Before leaving on vacation, Gail didn’t write much of a to-do list for us. As she bolted out the door on the way to the beach she said only, “Just try to keep up with the gardens!” It is a daunting task. The combination of steamy tropical heat and a couple of stormy downpours have had opposite effects on gardens and gardeners. We have slowed right down as the gardens have shot up, changing before our very eyes. But even with blood as thick as molasses and sweating away gallons, we’ve managed to keep up doing things like weeding, deadheading, collecting heaps of seed from all of the pink peony poppies, and replanting the last few dahlias and some gladiolus. — Better late than never, I say. In any case, the way the season is going full steam ahead, it will be lovely to have some fresh blooms in the garden a little later than usual.

In one way, slowing down is not a bad way to keep up. Here is a very small selection of new favorite plants and combinations from a slow look around the Display Garden.

Nicotiana ‘Crimson Bedder’ is a loose 2′ tall plant with good sized bright red (slightly pinkish) blooms that looks excellent paired with just about everything (which is good because I tucked it in throughout the big bed in the Display Garden.)

Panicum elegans ‘Frosted Explosion’ (left) and Hordeum jubatum – foxtail barley (right) are both new to us this year and I love them both. Frosted Explosion came with a warning to use it or lose it (it’s a great pick for arrangements) but we haven’t used it much nor have we been diligent about deadheading it. I’m really happy to report that it’s still producing new flowers even in all this heat. We rowed out the Hordeum jubatum in the cutting bed  and although I really love the way it looks flopped against its neighbor, I think it would be more effective planted in a border the same way we tucked in the panicum.

Probably the most photographed combinations in the Display Garden lately are the new residents of the cement pond. The water garden is drying up despite the little bit of recent rain so we’re very happy that these two found a new home here.

Are you keeping up with your garden?

It’s always a little frustrating for me when Garden Bloggers Bloom Day (hosted by Carol of May Dreams Gardens) falls on the weekend. So much more will be open tomorrow! But for the very nearly middle of May, there’s plenty to see and much more on the way. It’s actually amazing, considering how many things are blooming on the property – and blooming early – that we’re experiencing The May Gap.  We typically cross the gap at the end of the month.

The North Garden and Rose Garden are on the quiet side today. That said, in the North Garden the Trollius ‘Lemon Queen’ and perennial bachelor buttons (Centaurea montana) are blooming more exuberantly than I’ve ever seen them. And there are still a couple of clumps of tulips in the picture. I have to say that Tulip ‘Jackpot’ gets my vote for all-around-best tulip this year. It was among the first to arrive and is the very last to leave. – Not winning behavior for an overbearing party guest but we certainly appreciate it in a flower.

The Rose Garden gap will close in the next couple of days as roses (a couple of them are starting!) and Oriental poppies, allium and peonies open. I waited as long as I could for this poppy to open… I might have to stop through the garden again on my way home…

And in the Rock Garden, the tree peony which looked like this (below, right) this morning, is probably wide open now that the sun has come out. Maybe I’ll take a walk down there too… The last couple of years, the tree peonies opened 10-12 days later.

In the Water Garden, the best blooms are in the water – there are gajillions of tadpoles! (They are such tricky little buggers to try to photograph. Click on the photo for a larger view.)

Are you surprised by any of your mid-May blooms? Did you jump up and down or otherwise intervene to get any to open just a little sooner? (Not that I did that. Well, maybe just a little.)

I still haven’t seen any of our super scary yellow and black orb-web spiders, but it’s been a week of other frights – which of course makes me think of Halloween even though we’re still miles away. On Tuesday the “Deadheads” discovered no fewer than a baker’s dozen candy-corn colored caterpillars on one of our butterfly weeds (Asclepias tuberosa). But these were no ordinary monarch or swallowtail – even my favorite i.d. book, Garden Insects by Whitney Cranshaw failed me on this one. Thank goodness for google. They are Milkweed tussock or tiger moth caterpillars (Euchaetes egle) and their vacuum-roller-brush lashes render them completely unappealing to most hungry birds, or so I would imagine. (This caterpillar currently tops my list for what I want to be for Halloween.)

Cathy (Harvestmeister) discovered who was devouring the last of the cherry tomato plants. I might be blamed for helping myself to some of the tomatoes but this tomato hornworm was  filling up on foliage. We let him be though because a parasitic wasp has already laid claim, so to speak. Tomato hornworms can reach up to 4″ or so in length though this one is probably only about 2″.  I wonder if the tusk on their hind is a bird deterrant – though if not, I can’t imagine being covered in wasp cocoons is very appealing either. The braconid wasp, which lays its eggs on the hornworm is considered a beneficial parasitoid. Any time their eggs are observed on a hornworm, the hornworm should be left alone so that the wasp can keep doing what it does best. And when the hornworm grows up (if it’s not eaten by wasp larvae), it becomes the Sphinx moth a.k.a the hummingbird moth which has an impressive wingspan of 4-5″. It’s a bird of another feather for sure and a pollinator to boot.

Speaking of things that are larger than life, Augustus van Wribbit is back in our cement pond and easily twice his former size. I wonder what he’s been eating… We’re so glad the Display Garden’s guard is back at his post.

And speaking of garden guards, the “History of the Scarecrow” exhibit is being installed near our vegetable bed just in time for Blithewold’s Autumn Splendor series of events. No doubt our Brussels sprouts and spinach will be extra safe from crow predation due to the row of formidable scarecrow examples from Ancient Egypt (the very creepiest) all the way to the Wizard of Oz. These days, I kind of think our gardens might be better served by Deerbullies or Groundhoghorrifiers. Perhaps examples of those will be displayed next year…

Is there anything scary in your garden yet?

We’ve been so intent on planting the Display Garden that we’ve – not forgotten exactly – and not neglected certainly – but perhaps put off the Rock Garden a little lately. Since it’s at its very cutest now we made sure that the Rockettes (after planting the entire checkerboard bed in the Display Garden) got a chance to fuss a little over the precious Rock. I’m not entirely sure what makes the Rock Garden so “cute” – it’s not really diminutive, and although rock gardens are often a showcase for tiny alpines that you have to bend down with a magnifying glass to see, ours is not that exclusive – there are sizeable clumps of geranium and iris and columbine and hosta of an average rather than microscopic size along with the wee Alchemilla alpina and tiny campanulas and dianthus. I think there must be something about the poetry in the relationships between the plants and rocks and light and shade that makes this garden too adorable for words.

Lilah and I saw the poets themselves in some of the plant combinations. The ghostly pale spirea and skeletal columbine is Poe of course and the fleshy hosta combinations are as evocative as Neruda. Edna St. Vincent Millay recites the geraniums and Emily Dickinson always has something to say about an “admiring bog”. The violas remind us of Blithewold’s own dearly missed poet, Mary.  And for me there was at least one painterly association but then who doesn’t see Monet in the waterlilies?

Do you ever find yourself reminded of an author or artist as you look around your garden?

In the middle of a cold blast, chilly on the heels of a dark and snowy Solstice storm, I’m on the lookout for Joy (‘Tis the season, Fa la la la la).  But, luckily, I don’t have to look hard to find it.  No matter how stressful the holidays can be with family weirdness, travel difficulties and financial worries, we gardeners know where to look for – and find – a whole bunch of Joy.

It’s in the lengthening days from here on in and the optimism of another spring, summer and fall to come.

It’s in our faces and the faces of our friends when we laugh.

It’s in the frogs and bees and praying mantises that we know will be back.

It’s in the plants we love-love-love to grow.

It’s in bark and Swiss chard and the opinions of fellow gardeners.

We have so much to look forward to and so much to look back on – all that Joy is almost overwhelming.  ‘Tis the season to pass it on!  Joy to the World, friends and gardeners and Happy Holidays!