Choice Morsels

I haven't blogged for a few weeks because I tripped and fell on my front sideway and was injured and that kept me off the computer for a few weeks. Thankfully, I've had the members of the Sunday Bible study group to flock to my aide and be of great assistance for anything I needed done. Today's Garden Pics: This is a nice shot of my front bed that's in a spot of land between the mailbox and the gravel parking spot. A nice display of leafy green basil, orange marigolds, then pink Vinca & Lantana at the back. Morning Glory: I found this in my back flower bed this week; a random Morning Glory seed found it's way there and took root. I've seen them around the area, growing wild in the brush along the roadways from time to time. But you can tell that's what it is by the shape of the leaves and it's blue color.

Welcome to another Garden Pic Wednesday! Today we look at this weeks project: edging the North bed that runs from the A/C unit to a corner bed just outside my back door & patio. Back in July, my neighbor on this side hired someone to remove the many pines in his back yard and that person sub-contracted a tree cutter, a tree cutter who was completely inept at tree cutting. That cutter dropped tree trunks on every fence encircling my neighbors yard, adjacent neighbors sheds and turned all the grass between our houses into dirt driving a small tractor back & forth. My neighbor kindly made sure he replaced all the grass between our houses. So in these first 2 photo you're seeing the new sod. This photo is after I spent 3 days completely weeding this bed I've added some top soil along the grass edge to raise the soil level next to the sod in preparation for the edging. The Ponytail Asparagus fern you see at the bottom is part of the corner bed in the second photo This is the...

Today's featured Garden Pic is my Golden Spider Lily! Like the Orange, it's a Magic Lily with just a stem appearing in September. There are 2 stems, one from each bulb. (Apparently it was fruitful and multiplied.) I caught this pretty shot in late day yesterday, as the sun rays were sliding toward the West, highlighting this blossom!   I took this shot this morning: The second stem blossom opened & they look pretty entwined.

Here's a delightful early morning shot of Orange Spiders Lilies in the middle of Pink Vinca!  Orange Spider Lilies are a type of magic lily common to the Deep South; harbingers of autumn, a single stem or two springing up from the ground out of nowhere. Then, once the flowers are done, their leaves pop-up, lasting until spring when they melt away.  

Today I've got a great shot of a Gulf Fritillary Butterfly on one of my red Zinnia's! You know it's fall when you see them flitting about the flowers in their seasonal orange & black colors!   Also worked on planting my winter Garden in one 4 x 8 raised bed yesterday:  12 broccoli plants, 1 tomato plant, 1 row of purple bush beans, 1 row of Spinach & 1 row of miniature red romaine. I also plan on planting radishes, garlic and another row of spinach in that bed. I looked up what various garden plants like to grow together with on Pinterest, which is called "Companion Planting." I found out tomato plants hate being next to broccoli plants, but love beans and broccoli plants hate being near tomatoes, but love growing with spinach. Lettuce and radishes are neutral; they can grow next to anything.  So I'm putting rows of spinach seed between rows of broccoli and I put the row of beans next to the tomato. Hopefully, everyone will be happy!

Two photos today of some of the Vinca flowers in my garden! Vinca are a common annual flower that comes in white and a range of pink from very dark to very like. They also self-seed readily, so once you have them, you generally can just transplant the seedlings wherever you want flowers when the come up in late spring. Here in the Deep South, Vinca can winter over, though it depends on location whether they are in shelter, sunny area or not. They are susceptible to freezing otherwise.  I have come from random seedlings that popped up in various places in my flower beds and I just transplant them here and there.   Most of my Vinca blooms have a style like this photo below: they usually have a "pink eye" at their center. Though, occasionally, I'll see all white without a pink center, but the pink center is the most common. However, one of the seedlings I transplanted to my front bed this year looks like this: Dark pink with a extended white center!   I've never seen o...

I have two Garden pics today: my white & pink Pampas Grass just blooming!  August is they're bloom season! Also, the set of 5 fancy hybrid Daylilies I ordered in June from Springhill Nursery came in the mail yesterday, so I've spent time both yesterday & today planting the fresh roots. It was a special offer buy now, pay after delivery; 5 different daylilies for $30, which is good since usually buying a single hybrid daylily thru Spring