Digital Flower Pictures.com Almost daily informative blog about plants, gardening and photography. Written by a professional Estate Gardener from Connecticut. Statistics Unique Visitors: Total Unique Visitors: Outgoing: Total Outgoing: 203 10076 94 8483

Articles from Digital Flower Pictures.com

'Oregold' Hybrid Tea Rose 2007-07-19 04:57:00 'Oregold' Hybrid Tea RoseSynonyms: TANolg, Miss Harp, Silhouette, Anneliesse RothenbergerThis rose blooms best during the cool weather though it was chugging along last week with a couple of flowers last week. It is good performer though seems a bit tender as I have had to replace it twice after the winter. I don't do a lot for winter protection for my roses and usually have a couple of losses after the winter. I think this because most of these roses are rated for USDA Zone 7 and my gardens are on the edge of 6 and 7. 'Oregold' has a mild fragrance and a petal count of 25-30. Its parentage is 'Piccadilly' × 'Colour Wonder' and has a good pedigree with 'Peace', 'Tropicana' and 'Crimson Glory' roses in its lineage. Bred in Germany it won the AARS Award in 1975.I think I have said before that I have really warmed up to yellow flowers over the course of my career. Some of them are amongst my favorites now. Who would have thought that. Yesterday’s Wordless Wednesday featu ... Hybrid

Wordless Wednesday 2007-07-18 04:34:00 Wordless Wednesday ...

Eastern Prickly Pear Cactus (Opuntia humifusa ‘Orange Form’) 2007-07-17 05:07:00 Eastern Prickly Pear CactusOpuntia humifusa ‘Orange Form’(op-UN-shee-uh) (hew-mih-FEW-suh)Cactaceae (kak-TAY-see-ay)Synonyms: Devil's Tongue, Low Prickly Pear, Opuntia mesacanthaOpuntia italica, Opuntia rafinesquei, Opuntia fuscoatra, Opuntia allairei, Opuntia cumulicola, Opuntia impedataI really wanted to take a picture of this plant blooming the last couple of years and never got around to it. This year on July 3rd I did it. I almost missed it as these are from the last couple of blooms. It is a fun plant to grow and seems quite hardy. It is not invasive in my garden it as made a nice little clump, sometimes dying out in the middle and crossing the little dry riverbed they are planted in but always keeping within reason. The areas that died out filled in again. This Cactus is native to the Eastern United States and grows well in Connecticut. In the winter it turns a little brown and shriveled but bounces back nicely in the spring. It is easily rooted with the pads. There are usu ...

Allium grande? 2007-07-16 04:37:00 Allium grande?This was growing in a friend’s garden and he said it was Allium grande (that could be wrong). I searched the net and only found a few vague references to the name. It wasn’t in the couple of plant books I consulted either. One net reference said it was Ornamental Garlic but that appears to be a different plant of just a general moniker. Anyway it was a great looking plant that was about 2 feet tall and had spear-like bluish foliage. The flowers themselves were about 2 to 3 inches across. I don’t usually come across plants that stump the Internet but this is one unless it is a different species of Allium. Anybody have any ideas? This is some Lavender that is blooming at work. I don’t remember the cultivar (I’m full of information today) but it has a slightly darker flower and is a little taller than the normal types. It is funny that it is blooming because I was just about to tear it out and start over with something new since it has not performed well. This year ...

Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day 2007-07-15 08:31:00 Garden Bloggers' Bloom DayJuly 15, 2007I have wanted to participate in Bloom Day for a couple months now. I love seeing what is blooming in different areas. At the Estate and the other gardens I am in charge of there are literally hundreds of things blooming so I went for a few of the things that I had taken pictures of. I wanted to get this post up so I may try and add a few things later today. What a wonderful year for Roses we had. There are a few still hanging on. This first one is a David Austin variety named ‘Heritage’. It has slowed down but I wanted to post it since I have so enjoyed it this year. I went into the rose garden on Friday just to see what was blooming and a couple of the varieties were still going strong.‘Iceberg’: strong white bloomer.‘Strike it Rich’: I featured this on another post. I can’t say enough well about this new rose. I highly recommend it. It had the most flowers of any rose in the garden right now.‘Love and Peace’: This one combines ...

Golden Bluebeard (Caryopteris x clandonensis 'Worcester Gold') 2007-07-14 06:30:00 Golden BluebeardCaryopteris x clandonensis 'Worcester Gold'(kar-ee-OP-ter-iss) (klan-don-EN-sis)Lamiaceae (lay-mee-AY-see-ay)Synonyms: Blue Mist, Blue Mist SpireaI am not sure if you are suppose the cultivar name like they do in Massachusetts, ‘Woo-Ster’. This plant failed a couple of times for me until I found out it needs good drainage to survive. Since I have figured that out it has been happy in my garden. It needs sun to have the best foliage color, which is more chartreuse then golden. It often fades to a lime green later in the season and in more shady areas. Which I know to a lot of people who use gold foliage plants is an undesirable trait. Personally I don’t mind if a plant does that but I guess it could screw up someone’s design if it changed color. The flowers are a great hue of blue and are long lasting. They attract bees and butterflies in good numbers. The foliage is also aromatic and it has shown good deer resistance here in Connecticut and Westchester County ...

Wrong Named Rose 2007-07-13 05:02:00 Wrong Named RoseI think I got ripped off. I bought this rose as ‘Sexy Rexy’, which is supposed to pink but when it started to bloom it was blood red. Oh well, this is a nice rose and so far it has been blooming well. It is small rose but it has a good petal count. I think I will go back to the nursery and ask for a refund. I going to try and keep the rose too. I know this nursery has a sign that says, “all plants sold are true to name” (something like that) and I am going to call them on it. I don’t think it going to be a problem as I am good friends with the salesman and know the owner pretty well. The tags probably just got mixed up but still it isn’t fair. I first thought maybe it was the understock growing from below the bud union but the shoots are clearly above the graft so that isn’t the problem. This rose is too nice to be rootstock anyway.The roses are still blooming fairly well. I always keep my eye on which types and varieties do well in the heat. I will try an ...

Hybrid Verbena (Verbena 'Lanai Lavender Star') 2007-07-12 05:06:00 Hybrid VerbenaVerbena 'Lanai Lavender Star'(ver-BEE-nuh) Verbenaceae (ver-be-NAY-see-ay)I took these photos on June 6th of this year. I just found the flash card on my desk and it had 48 photos on it. This is three stages of ‘Lavender Star’ which has been performing well in the garden this year. One patch was almost completely devoured by slugs but has since been making a valiant effort at coming back. I like growing Verbena it is usually a trouble free and good producing annual. They have so many series and colors now it is hard to choose. I guess I am kind of partial to the red and purple ones though last year I grew a peach colored one that was exceptional. We had more thunderstorms last night. If this keeps up I am going to have to get the lawn mower out again. We got about .5 to .75 inches of rain which was good and no violent winds. The heat wave (3 or more days at or above 90 deg.F) was not that bad and now the forecast is for cooler weather. It already feels better outsid ... Hybrid

Great Coneflower (Rudbeckia maxima) 2007-07-11 05:36:00 Great ConeflowerRudbeckia maxima(rud-BEK-ee-uh) (MAKS-ih-muh)Asteraceae (ass-ter-AY-see-ay)Synonyms: Great Rudbeckia, Dumbo's Ears, Cabbage Leafed ConeflowerThis is a fun plant for a tough area or the back of the border. It has large bluish leaves that can grow up to 18 inches long. Later in the season the flowers shoot out on tall (5 to 7 foot) stalks. The central cone (which is only partially developed in this photo) is 2 to 3 inches tall. It mixes well with Cutleaf Coneflower (Rudbeckia laciniata 'Herbstsonne').Both of them are some of the tallest perennials I know that don’t need staking, which is always a plus in my book. This plant is native to Louisiana and Arkansas into parts of Texas so it is a heat and humidity tolerant perennial. It is hardy to USDA Zone 6 and has been in cultivation since the 1800’s. This plant will tolerate (and like) moist areas but mine are in a border with regular soil and water. This time of year I am doing a lot of pruning. I must have pruned ...

Virginia Creeper (Parthenocissus quinquefolia) 2007-07-10 04:25:00 Virginia CreeperParthenocissus quinquefolia(par-then-oh-KISS-us) (kwin-kway-FOH-lee-uh)Vitaceae (vee-TAY-see-ay)Yesterday I brought my camera to work and I was determined to take a picture of something I had never seen before. After walking around for a bit I found it. Virginia Creeper flowers! The flowers are really small and horticultural insignificant but I found when studying them up close they were an interesting color and the arrangement of the buds and flowers was also interesting. This is a plant that I usually let grow here and there in the garden. I never let it crawl on other plants. I do like the fall color, which is amazing, and the berries. The vine uses tendrils to crawl on things so I will let it climb over a fence or stonewall. The berries are poisonous and some people can also suffer an allergic reaction to the foliage. The birds can seem to eat the berries without any harm. I always thought that since this plant is often confused with Poison Ivy that people that got ...

Summer Blooming Azalea (Rhododendron ‘Golden Showers’) 2007-07-09 04:50:00 Summer Blooming AzaleaRhododendron ‘Golden Showers’I am always surprised that more people don’t grow these wonderful plants. At least a couple always sneak into any garden I design and build, since they are a fantastic way to extend the Azalea season. Their fragrant and colorful blooms come at a time in the garden when I can use the color. Here is a link and excerpt from a page describing these plants:“Throughout his life, Ed Mezitt explored the possibilities for expanding the seasons of color in the New England landscape. In the 1940s, he began selecting and propagating the more colorful individuals from seed-grown populations of the native plants grown in his parents’ nursery. The major catalyst to his breeding of the Summer Azaleas occurred in the 1950s when he discovered plants of the brightly colored Cumberland and Plumleaf Azaleas, both of which are native to the southern U.S. Like their New England counterparts, these plants flowered in June and July. Although they lac ...

Roses from the BBG 2007-07-08 10:25:00 This is probably the last post on my trip to the Brooklyn Botanical Garden. One of the highlights of the trip was visiting the Cranford Rose Garden. Here is an except from the history of the Rose Garden:“In June 1928, the Cranford Rose Garden celebrated the grand opening of what has become one of the largest and finest rose gardens in this country. It was designed by Harold Caparn, a landscape architect for Brooklyn Botanic Garden, and Montague Free, the Garden's horticulturist. Caparn had drawn the plans several years earlier, at the request of Stuart Gager, the first director of BBG.”Full History. They have a lot of other information on the rose garden if you click around a bit.I got a couple of pictures of the roses although the heat had kind of got to them by the time of my visit. You could tell they had been blooming a lot by all the spent flowers. The roses I care for at work all had a great season but this next heat wave is going to knock them back.This first rose is ‘Abo ...

Dwarf French Hydrangea (Hydrangea macrophylla 'Pia') 2007-07-07 08:33:00 Dwarf French HydrangeaHydrangea macrophylla 'Pia'(hy-DRAIN-juh) (mak-roh-FIL-uh)Hydrangeaceae (hy-drain-jee-AY-see-ay)Synonyms: 'Piamina', 'Comet', 'Winning Edge', 'Pink Elf’This is from the Brooklyn Botanical Hydrangea collection. The collection itself wasn’t that big nut it had some interesting members. I hadn’t seen this dwarf before and I thought the flower color was outstanding. Some research revealed some problems with this plant including reverting to a tall type and leaf spot. I still would try anyway as the size and color make it look like a worthwhile garden denizen.This Variegated Hydrangea was marked ‘Lemon Wave’ but it wasn’t as yellow as some of them I have seen. I liked the flower color which was a nice pale lavender. The little splotches of yellow on the teeth of the leaves was interesting. You might miss it if you didn’t look closely. The plant itself was also compact.This is a shot of the Lotus Pool. The pool and the garden surrounding it was my ... French

Buttonbush (Cephalanthus occidentalis) 2007-07-06 04:43:00 ButtonbushCephalanthus occidentalis(sef-uh-LAN-thus) (ock-sih-den-TAY-liss)RubiaceaeThis is isn’t my favorite shrub but in the right place it can work. It likes full sun and moist soil. It is native to most of the Unites States were it can be found growing in bogs, drainage ditches and even in shallow standing water. It gets quite large and the multi-stems can reach 12 to 15 feet. I have been cutting mine down every couple of years to keep the size manageable. This specimen was growing at the Brooklyn Botanical Garden in the native flora area. Cephalanthus is in the Rubiaceae family which is the fourth largest plant family. It has several familiar members including Sweet Woodruff, Gardenia and Coffee. This Hoover Fly was sitting on top of the large planting of ‘Zowie Yellow Flame’. I have featured both the Zinnia (Z.elegans ‘Zowie Yellow Flame’) and theHoover Fly (Toxomerus geminatus) before.This last one is an abstract of a tall unnamed Lily that was growing in the Perennial ...

Double Rose Lotus (Nelumbo nucifera ‘Rosea Plena’) 2007-07-05 04:56:00 Double Rose LotusNelumbo nucifera ‘Rosea Plena’(nee-LUM-bo) (noo-SIFF-er-uh)These are some Lotus photos from the BBG. Overall they have a world class collection it was however not presented the best it could have been. That is all I am going to say about it. I got in free because we have a membership at the New York Botanical Garden and it was $12 to park. Afterwards I noticed that there was some free on street parking available.This is a different cultivar of Lotus and it was quite pretty also.Even the buds looked good. ”You must be a lotus, unfolding its petals when the sun rises in the sky, unaffected by the slush where it is born or even the water which sustains it!”Sai BabaHere is a link to an article on the spiritual meaning of the Lotus flower atCosmicLotus.org ...