Winter arrangement

 

Update on the "winter arrangement" I created for our porch - here's the finished product!   I bought two bunches of mixed evergreen branches at a local hardware shop, as well as some very colourful branches from Sheridan Nurseries. 

A detailed view....

Even kitty cat was in the holiday decorating mood....

Winter arrangements

Check out this cool winter container arrangement I saw ay Sheridan Nurseries today.... Love the orange and green combination!   This totally inspired me to get some plant materials myself and attempt an arrangement for our place..... Stay tuned for updates!!

Fall bouquet

Probably last bit of blooms from the backyard this year - a few surviving pansies from the backyard planter which I cleaned out.  Fall yard clean up is going pretty well (at least in the backyard):

* mow grass
* cut down daylily and hosta plants
* cut down / pull unwanted plants
* raked leaves
* fertilize perennials

Now I got a few more things to do at the front yard... hopefully we can get a few more mild days in the upcoming week or two! :) 

Visitors

Some fun visitors in the back yard last week....

The white cat with dots has been frequent visitor in our backyard and front yard.... (he/she is a bit shy)... 

And a beautiful blue jay.... I hope it will come back again - it's absolutely gorgeous! 

Front yard - current plan doodle

Now that Fall is here and I've been doing some yard clean up, I thought it'd be a good idea to record what I currently have so that:
1) I can plan out (and dream about) my dream garden during the cold winter months....
2) So that I can remember and find all the plants I had without accidentally digging plants up....
3) Monitor how my plants are doing year after year....

So I drew up this plan over lunch break today as a mini-record.  I think my drawing is a bit out of scale (bigger than it actually is compared to the proportions of the plants - maybe it's my subconscious hoping the yard was bigger).  After some cleaning up the last few weekends, I managed to make some space between all the over-grown shrubs and now can start to see the plants individually.  I'm still not too happy about the positioning of the Viburnum and the Wiegla - I think they're too big to be up front like that.  Maybe I'll prune them a bit before winter to see if they'll grow back next Spring in a somewhat manageable size.

Now, the next thing to think about is to plant bulbs or not to plant bulbs.... I'll save that for the next blog entry :) 

Hydrangeas

 

I'm so happy that the Lime Light hydrangeas in our yard is turning out so beautifully in the Fall.  I read about how this kind of hydrangea turns pinkish in the Fall, but did not expect this pretty of a colour to show up.  I think they are especially beautiful during the colour transition when they're just turning pink but still has traces of lime green and white left.  

Nature is just so beautiful - the colours, the textures, the details.... make sure you look to nature every day and appreciate all it can offer! :)

Fall cleanup

Last weekend I began doing some Fall garden cleanup.  Other than digging up the dead purple sand cherry plant and clearing away some other bits and pieces, I actually needed to clear up some room to plant the remainder of the perennials I bought from Northland Nursery several weekends ago.

As usual, as I dug through the yard I usually find some really random objects.  Sometimes I wonder if people just decide to throw ANYTHING into the ground to fill it out - oh here's a brick, let's toss it in... and here's a broken flower pot, let's toss that in too, and why not a broken plate...?

Anyways, the several hour of work was very productive.  I moved around some daylily plants and planted in the new ??? plant.  I also planted the new clematis plant.  The only one I have left to plant is the new shrub rose...

The new lavenders I added are doing well ...

As I was clearing out the yard, it occurs to me that maybe I shouldn't clear certain plants because I heard before that some plants do better over winter if some of the foilate is left to stay.  So I went to the ever so useful inter-web and found two pages that tells you what plants you can cut in the Fall and what you should wait till the Spring.  Check it out! 

Fall perennials to prune:  http://gardening.about.com/od/maintenance/a/Fall_Pruning.htm

Plants to prune in the Spring:  http://gardening.about.com/od/maintenance/a/Spring_Pruning.htm 

Also, I found a link to a nice little page at Home Depot's website for Fall garden maintenance:  http://www.homedepot.ca/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/GardenCentre?storeId=10051&catalogId=10051&langId=-15&display=gardening_articles_6 .
It covers briefly a wide range of things to do... lots of stuff people probably already know but excellent information for me the novice gardener :) 

Happy pruning!! 

Beautiful Shed

Dream shed #1 (from Sheridan Nursery)

Backyard Landscape Doodle

So here is my first amateur attempt to sketch out the "existing condition" of our backyard (I want to learn to draw like a real landscape designer...)

As you can see, the shape and proportion of the yard is very long and narrow.  The previous owner did a nice job of putting in the deck and landscaping in the middle (some spots needs to be fixed up and thinned out).  I'll have to try to draw this again in scale next time, but at least it's a start.  From these sketches, I plan on playing with the design and shape of the garden all winter long (when it's too cold to be out there!) and hopefully by Spring time we'll  have a newly designed plan! :)

Happy planning! 

Northland Nursery

Last weekend we ventured out to Northland Nursery near Guelph, Ontario to check out the 1-gallon plant sale.  It was about an hour drive from Toronto and pretty easy to find.  We arrive at the nursery and all you see is just rows and rows and rows of plants.  We were like little kids in a candy store! 

The nursery carried a large variety of plants, everything from perennials, to ornamental grass, to trees....all in 1-gallon pots....  and the best part is, they were all $5.99 each! 

They even have a few horses and donkeys (not for sale) - perfect entertainment for little kids who are bored from the plants.  We made some nice purchases that day.  Among those, I got some pretty purple flower perennial (forgot the name)

A beautiful "Morden Sunrise" rose.... (have no idea where I'm planting that yet, but I can decide later!)

And many many more others!  We barely got everything to fit in the car.... 

Until next time..... we'll definitely be back for more! 

Happy Gardening! 

Front yard Plant ID - Lime Light Hydrangea

In the front we have a beautiful hydrangea plant.  From the research I've been doing online, I think this is one from the Paniculata Hydrangea family - in particular a "Lime Light" Hydrangea (http://www.hydrangeashydrangeas.com/limelight.html).  I learned (online) that the word "paniculata" relates to the somewhat "panicle" (cone) shape of the blooms.  I thought it may have been a "Little Lamb" hydrangea before but I think those blooms are slightly bigger than these... 

The blooms start off white in colour mid-summer.  Towards late summer and into early Autumn, the flowers starts turning pink and now at the beginning of October they are becoming a even more gorgeous shade of pink.

I'm still not 100% sure if my plant is a Lime Light, but form my comparison to ones I saw at the nursery it was pretty close.  I'm looking forward to drying these gorgeous flower when it gets cold out, I heard that they preserve pretty well when dried.

Orange and green planter arrangement

A beautiful planter orange and green arrangement I saw at Sheridan Nurseries the other day.  I really love that light green leafy plant (I think they're called Sweet Potato Vine?).  It really freshens up the arrangement and goes with practically everything.  I think they were quite popular this summer as I saw them at many gardening centres.  Hopefully next summer they will still be "in style" so I can get some for my container gardens :)

Backyard Plant ID: Asters

So there was this one low bushy plant in the middle of our backyard that we had no idea what it was.... that was until about 2 weeks ago, when it started blooming!



The plant has these GORGEOUS little purple flowers, they almost look like daisies of some sort.  Someone told me that it could be some sort of Aster, so I went online and did a bit of Googling....

From my online research, I'm guessing this could be New England Asters (a.k.a. Michaelmas Daisy)
http://ontariowildflowers.com/main/group.php?id=1
http://www.woodlandgardensct.com/fallplants.html
What do you think?

BEAUTIFUL!

Front yard - Plant ID - Rose Mallow

In our front yard, there are these GORGEOUS red/magenta flowers.  They bloomed mid-summer and the colour was absolutely stunning.  I recall a neighbor walked by and said "wow, they are so big, like a satellite dish!".

I went to Sheridan Nurseries and saw the same plant, so I checked out the plant tag to see the details.  I guess the full name of this plant is "Rose Mallow" (Hibiscus moscheutos Luna Rose).  I also found a link online with more detailed info: 

http://www.learn2grow.com/plants/hibiscus-moscheutos-luna-rose-luna-series/

A photo from Sheridan Nurseries - they had some beautiful ones there too! 

Happy Gardening!!!

Front yard - Plant IDs

So our front yard was quite over-grown when we had moved into the house.  Again, there was lots of material to work with so I was more than happy to go in to do a bit of clearing and weeding. I will have more "after" pictures to show on a later date.  But for now, with the help from some family members, we've identified some of the plants in the front yard...

Black Eyed Susan (Rudbeckia hirta) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rudbeckia_hirta

(These seems to be very common in this neighborhood - feels like every house has a bunch of these)

Veriegated Weigela...

http://www.brighterblooms.com/product/variegated-weigela.html

Cosmos http://www.bbc.co.uk/gardening/plants/plant_finder/plant_pages/228.shtml

Again, these seem to grow like wild weeds in our neighborhood (I don't mind them though, they are so pretty, and they make beautiful cut flowers!)

and Sedum
http://www.mooseyscountrygarden.com/perennial-plants/sedum-autumn-joy.html

I'm so excited to find so many different kind of plants in both the front and back yards.  It's so much fun to find out what each plant is, their characteristics, and visualize how it can look in the context of the garden with other plants and over time.  I plan on moving some of them around as currently many of them are overshadowed by taller plants that are at the wrong place.  There's so much to do, but so little time!

Backyard Plant ID - Japanese Spurge

New plant identified!  The plant that is in the middle of the backyard under the tree is called Japanese Spurge.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pachysandra_terminalis

 It has a very nice jade colour groundcover and in late summer there were even little white flowers blooming from it.  I think the previous owner did a nice job picking this plant for this location of the garden.

  The only problem is, the neighborhood raccoon family has decided to make the Japanese Spurge patch their bathroom, which I am not happy about.... so their "business" has been killing some of this beautiful Japanese Spurge plants.  I guess that wild life comes hand in hand with gardening, so I'm sure this is just the beginning of it.  I'm trying a few "natural" different anti-raccoon remedies to deter them from coming back.  I'm sure that will be featured in another blog post in the near future ;) 

(Here's a plant tag I saw at Sheridan Nurseries the other day of a Japanese Spurge)

Backyard - More plant IDs

With the help of a very knowledgeable family member, here's a few more plants identified in the backyard (Click on the image above for a zoomed in view)...

 we have.... Strawberry... (woo hoo!  Can't wait till next year's harvest, as long as the raccoon don't get to them first)

Purple Clematis...(it could be the Jackman clematis species)
http://www.canadiangardening.com/plants/vines-and-groundcovers/demystifying-clematis/a/30322
http://www.floridata.com/ref/c/clem_xja.cfm

 Daylily  (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daylily)

Coreopsis... (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coreopsis)
and some sort of hostas plant behind it...

Backyard Plant ID - "Black Lace" elderberry

Plant ID Round #1 - so what is that beautiful purple shrub in the right hand side against the fence?

When we bought the house, the plants hasn't fully bloomed and at one point we thought this might have been some sort of Japanese maple....

 

But as the plant grew, we noticed the shape of the leaves were not Japanese maple....

And in late Spring, these gorgeous pink flowers were popping up, so it was a clear indicator that this was some sort of elderberry shrub (I didn't figure it out on my own, thanks to several of my family members who are into landscaping and plants!).  

 

I did a bit more research online and concluded that this species is the "Black Lace" Elderberry (Sambucus Nigra).  It's a hardy shrub, with the dark purple leaves resembling Japanese maple (OK, so I wasn't the only one that got fooled!) and big "clumps" of purple berries forms after the pink flowers are gone. Apparently the elderberry are edible, but I don't think I'm going to try though... 

Here's a nice little website I found that gives detail description about the plant (http://www.colorchoiceplants.com/black_lace.htm) and (http://www.provenwinners.com/plants/sambucus/black-lace-elderberry-sambucus-nigra)