There seems to be a different quality to the flowers that bloom late. I could be making this up but they seem to absorb the light more than reflect it like summer flowers do. (Don’t they?) Maybe it’s just that the lower light makes everything catch it and keep it, summer’s hanger-onner blooms included Or maybe fall flowers seem extra-special and luminous simply because they keep the season colorful for us and nutritious for the wildlife right up to the bitter cold. (Click on pictures for better view.)

Asters and Sedum ‘Autumn Joy’ have finally come into their own and the space they’ve taken up all summer is totally justified (except for the 4′ wide ones in the North Garden that bloom even later than this…)

What would we do without fall blooming grasses like purple love grass (Eragrostis spectabilis) and pink muhly grass (Muhlenbergia capillaris)? Both are natives and I know the purple love grass reseeds because I have it coming up like a puff of smoke out of a driveway crack at home. I don’t remember ever growing the mist grass before and I’m deeply in love (but can’t seem to take a decent picture of it.) Even if that doesn’t reseed (and I don’t know if it’s likely to), I’m looking forward to the clumps increasing enough to get a good shot. This year we’re going to try to winter-over purple fountain grass (Pennisetum setaceum ‘Rubrum’) down cellar. Anyone had any luck with that?

The toad lily (Tricyrtis hirta) surprises everyone, even those of us who have always been fond of it. It’s just that strange and lovely.

But strangest of all is the crabapple in bloom down at the water’s edge. We can only surmise that it is under extreme stress after being defoliated by Irene, swamped by extra high tides and subjected to wide night-temperature swings in the last couple-three weeks. Clearly it’s desperate to survive – like it always has so far in the toughest spot. Fingers crossed. There may be a new crop of apples yet for the birds…

What’s catching the light in your garden?

Garden Bloggers Bloom Day (hosted by Carol at May Dreams Gardens) is the best excuse I can think of to show off some of my favorite weirdos. I know my cup of tea isn’t to everyone’s taste. For one thing, I tend to gravitate towards anything with nearly invisible green flowers like crazy-cool petal-less Boltonia ‘Nallie’s Lime Dot’ (below). It comes into bloom-ish in early September and is supposed to be about 4′ tall. Ours grew taller and then probably because it was shaded by our new dawn redwood hedge, flopped right over to hang with an aster. It holds up really well in arrangements so I’ll probably vote to move to a sunnier spot in the cutting garden. I also adore little Nicotiana ‘Delaware Indian Sacred’ (right) obviously because it’s green but also because it seeds itself around and is in bloom in one place or another all season long.

And ’tis the season to love the seedheads. They may look gone-by to some but I prefer the black knobs of rudbeckia sans petals. And aren’t teasel and cardoon at any stage wildly wonderful?

There’s probably nothing weirder than Amaranthus ‘Dreadlocks’ full stop.

And every late-summer/fall I rediscover cuphea. (Who doesn’t?) Suddenly though I’m head-over-heels for a cuphea that probably nobody else here has noticed.  Cuphea ‘Ballistic’ is a tiny little plant with mouse faces that ended up tucked under a whole bunch of other stuff (mostly other cupheas) in the kid’s bed. I vow to put them somewhere front and center next year and took a bunch of cuttings yesterday for insurance.

Speaking of taking cuttings, the speed of the season took us by surprise. (How did it get to be mid-September already?!) We usually start taking cuttings in late August/early September but have only now begun in earnest. If the same thing happened to you and those beautiful cut-able tips that emerge in late summer have since grown and flowered, cut your plants back in a few places to encourage new growth and check again in a couple of weeks.

What’s weird or wonderful in your garden right now? When did you start taking cuttings?

Blithewold has got to be one of the prettiest places for a wedding: there’s nothing like being surrounded by on all sides by a glorious garden, and framed by a sweeping view of the Bay to make one of the greatest events in a couple’s life even more special and spectacular. For every couple who chooses this place for their wedding, it becomes an important part of their story but I would have to guess that not since Marjorie Van Wickle was wed here to George Lyon has Blithewold been such a huge part of a couple’s life as it is for our own Julie Murphy and Dan Christina (Blithewold’s education coordinator and asst. grounds manager.) Dan and Julie met and fell in love here!

Blithewold is written indelibly on nearly every page of their story and to those of us who have been a witness all along (or almost all along – they kept it a secret for a whole year!) to their love for each other, it seemed that there could be no more perfect place on earth for them to exchange vows than Blithewold’s North Garden. And even the rain, which fell on their day like a blessing after weeks of baking sun, was exactly right. They say rain makes the knot tighter but for a pair of horticulturists it also greens up the grass and makes their garden grow.

It’s a testament to Julie’s wish that those of us who work at Blithewold not have to work that I didn’t even bring my camera. But I wished I had! Thank goodness Gail had hers and took such excellent shots. Gail also had the honor of assisting garden volunteer Terry Converse who made all of the gorgeous flower arrangements, which were dotted with flowers and foliage grown with Julie’s colors in mind and picked from the property. The wedding really couldn’t have been lovelier – or more Blithewold.

Julie and Dan, may your life together continue to be full of love, laughter, and the riotous abundance of an August garden after a rainstorm! Sláinte!

(All pictures in this post were taken by Gail Read. Click on for larger view.)

With so much coming into bloom now I might be crazy to try to identify June’s quintessential color. (I might be crazy full stop.) There are some great colors to choose from: take anything in the Rose Garden for instance. ( – I had to include another gratuitous Rose Garden shot because it’s so thrilling. And I think you can just about smell it from the picture if you concentrate.)

I also think that while blue is one of the colors that defines late spring/May, the dusky blues of June – like the Berggarten sage (Salvia officinalis ‘Berggarten’) in the herb garden – are completely different and entirely June-ish, evocative of June’s extra-long twilight. Of course my favorite sweet pea ‘Nimbus’ takes dusk to a-whole-nother level of stormy, also perfectly appropriate given the wild and wooly weather lately. But then that brings me around to the wooly ivories of things like Filipendula, Clematis recta, giant fleece flower (Persicaria polymorpha) and the Clary sage (Salvia sclarea) that has been catching everyone’s eyes this week. You just don’t see that color in July, not even in the clouds. Or else I don’t notice it the way I do in June.

And there’s a certain hot pink that seems to belong only to June although I’d have to say it’s a great color for introducing us to the notion of July. It’s about to burst on every Spirea japonica in that shocking combination of pink and yell-green (I had meant to type “yellow-green” but yell-green’s more like it) and it’s already capping the catchfly (Silene armeria).

When it comes right down to it I can’t decide – and don’t they all look like June in Terry’s arrangement? So in honor of Garden Bloggers Bloom Day, I’d rather put it to you for a vote anyway.

What color do you think defines June?

For gardeners, this blustery cusp of fall into winter is the true turning of the year – much more real to us than the holiday in January that opens the calendar year. As our gardens cycle now into rest, so do we cycle into reflection. This is our time to look gratefully back on a season rich and bright enough to sustain us through a long, dark winter. And, of course, the official Thanksgiving holiday is a perfect excuse (as if we need one) to celebrate the abundance of the passing season and share it with generous abandon.

It is also the start of a new season at Blithewold. Just as our attention shifts this time of year from deciduous plants to evergreen, we also concede a shift from outside to inside. The mansion is once again lavishly and glitteringly decorated for Christmas, and will be open from November 28 to January 2. (Click here for hours and events. – And don’t forget that the grounds, gardens and greenhouse are open daily, year-round.)

Happy Thanksgiving!