not yet warm

But the tulips are mostly withered anyway, even unto the two remaning T. clusiana chrysantha (beautiful), and there is only one "Ice Follies" representing the daffodils. The ipheion are nearly gone, freesia starting to wither, sparaxis about half gone, and ixia just in bud. The watsonia seem to be suffering from transplant shock. Only the clivia, cyclamen, and anemones are doing well, relatively speaking. The alstroemeria look promising, though. The calochortus frankly do not.

The sweet peas are starting to bloom at the south-east fence, and the snap peas are almost yielding a useful harvest. This autumn I'll plant an entire row in November instead of half a row. The saponaria is starting to bloom and the lithodora is looking very pretty. We also have several eschscholzia. The nameless ceanothus has some bloom, which is rather hard to see. The loropetalum is unmistakably out, the flowers much brighter than the leaves, and the berberis has more leaves, including green ones near the ground. Nothing from the zantedeschia yet. The lavender at least look nice and green; there are more nemophila open, I think three plants.

The solanum is most impressive viewed from the south. The osteospermum are also very showy, to say nothing of the flax. The dietes muster four blooms between them. Oh, and the salvia greggii is sparse but very bright red; the nasturtiums are climbing well and have some good deep orange flowers.

I'm after that gopher again. I've ripped out some more allium neapolitanum and transplanted various gaura and catharanthus, plus a couple of leonotis. All in all a busy weekend.

tulips wilting

... the species tulips, anyway. Next year, I should have some of the T. clusiana in the western strip, which has been pure green these last few weeks. Now the nemophila are starting to decorate it, and I'm very pleased to see them back. All the Darwin hybrids are out, and a plethora of sparaxis and freesia; this may well be the high point of my bulb garden. The daffodils under the front of the house are getting dry and old. Another red anemone is blooming. The cyclamen still have plenty of blooms and the Clivia is starting to open.

The plum tree has exchanged most of its petals for leaves. The solanum has a fair number of purple flowers, and rather fewer leaves. I've hacked off the outer parts of the two plumbago, which I should have done weeks ago. The biggest of the leonotis has more flower heads starting; I should consider what shape I want it to be.

The snap peas are just starting to be big enough to eat. Next year I should sow a full half of them in November. Make that this year. On the Strip, the osteospermum and freesia look gorgeous, except that I wish I had more yellow freesia, and perhaps even a few more purple ones. The California bluebells are being joined by their neighbours the eschscholzia and by their colour allies the lithodora and anagallis. The scarlet flax blazes generously from the northern Zone and the edge of the drive.

better and better

Just after my last, nine days ago to be exact, the "Ice Follies" daffodils in front of the house started blooming. In a few days they were all open, looking crisp and pretty. Now the "Barrett Browning" that I planted in front of them are also open, less spectacular, but a good counterpoint. The others, which I think were salvaged from elsewhere in the garden, are not yet even in bud. I may put some daffodils in the south Zone for next year. The "Falconet" are almost finished; some of them will be trimmed this weekend. The "Tete a Tete" are over, and there is one "Minnow" (I think) open. There is still no news of the N. obvallaris. Puzzling, that.

The species tulips are doing very well, at least the yellow-and-pink ones ... T. sylvestris I think ... and the "Lady Jane" T. clusiana. The Darwin hybrids are opening, starting with the bright red ones. The anemones are much as they were, except that the bright red one now has more blooms. Four. The hyacinth is over.

I've ripped out the zantedeschia that were under the big escallonia by the front gate and put them next to the solanum, where the watsonia used to be. They may not bloom this year. The ones in front of the house, next to the aforementioned daffodils, are growing but not yet in bloom. Where the z. were I might put in some ipheion, crocus, or miniature daffodils.

In the front walkway, the clivia miniata has six -- six! -- flower stems and buds are swelling. The cyclamen are still doing well. The sweet pea is starting to climb (but you should see the ones by the east fence) and some "Grandpa Ott" ipomoea have at least germinated. There are plenty of flax, a few eschscholzia, and a few gilia capitata open; the osteospermum are putting on a good show, and the trailing rosemary, besides blooming, is starting to grow upwards. The calochortus and phacelia campanularia continue. At the south fence a few nasturtiums are open, and the salvia greggii has a few flowers as well. In front, the new grevillea has inarguably got some flowers, which are slowly getting bigger; the same goes for the loropetalum. The berberis has leaves to perhaps six inches above the ground. The teucrium still looks good. The various perovskia are getting their first leaves. And there are plenty of muscari; perhaps too many. The white freesias outside the back door opened last week, and are now being joined by one or two in other places. What look like most of the sparaxis are open, in colours ranging from deep red through orange to pale pink and one or two rather startling white ones.

The first few "Johnny-jump-up" viola are in bloom, and the leonotis in the corner lawn has more flower heads active, so that I become very glad I protected it over the winter. The gophers are back; I've set traps in the corner lawn and my son is trying to drown them in the back lawn. The plum tree still has some blossom and is adding leaves, including some that probably presage the growth of additional twigs from the trunk, and so must be stripped off. The rhaphiolepis are budding strongly. The alstroemeria by the back gate has a few flowers ready to open.

lonely as a cloud

Ouch! It has been more than a fortnight since I last was here. And the first yellow daffodil -- a St. Keverne, I think -- opened nearly that long ago. We now have a few more yellow ones and several of the Falconet, some of which I evidently moved a few yards northwards without telling myself. A few miniature daffodisl are open, possibly the Tete a Tete, which I should move closer to the street (in front of the row of lavender). There is one calochortus, the pale purple one; the hyacinth is doing nicely, and though we still have only two anemones open, there are more growing where I planted them in soil that I had enriched with compost. I'm now nearly sure they just can't take this heavy clay unless it is amended. There are plenty of ipheion and it would be a good thing to put some of them in the western strip, which is rather dull at the moment. The muscari armeniacum are opening and the cyclamen are still strong; no bloom from the alstroemeria at the moment. The freesias, and some of the tulip species, are in bud.

The plum tree is in wonderful nearly full bloom. The creeping rosemary at the south-east corner is also blooming, which I had forgotten to mention, and the snap peas that I planted in October or November have got a few flowers. Many of the phacelia are open, and of course the osteospermum. There are a few more flowers from the dietes. The loropetalum is clearly budding.

Springing!

For a week and more I've had some mini iris open, starting with the dark purple I. reticulata "George", and going on with the deep blue "Ida" and not quite so deep blue "Cantab". I should put some of those in the place west of the old malacothamnus where it's now rather bare. Today I saw one blue-purple anemone coronaria had also opened, several anagallis monellii, and one scarlet flax in the Zone. The scarlet cyclamen looks quite wonderful; the maroon one is losing blooms. None of the alstroemeria are blooming at the moment; on the east side, the osteospermum are doing well, as is the creeping rosemary, and at the south fence the salvia greggii has started to bloom too. The new grevillea has some deep red buds. The teucrium still looks good.

The daffodils I planted in front of the house last autumn are simply rocketing up out of the ground; some older ones already have swelling buds. That unidentified bulb by the back gate is a freesia, to judge by its flower stem, so I had better move it to somewhere sunnier. Behind the house, those leonotis I transplanted look fat and healthy; in the corner lawn, the half-grown one is fine, but of the others, one
half-eaten seedling remains. In the southern Zone I am going to have far too many of them if I don't watch out.

trans plant trans plant trans

After pruning the plum tree (trying to keep it open, remove duplicate shoots, and look for buds pointng the way I want to grow) I turned to planning, and moved two gaura seedlings from the corner lawn to the big belt of perovskia outside the back gate, and half a dozen watsonia to the retaining wall just north of there. I can't remember if those are the white or the orange ones ... we'll find out in a few months. Then I sieved some earth and stones under the front of the house.

The cyclamen in the front walkway are going well ... the scarlet one is trying to catch up with the maroon. The berberis has lost its last few leaves; the teucrium is spreading a bit wider; there are a few dots of primrose. Also slight bloom from the flax and the solanum rantonnetii (?sp); not a lot else yet.

more pebbles

Yes, I'm at it again: separating soil from pebbles and putting the pebbles in a trench.

Yesterday's storm seems to have left no flowers on the solanum nor leaves on the berberis but other plants are much as before. Two of the anemones that I planted in the green tubs with a mixture of soil and compost are coming up. The creeping rosemary is doing well, with a little bit of bloom; the juniper next to it is not visibly growing. Pity: on my walk this morning I saw a "lawn" of low-growing juniper and thought that might be better around the water meter than the erigeron karvinskianus (Santa Barbara daisy) that I have there now. The northern plumbago is not quite so yellow; I'll give it some more nitrogen in a few weeks. The various transplants from two weeks ago look healthy.

I can now see which of the daylilies in the Zone (and, for that matter, by the drive) are evergreen in this climate. I'll log them on the spreadsheet ... oh, I should create a new one of those for 2008.

Last week I finished demolishing the godzilla, except for some new growth that I hadn't the heart to cut down. I also hacked the salvia chamaedryoides right back, and hope I haven't killed it. Some of the catharanthi are looking sad, but I'm leaving them uncut for now. There are some overgrown lobularia that need to be shorn or pulled, so I've been doing some of that. I've also transplanted some chunks of cerastium tomentosum along the front path, and may do one or two more.