daffodils – Page 4 – variegatagal

Elusive white narcissus – mistaken identity

03/12/08 Mystery Narcissus Revealed - Accent Daffodil

What I originally thought was the first Thalia narcissus bloom in my garden bore further inspection after I took snapshots of it yesterday. This was not the all-white, multi-flowering, orchid-like daffodil that I was expecting! Both blooms that I had seen so far boasted a white perianth and a yellow (!) cup. It caused me grave concern as I was about to shoot off an email inquiry to Brent and Becky’s about it…until I racked my brain trying to remember if I had EVER purchased and planted daffodils before.

Then it hit me…Breck’s. I scoured my old archive email for an answer–thank goodness, I still kept those around. And there it was, dated 4/14/06, an order from Breck’s for 2 packages of Accent Instant Bloom Daffodils along with some Inzell, Frosty Beauty, and a color assortment of tulips. The tulips which I had lost in the beds some time ago had occasionally surprised me with a red or yellow bloom here and there (I wrote off the Frosties a long time ago), but I had never caught sight of the Accent daffodils until now.

It made perfect sense now why the yellow cups faded to pink, as the Accent supposedly had salmon/pink cups as they aged. I’m not sure how many of these Accents have survived over the last two years, but it’s a testament to their hardiness that they persisted this long. Mystery solved.

Winter cleanup and filling holes

With the mild weather this past Sunday, DH and I did some pruning and clearing of the front yards. DH took some shears and proceeded to prune the dead branches off our two myrtles. He also removed the unsightly canna leaves that frost had killed. I pulled and uprooted grass that had infiltrated and overwhelmed both front yard beds, and I’m happy to see that I will be transplanting some nandina and salvia volunteers to the rear yard this year. The fringeflower bushes next to the front door have doubled in height since they first arrived and are in desperate need of shearing, which will happen hopefully in early spring. I wonder if my mango calla lilies survived the winter and will put a showing this year? The muscari sprouts promise to bring some color the front yard when spring arrives. And while the Crimson Pirate daylily leaves have finally succumbed to the cold, I have no doubt they will return with warm weather. Now if only I can get hubby to apply some serious weed killer to the lawn.

I also hopped over to Home Depot to purchase 10 bags of topsoil to fill some holes dug up in the yard. I suspect Dash has attempted to burrow underneath the crepe myrtle in the side yard, exposing the root ball. It was a surprisingly huge hole, and I’m saddened to think of the irises that were lost. I’m also upset to find the remains of my zebra iris, Doe Z Doe, scattered in the side yard. The nandinas I planted and replanted in the middle back bed showed signs of damage (one was completely chewed/ripped apart). And if it weren’t for the planter loops I erected, I suppose the new salvia I planted may have perished. Did any of the zebras survive? I’m almost heartbroken thinking about it. Such is the plight of the gardener who shares their yards with dogs.

But the daffodils are pushing up through the ground and it looks like it will be a lovely show early in the year.

Tornado cuts swathe of destruction thru local garden

That handsome tornado’s name is Dash, and he is 1.5 year old Australian shepherd who has taken a great delight in mowing over plants in my backyard. Several bulbs and tender shrubs have met their demise under the paws of this stampeding ball of fur. The most recent deaths included a healthy thriving purple salvia as well as my most mature white salvia. No fence can keep him out, and I’m at my wits end trying to find some way to deter him from entering the beds. I purchased 6 planter rings from Home Depot this weekend and hopefully I can protect the remaining fragile salvias, including the 2 salvia chamaedryoides that were cut low by this Texas twister.

Meanwhile, I’m way behind on purchasing my white daffodils for the 2008 show. I’m looking more into salvias to fill the bare spots in the garden. A few that have caught my eye: Salvia greggii or jamensis ‘California Sunset’ (orange) , Salvia greggii or jamensis (?) ‘Sierra San Antonio’ (coppery peach), Salvia greggii ‘La Encantada Peach’, Salvia jamensis Moonlight (yellow) , Salvia greggii ‘Yellow Cloud’, and any more orange, yellow and peach variants I can dig up.

Flowers of a different stripe

Broken color irises. They’re eye-catching, they’re unique. I love their splashy looks…and I hope to enjoy them in my 2008 garden. I’ve discovered an internet purveyor of striped irises at ZebraIris.com and I’m browsing their library of dazzling bearded irises for specimens to go into my white-and-blue flower bed. It’s about planting time for the iris rhizomes…and with the Texas weather so mild this week, I can’t wait to do some digging.

In my shopping cart:
Z Z Zanzibar – I. Variegata species, 25″ rebloomer (x2)
Blueberry Filly – intermediate bearded, 23″ early bloomer (x2)

My iris show this year included the very early (Feb/Mar) dwarf irises (reticulata and danfordiae mix) and the April-blooming, 24″ Dutch Eye of the Tiger. (Here’s a basic explanation of the differences between the bulb and rhizome types.) There’s a strong need to fill in the months between February and April with color. Hopefully some irises and white daffodils will fill that gap.

More purchases, plantings, and today’s wishlist

On Tuesday, dear hubby and I took a trip to the local Home Depot. I was intent on building on the idea of his tree ring by grabbing 16 red/charcoal foot-wide retaining wall stones. I also needed some new gardening gloves and gave me a good excuse to check out the plant selection. Sadly, no blue salvia in stock. I did find two trays of Agastache Acapulco Salmon & Pink in full bloom. I took one home and got it planted yesterday.

I discovered that the Salvia Hot Lips in the side yard had gotten so big and rangy that it overwhelmed a neighboring purple salvia (along with a black ophiogon, artemisia, and the only other existing anemone). I quickly dug up the purple salvia–okay, more like violently uprooted–and transplanted it to the middle bed. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like it’s going to survive the move, having lost much of its rootball. It hadn’t been too healthy to begin with after living in the shadow of its leggy neighbor.

So I’ve been toying with the idea of putting crocuses in the yard, except that I learned that they are considered annuals in Texas. Having learned my lesson with tulips, I’m not about to invest in a single-year show. So other ideas have crept onto my white-and-blue wishlist of the day: more muscari, more irises (dutch and dwarfs), white daffodils, white callas, allium caeruleum (azureum), nepeta (catmint) racemosa or faassenii, black leaf plants such as heuchera and ajuga and penstemon digitalis Ruby Tuesday. I’m also growing fond of Agastache rupestris and a agastache coccinea x rupestris hybrid called Firebird.

Speculation of the day: those salvia greggi reds in my front yard–could they be Furman Reds?