Author: susansdailygarden

Tender Love daylily – first year bloom

Last fall I bought a dozen daylilies to start the garden at the small house up north. Only five, however, got planted there. We were swamped with interior work and my creativity was just not flowing for the garden. I need think time sitting outside looking at an area for my garden ideas to gel. We were barely having any time out in the potential garden areas. And I was a bit nervous about the deer. So, the other 7 new daylilies got planted at the townhouse. A few came up in the townhouse gardens this year, the most exciting being the very late blooming, fragrant Tender Love.

I can already tell I will buy more. They feel like they will be like Blue Mouse Ears hostas to me. Each year I added more until I literally ran out of room in the area. I think Tender Love daylilies will be the perfect companion to the Blue Mouse Ears hostas, each shining at their own time, in the front of the garden.

An aside – Yes, that is clover in the garden. I left some for the bees and bunnies in the early years and it stayed. I pull it when it gets too much.

Back to the Tender Love daylilies Blue Mouse Ears pairing 🙂 Soon a bunch of the Blue Mouse Ears hostas will make the transfer up north. Not all, but some that need dividing and are crowded. Dare I move the Tender Love daylily too? Or splurge and order a few for up north?

The cheap in me says move it. The tender heart in me says it bloomed so perfectly right where it is, leave it. It is quite dainty. We’ll see how the remaining bud survives the landscape maintenance. That will probably be the decider.

Scope creep

A bit of scope creep has occurred in the garden at the little house up north. The garden jumped the sidewalk and started on the area between the long gutters on the back of the house. I knew this was a possibility and I did nothing to prevent it. Oh for the love of gardens!!!

I had a bunch of weigelia rootings that took so I planted them. If they survive they will need space. That area looked perfect to me!

The plan has now been nailed down to a grass path. The concrete will eventually be removed between the house and the garage and the garden can start right there. If it never expands beyond the weigelias that’s fine, but I have a feeling it will. Little by little. 4 bags of mulch and a base layer of cardboard at a time.

Deer walking through

At our little house up north, we have a deer “highway” along the side of the house. I discovered the path in the snow when we started coming up last winter. We knew they were bedding in the back yard so it wasn’t a surprise.

A couple days ago I woke up about midnight. I was reading in the living room and heard crunch crunch out the livingroom window. I suspected it was deer on the dry grass. I looked out the kitchen window and sure enough, first one big doe, and then a few minutes later another. Nice to see them as long as they are leaving my plantings alone – which they are 🙂

I wish I had a picture, but it was dark, and out the window. I can show you what our neighbors say the deer especially like. We have crabapple trees. A few days ago a few apples on the lower branches were ripening. Now I see they are … gone.

Ash “snow”

We have been keeping aware of the Greenwood fire in Northern Minnesota. There are increasing closures as the fire jumps major highways. Heavily wooded, beautiful forest areas with very old trees are being threatened, and over 20 thousand acres are on fire.

The air quality changes by the hour. Yesterday after work the air seemed clear. We went for a drive up the shore to Palisade Head (a high point along the shore of Lake Superior) and were totally taken off guard as the smoke in the air began to quickly thicken.

That’s the way it’s been – the winds change, the smoke rolls in and out, sometimes very quickly. Last night was particularly bad. It was “snowing” ash. We watched as particulates from what used to be trees just a day or so ago worked their way down from the smoke and cloud cover onto us. It is a sobering thought.

The latest weather forecast is calling for a few days with a decent chance of rain. Even so, the reports are the fire will not be fully contained until the snow flies – more than a month out.

Prayers for the fire fighters and the home and property owners.

Space

Space is something I have very little of in the townhouse gardens. It is rare I can add a new plant without it looking crowded. I love the look of daylilies tucked in between hostas, or is it hostas tucked in between daylilies?

However, I made a tough decision this last week. Daylilies gotta go. I know – what? Here’s the deal. The new landscape maintenance team at the townhouse is awesome at blowing cut grass and fallen leaves out of the rock. Really awesome. Really really awesome. The gardens all have rock. There is a lot of collateral damage lately. Mostly to the daylilies. Why have daylilies when they don’t survive for their day? So I made a decision. A lot need to go. Up north. This fall.

What holds up way better against the blowers? Small to medium hostas. I have plenty of those, too. Maybe I should divide a medium-sized hosta and put it in this space.

What about the sedum?

I have mixed feelings about moving the sedum. They are such a resilient plant, and super easy to propagate if they do get damaged. Literally if a stem gets broken, I stick it in dirt, it roots, and I have a new sedum plant.

I really like the fall color sedum provide as well as the 12 month interest. The pollinators LOVE them and the bunnies eat the unbroken stems all winter. When the bunnies do that, it also makes my spring cleanup easier. But for some reason, once the stems are broken, the bunnies don’t seem to have as much of an appetite for them. Very different from the sunflower!

I have already brought sedum plants and sedum cuttings up north and they are doing well with the mulch around them. I suppose where I’ll land is that if any of the Autumn Joy sedum get severely broken this fall, I’ll move those plants up north right away and let them sleep there. Then next summer I can take cuttings and start building a row to make a hedge – maybe on the farthest long gutter downspout.

Careful!

I am being cautious about bringing up plants that are under the Linden tree. There are tree roots, yes. But more concerning are the Japaese beetle bugs. They lay eggs in the soil. I don’t know if the eggs would survive the move, but I really don’t want to give them the opportunity.

So unfortunately, the Marque Moon daylilies, many of the hostas, the pink Asian lilies… Will all stay.

But the hostas outside of that area, and maybe a PurpleD’Oro need dividing and will go up north.

Maybe yet this fall, but more likely next spring.

It’s a lot.

That’s a lots of digging

So that’s the plants, so far, that are going up north in the next wave. That’s enough digging for me. It’s a lot of work to dig them out, but that’s only the first part. They have to be protected for transport, the holes have to be dug in the new garden to accommodate divisions, not just plopping in the whole existing plant, next there’s soil amendment, cardboard, mulch, and then watering.

That may be enough for this fall. I’m already having a realization that I will fill more space than I planned, but hey! If I plant along the long downspouts and put in mulch, then my husband doesn’t have to remove the downspouts anymore to mow – right?

Could be this whole area, or 2/3, with a grass area in the middle for lawn chairs. It’s bigger than it looks …

We’ll see.