First Irises

I believe these are the iris we received from the Master Gardener presentation at the MN state fair, perhaps Iris Germanica 'Alba'. The tulips and daffodils have finished blooming. Soon all the irises and peonies will be in bloom. The irises seem to be shorter this year, probably from lack of water.

Snow Anenome

This little plant is really taking off and has a lot of new white buds. I purchased this from the plant sales last year. Does anyone know the best way of propagating these?

Bleeding Hearts

Here is a bleeding heart I purchased at a plant sale last year. It is doing so well on the hilltop slope, that I bought another 5 including a white one, from plant sales this year. At a buck each you can not go wrong and may just solve the slope problem.

The slope is dry shade from black walnuts. If that is not enough the deer always visit there and chop away on the hostas. I have been slowly adding plants to help prevent erosion. I also added several dead nettle plants, buggleweed, and periwinkle.

Unknown daffodil

This little daffodil has 2-3 miniature daffodils per stem. Any idea of the variety? Could it be Minnow'?

Veggie Plant out

Sunday, we planted the eggplants, tomatoes, and peppers. I had way too many tomatoes and had to make some hard choices of which ones to plant. Thorny Guy did not leave me enough space.

The beans also got in the ground. We still have a lot of work ahead of us though as corn and melons are next.

Note from Thorny Guy: Ladybug knew her allotted space was for 15 tomatoes and 15 peppers. 24 of each were planted. Now the real question, who is going to weed all these extra plants?!?

Creeping Phlox

The first picture is of Phlox subulata 'Candy Stripe' which Thorny Guy found at a box store fifty percent off bin last year. It did not take to the winter well and about half died, but it is starting to come back. The others are a purple and pink variety which we moved from Maryland.

Liliacs

Hyacinth 'Gipsy Queen'

This is the only type of Hyacinth to survive the winter. We had a lot better luck in hyacinths in Maryland. This one is called 'Gipsy Queen' and smells divine.

A long popular variety beloved for its elegant apricot pink flowers and rich fragrance. A strong growing bulb, Gypsy Queen will pop up reliably year after year for a distinctive spring display.

Double Daffodil 'Replete'

This daffodil had me stumped as to its name (of course I did not label it). At least I saved the picture from the box it came in, and managed to find it. The problem was I had bought two double daffodils, one yellow with orange frills and one white with pink frills.

This one appeared to me to be white with orange frills? I was stumped, until I found a website that said the 'Replete' are peach-pink. So 'Replete' it is. I am not a fan of the double daffodils although Thorny Guy likes them.

Daffodil 'Cheerfulness'

Double Daffodil 'Cheerfulness'

Cheerfulness, introduced in 1923, is in a division known as double. Daffodils in this division are loaded with petals, some of them frilled, and often have multiple flowers per stem.

Fritillaria

This is a new addition in bulbs in the garden. Looks like I got one purple checkered one and several white from the mix. These are all in the woodland garden, where not a lot will grow so I hope these spread.

Fritillaria 'Spring Bell Mixture'

This unique mixture contains a blend of various dwarf fritillaria in shades of purple, cream and olive green. The 1 to 11/2" bell-shaped flowers hang downward from the stem and gracefully nod in the spring breeze. All of the dwarf fritillaria varieties in this mixture are extremely good naturalizers that will increase your enjoyment year after year.

Narcissus triandrus 'Thalia'

I have several clumps of Thalia around the garden. They seem to be really taking off. These are a shorter than the large cup varieties which have already bloomed and are now drying up. These are making a great second wave of daffodil blooms in the garden.

Narcissus triandrus 'Thalia'

Narcissus 'Thalia', sometimes referred to as orchid narcissus, is a wonderfully fragrant, pure white daffodil with multiple, pendulous flowers on each stem. This is the oldest known hybrid (1610) derived from Narcissus triandrus, a species originating from southwestern Europe.

Upper Orchard in bloom

The upper orchard is in full bloom. This is our one and only cherry tree on the property. It is full of flowers and a couple of bees have their work cut out for them. The sweet fragrance from these trees is overwhelming!

Strawberries and rhubarb

We hit more plant sales on Saturday (list of plants to follow). Needless to say, I could not plant them all in the ground over the weekend. On the way back from the sale we hit a garage sale which had this huge strawberry pot.

Since the strawberries in the upper field have been a disaster, I decided to move the survivors into these pots. This way I can keep a closer eye on them. That and the deer should not be able to eat them on the deck!

Thorny Guy then rototilled half of the strawberry bed, and planted onions there. They should be quite happy as last year a trailer full of manure was added to the strawberry bed and mulched with hay.

We spent Mothers day at my mom's swapping plants, cutting back her bushes, and planting her latest plant sale finds. I brought the tomatoes, eggplant, and peppers that were started from seed for their garden.

My mom's rhubarb is huge and doing much better than ours which we transplanted in the fall. She let me grab four cups! Let there be rhubarb crisp. Too bad there are no strawberries to go with it yet.

More Blooms

Chinese Wild Ginger

We hit our first plant sale today sponsored by South St. Paul Garden Club. Lots of hostas and daylilies without names or color which I did not want to take a chance on. But I did find the following all for ten bucks.

• Tall Phlox unknown variety and color
  
• Two Lamium, Spotted Dead Nettle plants
  
• Hardy Geranium
  
• Two more bleeding hearts
  
• Chinese Wild Ginger
  
• A couple of bell flowers

The most interesting find was Chinese Wild Ginger although possible a zone 5 plant.

This rare Chinese species forms a clump of glossy, arrowhead-shaped green leaves. Flowers are the largest in the genus, a strange combination of creamy-yellow with brownish purple spots. Plants must have a humus-rich soil and regular moisture through the summer months. Size: 6" high by 12" wide.

Rhodies

PMJ Rhodies are in bloom. We brought these last year from Fleet Farm. They survived the winter with a little help by fencing them in and packing them with leaves. The deer seem to have left them alone for now.

Spring Hilltop Garden

This is an overall view of the hilltop garden which was just weeded. I am so happy to have it weeded as it is a big chore, even with the mulch... lots of dandelions! I still need to work on edging the borders better and adding some more mulch, but it is taking shape.

This garden was started from scratch when we moved in Fall of 2007. It contains all the Maryland perennials, we carted half way across country. It still is in its growing state and has a lot of growing design issues, but I am quite happy with it this spring. All the tulips and daffodils came back and are making quite the statement.

Tulips

Disappearing Tulips

The tulips under the river birch either are disappearing or divided and not producing flowers. Here is a shot from this year. There are only two small white tulips here.

Where as last year, we had a good clump of ten or more big tulips. See picture below from 2008. Perhaps they are not getting enough light after blooming, or have split and will come back in full force next year. I will have to keep an eye on this site, as it may not be a good place for them.

Favorite Daffodil so far...

This is a Salome Daffodil and is my favorite daffodil blooming in the garden so far. The problem is there is only one in bloom. I love how the stark white petals, sets off the multicolored cup. Here is a description of the daffodil.

The Daffodil 'Salome' has ivory-white petals that form a flat circle - that's the perfect backdrop for the trumpet-shaped cup, which changes from lovely yellow-apricot to salmon as the flower matures. The very edge of the cup is bordered in gold. The blossoms last up to 4 weeks and appear in mid spring. They are great for mass plantings, containers, and borders.

Tulip (Greigii) Calypso

Here is the other Greigii Tulip Hybrid in the garden. It is more of a pink flower than the red Ali Baba. The foliage is has less of a blue hue.

Tulip greigii Calypso is a very pretty dwarf tulip for borders or planters, it blooms with large orange red flowers tinged with apricot edges and the foliage is very decorative with a pattern of purple stripes. Greigii Tulips are ideal for rock gardens and containers because of their short size, and as an added attraction the have highly decorative green foliage with maroon colored stripes or spots. Their flowers open wide in full sun. They are perfect for naturalizing if you leave them alone, they will multiply and come back year after year. Most varieties flowers from April to May.

Daffodils

New Toy

Thorny guy got a new toy. I have to say it works pretty well, although it is way to heavy for me to handle by myself at the moment. It tills pretty deep so the plants should be happy with that. It just needs to avoid softball size rocks, learned that one the hard way.