Variety is the Spice of Life

Well, that variety certainly is the 'spice' if as a gardener one likes a great range of plants. Though it has never been elucidated here, that range, in terms of the type of plant, encompasses at least these forms: smaller perennials, annuals, shrubs, trees, vines, ground covers, xeriscape plants, succulents, a group that includes Aloes, Agaves and Yuccas, South African plants, CA natives, water or bog plants, bonzai, dwarf conifers, bromeliads, bulbs, plants for deep shade, tropical plants. The list is much longer, depending upon your parameters. The idea is, there's a great wealth of plants to choose from in fashioning a garden, with each one of these listings also potentially serving as a theme garden. At one time or another, I've employed five from the above list for such a theme garden. Even if one doesn't (as I have) populate one's garden with some of each of these, it is fun to consider the role that they can play in our gardens.
On that note, here are this week's photos.

Begonia Illumination Apricot. One of the heaviest bloomers of all my begonias. Love the color!

Helenium Mardi Gras. I know I take too many photos of this amazingly prolific sneezeweed but it's so damn beautiful. A bee magnet.

Tiger lily. Not sure which one this is but it always produces tons of flowers.

Tigrinum Flore Pleno. This is considered a double tiger lily and, as well, it has the deepest orange in my collection of tiger lilies. 

Although slightly shaded, this is my Erica speciosa. It's starting a new bloom season but I enjoy the foliage year round.

Although the Digiplexis craze has somewhat subsided, they're still widely available. This is the original, D. Illumination Flame. Of note, the flowers are infertile and thus stay open and beautiful much longer than those of its cousin Digitalis (foxglove). 

Sphaeralcea Newleaze Coral. This exuberant mallow has sprawled out of its pot and onto the street.

This Lilium 'My Wedding' turned out to be very similar to another double white lily I grew this year (Lodewijk). Though not quite as fragrant as the latter, it still exuded a pleasing scent. The photo below shows more of the stand of this variety.

Ageratum houstonianum. "Houston, we have a ... success." This tall, long blooming species is always a delight. A fave of butterflies.

One could easily add 'caudiciforms' to the list of types of plants in the intro. Here's one - Cussonia natalensis. Caudiciforms are recognized by their fat trunks, which can be just a couple of inches tall or in the case of certain trees 50' high!

Leucospermum 'Veldfire.' Though it's already bloomed, this pincushion bush hailing from South Africa has I think some of the most beautiful foliage of any Leucospermum.

If it's August, that means it's time for Crocosmias. Here's my C. Emily McKenzie. Fiery orange flowers on tall arching stems are its calling card. 

Likewise past its spring blooming period but still attractive is my Cotinus Royal Purple. I took the plunge and pruned it hard this year and it bounced right back, more lush than before. There's different kinds of pruning but you might think of this type as 'restorative' pruning.

My Tecoma x smithii is now a force of nature. It's not only climbed to the top of a 20' street tree but it's blooming even more vigorously this year. No matching that sun-drenched color.

The bed between the front driveways was once all Australian natives. Though I've since deviated slightly from that organizing principle, this Adenanthos (Wooly bush) continues to hold down, if not dominate, the bed.

Non-cat lovers can skip the next tw photos. Here's Phoebe out in her element, making sure I'm getting the (gardening) job done right.

This year's "most outrageous lily" award goes to L. Bombastic. Huge, the deepest red ever and really, really fragrant! Case closed.

I mostly took this shot to capture the colorful little metallic green fly that was visiting my Helichrysum bracteanta Monster Red.

Lazy Days of Summer

We've finally reached the lazy days of summer, at least most of us have in our gardens. That doesn't mean there isn't always work to be done - weeds never take the summer off - but hopefully we've planted most of we're adding for the spring and summer season. Time now to enjoy the fruits of our labors. One of the 'stopping for a moment' joys for me is photographing the garden. As I have a 'one-of-everything' garden, there's always something in bloom or providing interesting foliage. Here then are a few 'snapshots' of the end of July garden.

Helenium 'Mardi Gras.' I've literally taken dozens of photos of this plant over the years but it keeps coming back strong and blooming its heart out. A real favorite for bees. 

As I've mentioned, lilies are my favorite bulb and I have a lot of them. June-August is the height of the season for them. Here's an unusual 'tiger lily' type - L. leitchtlinii. A spotted golden yellow.

Most will recognize this as the flowering stem for a Pineapple lily. It's Eucomis 'Sparkling Burgundy.' As with most pineapple lilies, the flowers open from the bottom up. Also popular with bees.

Though a bit shaded, this is my Cuphea purpurea Firecracker. It's sort of a cross between a cigar cuphea and a bat-faced type. And as you can see, it blooms prolifically. A hummingbird magnet.

Though shot at an odd angle, here's a photo of my Lily Golden Splendor. It's a trumpet type, meaning very long and large. Fragrant too, if not quite on the scale of the Oriental types.

Driveways bed. This bed started as an Australian natives bed and though the foundation plants are still these Aussies, I've added succulents and a few bromeliads to the front. 

Here's one of the succulents in that bed - Cotyledon orbiculata var. orbiculata. As you can see, it's in bloom right now.

Teucrium Summer Sunshine. I love this tough little germander. Though it does produce little pink flowers I've added it to my garden for the sunny foliage.

Evolvulus. This morning glory relative has turned into one of my most reliable (and beautiful) perennials.

It's time to prune back my Impatiens Congolense. It's gotten a bit leggy, even as it keeps producing those charmingly wax red and yellow flowers.

Justicia betonicum. This less common plume flower has green-ribbed white bracts and little pink flowers. 

Mina lobata. I grow this every year, finding its gradation in color from red through orange, yellow and finally white to be very charming.

This is the bed to the right of our main walkway. That's an Eriogonum grande rubescens in the foreground, various Agastache beyond it and finally the Helenium at the top of the bed. The bed also holds several varieties of tiger lilies. 

Mimulus Jelly Bean Gold. As many of you know, I have a collection of Mimulus varieties in my garden. I think I may have all of the Jelly Bean colors. 

Two of the later blooming lilies are this Rio Negro (above) and the Bombastic (below). They're Oriental types, thus deliciously fragrant. 

This Lily Bombastic is, along with the double white Lodewijk, my two favorite lilies all year. 

This sounds like a bad joke: what do you get when you cross a Calibrachoa with a Petunia? In truth, someone did that and called it a 'Petchoa.' Here's a Petchoa Caramel Yellow. Incidentally, Petchoa? I mean, y'all couldn't come up with a catchier name than that?

Lily Black Beauty. Not sure about the color but they got the 'beauty' part of the name right. Although it's not a tiger lily, it does have spotted recurved petals. Lovely.

Tecoma x smithii. I thought this was a better behaved Tecoma but time has proven me wrong. It's climbed up into a street tree and is now 20' tall. Oops. 

Gomphrena decumbens. Although this year-round-blooming perennial has a common name - Airy Bachelor's Buttons - it really needs one that's more snazzy. Purple Reign? Okay, we'll keep working on the new common name ...

Tilden Botanical Garden (RPBG)

A friend and I spent a lovely day at Regional Parks Botanical Garden two weeks ago. The former Tilden Botanical Garden, it's located in the Berkeley Hills just up above the UCBG campus's Strawberry Canyon. Here are a collection of photos taken that day. I have positive identification for most, thanks to the Garden's scrupulous signage. There are a few questions, where signs couldn't be found or where access wasn't possible. So for those unfamiliar with RPBG, it is devoted to plants native to California. And it is laid out by regions of the state, with a handy map that lists those nine regions. As we know, California is an incredibly diverse state ecologically (and thus botanically), making this Garden a treasure trove of learning. Then again, one can wander the garden and enjoy its many treasures without knowing anything about plants at all.
So we start with one of the most common of California natives - Romneya coulteri, better known as Matilija poppy. It forms large drought tolerant clumps that produce very large 'fried egg' poppy flowers all summer.

Clarkia species. We couldn't find signage for this but do recognize it as a Clarkia species. Clarkias are a wide-ranging, late spring to early summer blooming annual. The flowers are mostly shades of pink, but that encompasses very pale to very bright pink. There are white flowering Clarkias as well.

This unusual plant (Iva mayesiana) is known as San Diego Poverty weed. A most curious common name, n'est-ce pas?

Yes, it's a tiger lily, but which one? In this case it's a Humboldt lily (Lilium humboldtii ssp. ocellatum). They are known for producing tall (6-10' high) stalks filled with recurved and spotted orange flowers. Quite a sight, even from a distance!

Speaking of plants with odd common names, how about Southern Mountain Misery (Chamaebotia australis)? As you can see, it has feathery fern-like foliage and a weeping habit.

Though we're not 100% certain, my friend and I think this Datura is D. wrightii (Sacred datura). Daturas are related to Brugmansias but are shorter, have upturned flowers and generally act as annuals.

This Manzanita tree was probably tagged but we didn't wander off the trail to check it out. So beautiful, especially here with the light shining through its branches. 

Adiantum jordanii. Commonly called California Maidenhair fern, it has petite leaves and slowly spreads out. It likes shade and semi-moist conditions. It is a relative of the common southern maidenhair fern that is so popular as a houseplant.

We're not sure of the species info for this good-sized lupine. It has pale yellow to white flowers and has over time made a vigorous clump.

Many people are familiar with the shrub known as Ninebark but did you know there's a low-growing native species? It's Physocarpus capitatus 'Tilden Park.' Lovely!

If this looks like a Monkey flower you'd be right. It's not however the drought tolerant 'sticky monkey' flower found throughout northern California. This is Mimulus cardinalis, which actually prefers semi-moist conditions. 

It had been a few years since I'd visited the Garden and I'd forgotten how big it is. It comprises 10 acres and parts of it are quite wooded, with a series of very pleasing streams. Several of those streams are crossed with wooden bridges, as was the case here. In the right foreground is a Bay laurel stump that's resprouting.

Here's another shot of one of the wooded sections in the garden. The shrubs that are growing on the banks of the stream are riparian types, dependent on regular moisture.

Here's another stream bed, with the right side hillside covered in ferns. 

As with any well-designed botanical garden, there are plenty of elevation changes in the Garden. Here we're on one of the higher trails, affording us a nice view looking back over a surprisingly wooded Garden.

This lovely cascading maidenhair fern wasn't ID'd (or perhaps we never found the sign). My friend ID'd it as an Adiantum but we're not sure of the species.

Another higher elevation view over the garden, this from the western reaches of the Garden.

We did find signage for this prolific Clarkia (C. imbricata). As you can see, this one has a bit of purple to its pink tones.

We know this is an Aquilegia (Columbine) but couldn't find the sign. I think it may be A. longissima, a yellow flowering native with especially large flowers and long spurs.

Likewise, we know this is a Vitis (grape) but don't know which species or variety. It does have a lovely silvery cast to the leaves.

Abies procera (Noble fir). We both marveled at the immense size of the cones on this fir tree. 

Most people will recognize this as a prickly pear cactus (Opuntia) but we didn't stray close enough to get its species or variety info. It's already forming fruits.