving. The hanging bell shaped blooms are a really cool touch in the garden and the seed heads are just as cool. To the right we we have newer variety of cat mint which is very rabbit resistant and also much more upright and most importantly does not flop! Some say in the horticulture industry this will be a replacement for Saliva.

Pale Purple Coneflower

Purple Poppy Mallow

The native plants time to shine comes just as the hottest most humid weather of summer starts to come in. It can be a dull time for some gardens but with native plants you really have a powerful  burst of color through July and August and guess what, water isn't needed! Here we have Pale Purple Coneflower which is a much more perennial-like Coneflower and it native to full sun sites in prairies. It takes a couple years to mature enough to flower but its worth the wait! The petals are skinnier then what most are used to but its so unique in its own way. Purple Poppy Mallow adds a rare color to the garden not usually seen in perennials, its hot pink. This plant really enjoys wetter sites but seems to do okay in my gardens which have normal soils. Here you can see it is paired with yellow Yarrow a combination which was more or less an accident but I like it!