tidied up

grass edges around a few more beds today, and borders of the lawn where my husband mowed yesterday. I was trimming stuff and pulling (what I think is) japanese stiltgrass from around the milkweeds- still no monarch caterpillars though I did glance looking for them- and saw the hummingbird! It was inspecting my young hybrid japanese maple tree (wonder what attracted it to that) and then zoomed over to feed on a few blooms of gladiolas. Must be feeding on the black and blue salvia, too. I'm hoping the cardinal climbers will bloom soon and then I can see it on my deck. 

I do believe my echinacea patch looks healthier than ever this year.

I'd hope it's from measures I took the year before last, to cut back on disease- cutting out all stems that had white stickiness fuzz from mealy bugs, and when the plants died back, cleaning out as much of the dropped blackened leaf litter as I could- assuming it harbored aphid eggs. This year there seems to be far less diseased leaves. (I had the same sense about my borage patch in the front yard, but it could just be that I'm so glad to be out doing stuff in the yard again, everything looks better than ever, ha). 

I've seen what looks like a single pea vine among the echinacea in years past, this time I found it flowering- looks like a sweet pea but no scent.

The funny seed stalks of my arum are standing around.

I did see a swallowtail butterfly up close among the coneflowers, and stood a while just to watch it. Still pleased with my patch of lysimachia purpurea groundcover

- although it remains much less impressive through the camera eye.

Also happy with the sweet woodruff, even though I still remember how my youngest thought it was a weed! (The one that's really a weed is the creeping jenny- I regret putting that in now. I must start pulling it out).

The boneset plant is doing just fine here in the back corner- where nothing else had really thrived yet. It's near my camellia- here's a picture of that- which also looks better this year than ever.

I'm telling you, my vision is colored overly positive since recovery has allowed me to get outside and get my hands pleasantly dirty again! Only an hour or two a day so far, that's enough to tire me out still, but I'm happy with it.

garden

First the good. I harvested sweet pea seeds to save

and tatsoi (so many!)

Lavender is done flowering, so I cut it back. Chopped up all the trimmed stems, leaves and flowers, scattered on the beds of amaranth calaloo and leaf beet chard / cowpeas. I think some bugs don't like the scent! A few striped beetles immediately took flight away from the bed onto collards. I tracked with my eyes and smacked 'em.

The cowpea, bush green bean and leaf beet chard bed:

with collard greens behind:

I trimmed out over half the leaves of the sorrel- because they looked sickly- leaving more room for the sage and lemon balm now. Tarragon has grown nice! I used some in a soup but a bit too much, my kid complained the flavor was strong

Then moved on to a dismal chore: cleaning up all the wilted foliage. Carrots- all looking dead and brown-

but the smallest inner leaves are fine. And I pulled one- the root is fine. No rot. So I don't think it was the downpour.

What's left of my tomatoes, after I cut off all the brown and yellow and wilted leaves. Dreadfully familiar, this. At least now you can see how many tomatoes I have! But I don't know if they'll be okay.

I didn't find any pests on the tomato or carrot plants, but startled a few stinkbugs in the zucchini and cucumbers. After clearing out half the zucchini leaves that were rotting or blanched of color, this is what's left. It looks so leggy and open now.

But maybe enough still healthy to recover. Here's one zucchini growing!

On the opposite end of that bed, what's left of the lovage (that towered over my head just a few days ago)

I haven't been out here enough the past two weeks, to keep ahead of the bugs. There's whitefly and cabbage loopers on the collard greens. Leaf hoppers in the chard and green beans. Some kind of beetle in the amaranth, and slugs in several places. I have biodegradable, organic insecticidal soap, but can't use it in hot sunny weather or it will cause leaf burn. We have several more days of sun before it rains again. I'm considering coming out to spray the plants very early in the morning, before it's hot- and then hose them down after . . . 

things happening among the plants

My 'Lavendar Magic' african violet bloomed and it is so pretty.

The runners on my plain spider plant have tiny babies now, and another one is sprouting. 

The 'wandering dude' plant (haha) is growing upwards against the window- I am wondering at what point the stems will become too heavy for themselves and fall over to make the trailing habit. 

Outside I thought the sweet peas were done since I left some pods to go to seed, but there's another round of flowers blooming. 

Zucchini and the others in the melon bed are getting big fast, so I hope I actually have a decent amount this year.

The unknown plant in my garden is getting huge- it's up to my hip now. And cardinal climber behind it have wound all the way up the trellis, so lovely, but I still haven't seen a hummingbird visit.

Some of the rumex I moved look shabby, but others are growing new leaves!

Monarda and echinacea are blooming-

Cicada noise is diminishing, and though the oaks and maples have lots of "flagging" with dried leaf bunches hanging down, all my smaller shrubs seem okay- even the youngest rose of sharon

and the two-year-old ones- have taken no harm.

Summersweet-

Bay laurel-

Oakleaf hydrangea- all okay!

Daylilies are blooming on the top of one sideyward by the driveway,

and on the opposite side, turtleheads are making a nice thicket,

and gladiolas coming up strong- though I do need to go out and pull some weeds

geranium pinks

My new geraniums have flowered-

bright pinks 

the two darker ones are only slightly different-

one has accents in the center

Small russet-and-orange one (I'd need to look at the tag to remember its name) flowers are vivid red 

Sweet peas are done flowering- such a short period- and I left a few pods go to seed.

Pulled handfuls more of tokyo bekana seedlings. This time just ate them as a side to meat pie. My husband thought I was growing sprouts on purpose and asked me about the "alfalfa" in the garden. Ha ha.

come up

All my new plants are sprouting in the greenhouse!

Outside, spears of gladiolas are coming up on the sideyard. Tithonias look great, one aster died. My purple clematis is blooming again, lavender is flowering, cardinal climbers are starting to go up the trellis. More sweet peas are in flower, lots of white nicotiana, and a hummingbird visited yesterday. I only caught a glimpse of it, though. At first I thought it was a cicada!

I pulled the older tokyo bekana and cut off all the dried seedpods. Just as many more were still too green. Even all these weren't good- on opening, more than half were mildewed. 

Still got plenty of seed, though!