jroot's Garden

Beautiful flowers jroot!!! May I ask what the name of the flower in the last photo is?? Sure is purdy!!!

-- "A perfect garden is just a garden to be in-perfection. Mornings to work on it and evenings to pause and look at it." Southeast Michigan, Zone 5a/5b

It is called Queen of the Prairie or Filipendula rubra. I love it, as it resembles astilbe somewhat, but gets to be 3 or 4 feet tall. I have it where it gets sun/ part sun.

check out this site. http://www.holoweb.com/cannon/queenof.htm

-- jroot

Certainly makes a statement … wish I had the room for it; as it is beautiful.

-- "A perfect garden is just a garden to be in-perfection. Mornings to work on it and evenings to pause and look at it." Southeast Michigan, Zone 5a/5b

I do like that Queen of the Prairie. You say it does well in partial sun?

-- the day you quit learning is the day you quit living.

jrootyour Queen of Prairie iseems to be lot lighter in color than mine!
And Dini: I have quite a few of them all over the property and the ones in the part shade are about 2 and a half feet tall and the ones in full sun are 5’ to 6’.

This is my tallest and wildest one!!

-- Eklectic, Follow my Bliss, South East Ontario 5a

I can live with the shorter height. It’s not as if I can change the light pattern in my yard lol!

-- the day you quit learning is the day you quit living.

Hmmmm, pretty!!!!! :-)

-- "A perfect garden is just a garden to be in-perfection. Mornings to work on it and evenings to pause and look at it." Southeast Michigan, Zone 5a/5b

I took a few shots today, after yesterday’s surprise wind and rain storm.

One of my brugmansias

The first canna to open near the upper dahlia bed

Some of the dahlias in the side garden

Foxglove near the driveway

Hollyhock in the lower garden. There were too many mosquitoes to get close, so hence the zoom shot

Some nasturtiums in the raised bed

A new plant I bought on sale. Already the tag has disappeared, although I KNOW that it was placed beside the plant

Oak leaf hydrangea

-- jroot

Nice! Oh so very nice!

-- Eklectic, Follow my Bliss, South East Ontario 5a

Thanks, Eklectic.

I forgot to add this one:

Some Rudbeckia

-- jroot

oh so beautiful.

-- - Debbie, SW Ontario Canada (USDA Hardiness Zone: 5a)

Beautiful!
I just started Rudbeckia this year, I can’t wait until the clump gets that nice and lush!

-- the day you quit learning is the day you quit living.

Lovely flowers!!!! And I too love those Rudbeckias. Damocles gave me a bunch of his Brown Eyed Susans. They are growing quite lovely in my front bed … I am also growing a really beautiful one called “Prairie Sun”. Bought 4 plants this years and they are now beginning to really bloom. If you don’t mind, I’ll post a very small photo of the flower here so you can see it.

-- "A perfect garden is just a garden to be in-perfection. Mornings to work on it and evenings to pause and look at it." Southeast Michigan, Zone 5a/5b

I sat down for lunch on the deck today, and saw one of my hibiscus trees on each corner of the deck overlooking the lower garden. I thought I would catch a shot of it.

-- jroot

Way to go: live with the camera and share the beauty!

-- Eklectic, Follow my Bliss, South East Ontario 5a

Lovely way to enjoy lunch!

-- the day you quit learning is the day you quit living.

Beautiful view !!!!!

-- "A perfect garden is just a garden to be in-perfection. Mornings to work on it and evenings to pause and look at it." Southeast Michigan, Zone 5a/5b

John, I work in my gardens with the camera in my pocket. LOL Otherwise I miss the shot that is only there for that instance. Your flowers are so pretty—I would love to see your whole garden. From what I’ve seen so far, it is put together creatively with some very dramtic flowers. Really enjoyed your pictures.

-- 'To plant a Garden is to believe in Tomorrow'

jroot, your garden looks great. I know what you mean about the camera; it is usually my binoculars that I end up wishing that I had brought out to the garden. How do you winter over your brugmansia? I just got some seed this spring and they are doing well but would value some advice about wintering.
Also we are near neighbours!!

-- horsetail, Fergus, Ontario

Fergus is just a hop, skip, and a jump away from here. Good to meet you, horsetail. I note that your email contains the name “grimes”. Any relation to Perry, or Sandy from Guelph?

Most of my brugmansia go into my cold cellar ( which does NOT freeze) for the winter, where they enjoy a nice long nap, getting water every 3-4 weeks. I don’t have room inside the house for all of them, and frankly, I think they do well with the rest/nap. My variegated brugs, and a couple of the other ones I have don’t do well with being cold, so they have to stay in the house. The variegated ones go into my dining room, and they get watered every three days. The other fussy ones go up to my wife’s studio, taking up her valuable counter space :( I hear about that every winter. LOL

The brugs will not survive in the ground at our grow zone. The positive side of bringing them indoors is that sometimes they reward us with flowers inside. The downside is that they are mite magnets, so they have to be stripped of their leaves in the fall, hosed down, sprayed with insecticide, hosed down again, and brought into the hosue. They will lose their leaves anyway because of the change in light from outside, so stripping the leaves is not a major deal to them. Just be careful not to get any sap near your eyes. I lost vision in one eye for about 14 hours a couple of years ago because of it. Very strange dilation of the pupil. Another negative of them indoors is that they do drop their leaves a lot, and they do need water at least twice a week. Sometimes, they shed all their leaves in spite of everything and go dormant indoors. One never knows.

At any rate, when you smell the fragrance of some of these brugs, it all becomes worth the work. :)

-- jroot

Thank you for your advice.This my first time having brugs. As I said I got seed so I don’t even know what colour they will be.Two of the seeds were blind. I tried cracking off the seed pod and it just fell of but the stem was green so I left them. In a few days they shot out leaves. The other two sprouted in the normal way. Because of the cold and unpredictable weather I have kept them all inside. I did try putting the two larger ones out but by the next day an insect that looks like a lady bug but is yellow with black spots had eaten one of the leaves so I brought them back in.
Miss Deb and a few others hopfully will be coming this way for a corn roast in August.When we get the date set I will post it. Hope we can all meet then.

-- horsetail, Fergus, Ontario

Sirry, I forgot the other question. No I don’t think we have any relatives over here with last name Grimes.

-- horsetail, Fergus, Ontario

I took some more shots early this morning of the garden.

Datura plant hiding the gas metre.

Canna Lily

Close up of Datura

One of the brugmansia opening at the front

Another Canna

Fringed Star Dahlia

Gooseneck Loosestrife

Outhouse flower – the smaller single bloom one

A view below and along the wall, where you can see the outhouse flower, and the miscanthus giganteum

Poppies are still in bloom

Another shot of the datura

-- jroot

Jroot you sure have some beautiful flowers.You must be very proud of your yard.You have such a wonderful assortment of flowers.

-- Bon,Hastings,Ont.....zone 5a....Always room for one more

Bon said it all jroot … yes, beautiful yard and flowers!!!! Do enjoy the photos … keep em coming!! :-)

-- "A perfect garden is just a garden to be in-perfection. Mornings to work on it and evenings to pause and look at it." Southeast Michigan, Zone 5a/5b

Lots of work, an artist’s eye, and definitely no fear of color. Breathtaking yard.

-- the day you quit learning is the day you quit living.

I got some more shots tonight.

Salmon coloured canna with dark leaves

Apricot brugmansia about to open, but I’ll miss the bloom. :(

Perennial Sweet Pea

Day lily – beside the cedar obelisk

-- jroot

Just beautiful jroot!

-- Eklectic, Follow my Bliss, South East Ontario 5a

Hmmmm, nice … see you have a Sweet Pea too. Their aroma is just wonderful!! You have such a wonderful selection of flowers within your gardens. Such pleasure they must bring you and your wife!!

-- "A perfect garden is just a garden to be in-perfection. Mornings to work on it and evenings to pause and look at it." Southeast Michigan, Zone 5a/5b

Photos at night have a completely different look. i was playing with my camera tonight.

Datura is hiding the gas meter. Does that mean I won’t have to pay ? ;)

One of my brugs at the front of the house

Dahlia cluster

Canna lily

Another dahlia

Phlox

hydrangea

-- jroot

oooh how lovely.
hiding the gas meter.. nice try!

-- - Debbie, SW Ontario Canada (USDA Hardiness Zone: 5a)

These pictures are wonder I love brugmansia I’m surprised about how you over winter them…great to know I’ll be able to do that in my new home. I love this site.

In parts of California, you may be able to overwinter the brugs outside. I note that you are zone 9. If you want earlier blooms though, you can take it in, overwinter it ( either dormant or active – depending upon the particular kind of brugmansia that you have ), get outside and aclimatized in the spring, and then planted and fertilized on a regular basis, and you will be rewarded.

Check out the garden web, where there is a forum specifically dedicated to brugmansia. There are many people from your area on the site. Mind you, in the past year or so, there have been a lot of people talking about other things than brugs on the forum, including aches and pains, and losses of dogs, etc. It has become more of a chat room, unfortunately, so I am rarely posting there anymore. Anyway, here is the link.

http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/brug/

Also check out this other brugmansia site which is relatively new, and very informative. Most members are American or Canadian. They are mainly brug addicts, as indeed I have become. Ruth Ann, from Burlington, is the Canadian director and an amazing wealth of information. You should see her brugmansia FOREST. Amazing. Unfortunately, I don’t have the space for what she has. Here is the link:

http://www.network54.com/Forum/444612/

There is the American Brugmansia And Datura Society, with members from all over the world, that you might be interested in as well. Once again, I believe that Ruth Ann is a director there.

http://abads.org/phpbb/portal.php?sid=bded4e5e3135ed3db5c8c64f13cbb57f

-- jroot

Thanks for all the links I love Frosty Pink, and the double white…I am hoping i can take them when we go to washington now. Thanks so much for you help on this.

Are you moving to Washington? Is that Washington D.C., or the state of Washington? If it is the state, there is a lady up there going by the name of Karma Happy Toes on the brugmansia site of the Garden Web who does amazing things with brugmansia. She has one called Shorty which does not get too tall, and yet flowers like crazy for her. I am one of two or three people in Canada who has a cutting of her Shorty. Last fall, I got over 175 blooms at one time.

Karma will be a great resource for you, if you are moving to the state.

I have also seen brugmansia in Washington D.C., but I am sure that they would have to go indoors for the winter there.

-- jroot

lulugardengirl, I was just thinking. If you can’t take the entire plant with you, you CAN take several cuttings with you. Let me know if you need some advice on that, including how to get them going.

-- jroot

I discovered this lovely lady hidden by leaves. I knew she was around somewhere, as I could catch her sexy scent early this morning.

Brugmansia: Roth Kirch X Balao # 5
This one cannot go dormant in the winter, so it has to come inside and live wth us all winter. What a shame. ;)

-- jroot

Well isn’t she purdy!!!!! Yah, I see that it is such a shame to have to share your home with this beauty … haha!!!

-- "A perfect garden is just a garden to be in-perfection. Mornings to work on it and evenings to pause and look at it." Southeast Michigan, Zone 5a/5b

Oh! my word, John. What a lovely flower. And the colour is so delicate. Really an amazing flower John, Thanks for sharing with us.

-- 'To plant a Garden is to believe in Tomorrow'

That ” shorty” is truly awesome Jroot.I’ve never seen anything like it. Wow.Beautiful.

-- Bon,Hastings,Ont.....zone 5a....Always room for one more

What amazing garden photos. I’m envious of your brug. While we were in BC this summer I saw some huge ones growing in various gardens. Oh to have their growing zone.

-- Stop by and visit my homepage at http://www.craftygardener.ca or my blog at http://craftygardener.blogspot.com/ Thanks, Linda aka Crafty Gardener

I’ve got one that is over my head now. It has been a good bloomer for me so far, but right now is taking a rest. There are buds on her though.

-- jroot