Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Latest Flowers - Still Time to Bloom!

The season may be creeping ever so close to the first snow fall, but the flowers are still making an appearance in the perennial garden. Few leaves are left on the trees, and the bare red stems of the Siberian dogwoods are looking fantastic.
Morning sun on the yard:

The fall aster (A. dumosus "Alert") produces many flowers, though I give no thought to this plant in the rest of the year, neglecting it while the spring and summer flowers are putting on a show. Now, I wish I had a whole garden of bright fall asters.
Aster dumosus "Alert":

"Pink beauty" Potentilla still has some fresh blooms too:


I got this tiny primula from a friend, who grew them from seed she obtained in a Rock Garden Society seed exchange. I believe this is Primula scotica, though if you have a better idea, let me know. I know that it is winter hardy here (which rules out many varieties), as this is its second year and it has self-seeded to make several new plants for me. It usually produces flowers in clusters on stems held above the plant, but I can forgive it for hugging close to the ground in this cold.
Pretty little primula with farinose buds and stems:

I cut down my Martha Washington geranium (Pelargonium domesticum) and made this whole tray of cuttings for next year's plants. The original plant is in the pot on the left. I think I'll grow a bunch of these next year. Of course, that will depend on the success of my cuttings! My grandfather moved into a seniors' complex this past year and had to leave behind all his geraniums and and winters spent coddling geranium cuttings under lights. Hopefully I'll have a deck full of these beauties next year and Grandpa can check my blog posts for the pictures! The pot on the right contains cuttings from a pink "tulip geranium", a variety whose flowers look like clusters of tulip buds, as they never open. I dip the cuttings in Wilson's Root Stimulating gel before putting them in the sterile seed-starting mix mixed with additional perlite.
Geranium propagation:

Finally, these delphiniums appear to be a bit out of sync with the season, but possibly will produce a second set of flowers for me before they are dumped on with snow!

4 comments:

Northern Shade said...

The red foliage in the first foliage looks great, since yo don't see as much of the red around here. Alert has a good number of blooms on it. That's good t see in October. Your delphiniums are very optimistic. You have to give them a lot of credit for trying for a rebloom. Even the little blue buds look pretty.

Northern Beauty Seeker said...

I have seen some delphiniums here in Edmonton opening new buds in the last week as well. I love this mild October after a cold September, but was rather surprised when I discovered I had raspberries ripened last week. Oh well, they were a treat. :)

Randy Emmitt said...

Enjoyed my visit! never seen such red asters. We are in central NC so fall is just starting here.

Unknown said...

Nice to have a few latebloomers come along at this time of year, isn't it? Helps us to get through what looks to be a long, trying winter.