Peonies 2012

Last fall, I placed an order for a few peonies at Adelman Peony Gardens in Oregon. They all bloomed this spring. Having seen a lot of flopping peonies in the neighborhood, I opted for Japanese and double types with strong stems, my main criteria in choosing peonies for my garden. Here is a link for the different types of peony flowers. The following four peonies are what I ordered.

Leslie Peck,deep pink with pink and peach petaloids.

Madame Butterfly, Adelman's catalog describe this as glistening magenta color.

Pink Pompom, a double pink peony with pom pom-like petals in the center. This peony is said to have a great vigor. It is still remain to be seen in my garden.

Buckeye Belle, an early bloomer, semi-double dark red peony.

Duchesse de Nemours, a double white with great fragrance.

Kansas, a double type with watermelon red flower. It is hard to capture its true color.

Kansas and Duchesse de Nemours planted together in the mailbox garden.

Both of these peonies were acquired on clearance last fall.

And this is my NOID dark pink single peony.

This is how the flowers look like as they mature.

Iris As Cut Flowers

With the soaring heat we are experiencing here, I cut the remaining iris blooms from the garden and put them in vases. I love the orangy scent that wafts throughout our dining room.

Lilium pumilum

The first lily to bloom here in my garden. L. pumilum is a species native to Asia. The orange-red flowers are small, fully recurved and hang like little lanterns from the long pedicels.

New Plants for the Garden

This spring, I have been to several garden centers in search for some cool plants. I have known a couple of these from fellow bloggers.

Actaea simplex 'Black Negligee', bought specifically for this area where majority of the plantings are lilies and daylilies and are all green. I am in search for the variegated Iris pallida for this area.

A close-up photo of its stems and foliage.

This is how it look like when I brought it home, it is about two feet tall. The tag says it can grow up to 5 feet tall and blooms in late summer with tall white spires.

Aruncus aesthusifolius, dwarf goatsbeard.

Helleborus Winter Jewels 'Cherry Blossom'. I did a search online and it look like H. Elegance White. Its blossoms are a double greenish-white with maroon speckles.

This is its tag and when I research for Cherry Blossom, this is what I have found: Walter's Gardens info and Monrovia.

Iris 'Gerald Darby'

A Mother's Day Project

This mailbox garden project was planned last fall after someone hit our mailbox and broke the wooden post. At about six o'clock yesterday morning, I started working on the project and I was done on that day also except for the mulch cover. Today, I went to a local garden center and bought a couple bags of shredded mulch to finish up the job.

Here you see the finished project.

This is the front and as you can see, the plantings are nothing special considering the spot where it is in. Another issue is the salt during winter and my husband and I discussed about putting a barrier come fall. Planted here are two Hosta 'Wide Brim', two Alchemilla mollis, Peony 'Duchess de Nemours' and 'Kansas, historic Iris 'Sans Souci', unnamed sedum, a few NOID historic Iris and a few perrenials I dug up from the garden. Some Camassias are seen blooming here.

This is the entry to the driveway. Again, the plants are nothing special. I planted two Shasta Daisy and some NOID irises. I divided my one old and leggy Heuchera 'Palace Purple' and planted them in front of the border. I tucked in a few lily bulbs in here too.

Here is a photo taken after a few days when it was rototilled. The peonies you see here are bought on clearance last fall and tucked them in here.

The peony leaves and the iris look good together. Here is an update on the two Intersectional peonies I bought last fall. Both of these are suppose to be Kopper Kettle.

The first one is kinda weird. Its first blossom was a magenta and the second one is kind of pink and peach in color.

The second one is lemon yellow.

A garden scene where the irises are blooming. A few more weeks and it will be a lily show here in my garden. Happy gardening everyone.

Wordless Wednesday: Columbines