Planted crinum 'Bradley'; everything's green

Just now stuck 'Bradley' in the ground, mere moments ago. He's possibly a little too close to the cedar elms, but we'll see what he does. Right now, of course, he only looks like a giant onion with an old, chopped-off six-inch stem coming out the top.

Larry the lemon tree is covered with flowers, the impatiens in the front beds are a blanket of lavender, and all my spuria iris as well as the spurious iris (I inherited at least one mystery iris from the previous homeowners) are huge, green and strappy but show no signs of even considering a flower.

The crape myrtles have all leafed out in the past couple of weeks, as have the cedar elms, Arizona ash (trash) and bur oaks. As for the new daylilies... well, they're not dead yet! And at least one shows new growth. The survivors from last year all look big and fine.

Of note: Absolutely nothing in the main flowerbed is blooming now. The pansies in the pots and the impatiens in the front are blooming their heads off, but I don't have anything colorful going in the perennial bed. A chronological gap to be filled!

New daylilies planted; temperature hits 95

Received from Oakes yesterday (when the temperature hit 95 here...) and planted today: Little Heavenly Angel; Mini Pearl; Little Strawberry Shortcake; Strawberry Candy (a freebie); Elizabeth Salter; Stella in Yellow. These are in addition to the previous year's survivors: Marcia Fay; Pandora's Box; Chicago Petticoats; Scarlet Orbit; Pardon Me.

Should bloom in roughly this order:

(yellow) Stella in Yellow (extra early, rebl)
(red/yellow) Scarlet Orbit (early, rebl)
(white/purple) Pandora's Box (early-mid, rebl)
(pink/red) Strawberry Candy (early-mid, rebl)
(pink/white) Little Heavenly Angel (early-mid, rebl)
(gold/rose) Mini Pearl (early-mid, rebl)
(copper) Little Strawberry Shortcake (mid, rebl)
(red/white) Marcia Fay (early-mid, rebl)
(peach) Chicago Petticoats (early-mid)
(peach) Elizabeth Salter (midseason, rebl)
(maroon/gold) Pardon Me (mid-late, rebl)

Holding steady amid the rains; pruned roses

Pruned the sickly roses pretty heavily about a month ago (NOT the approved pruning time!) and was rewarded with a flush of healthy new growth. It's been raining heavily for about a month and everybody's lush... now the heat will set in!

Other crapes in the neighborhood are blooming but not ours yet; Mom speculates those in full sun may be warmer, thus starting earlier.

Daylilies have been blooming for at least a week -- the soft peachy one is blooming its head off and just lovely.

Ruellias are green, not blooming; narcissus greens have just started to go brown.

Two potfuls of impatiens on the front porch, planted about a month ago, have been blooming steadily the whole time; ditto two pots of petunias in a sunny corner of the back deck. Really pretty.

Oxblood dormant; daylilies still blooming

Both the oxblood lilies and the Grand Primo narcissus have completely croaked in the past two weeks; I sincerely hope that's dormancy!

Replanted front flowerpots with vincas, doing OK so far. Pansies had completely dried up.

Copper soap fungicide (or dumb luck) is doing wonders for the roses. No sign of black spot or powdery mildew.

Daylilies still blooming, only a couple at a time, but really fantastic colors.

Daylilies blooming; pansies pretty much toast

This makes the daylilies' start time official too: end of May/start of June (first bloom observed yesterday this year). 'Chicago Petticoats' is the only one blooming right now, but others have scapes. All are pretty short even after a full year in the ground, which is nice to my mind because they make a tidy low plant. If I could just remember how long the foliage stays pretty, I might consider popping some daylilies between the crape myrtles in front.

Foliage on the jonquils is starting to die, about the same time as last year.

The pansies in flowerpots out front are miraculously still blooming, which means I have verifiable bloom time from at least December through May (and I planted them pretty late in winter, probably could have started them in September). But, they are looking extremely rough -- very dry, much dead foliage.

A neglect-fueled drought has hit my roses particularly hard. Even the relatively robust climbers now exhibit powdery mildew. Having found a reliable source for copper soap fungicide I'm going to step up to once-a-week spraying and get the watering system in the ground pronto. Last year's notes indicate that they looked awful in late May though 'Brigadoon' down there in the shade looked better (which is exactly the case right now); and then a week or so later they were resurging and Brigadoon looked worse. Will be interesting to see.

Larry has a big crop of lemons that are larger than last year, still green, and not dropping off the boughs. We are pleased.

Our two crape myrtles on the north side of the front (Droopy and Mickey) are consistently wilted -- we have stepped up to watering them every other day or so. Watering system might help there but not necessarily as the two near the driveway (Gunter and Greta) do not need such frequent water.

We have been observing other crape myrtles already in bloom around the area so we think that if we don't kill 'em, we might have an artificially long blooming season there as well.

Light freeze. Daffodils returning, pansies exploding

Both the Grand Primo and the Texas Star narcissus have come up for a second year; again, the Star looks spindly and the Primo looks lush and vigorous, but both are about to bloom.

Looks like at least two of the spuria iris and six of the daylilies have made it; I need to begin fertilizing the spuria again as they emerge from dormancy, and probably the same for the daylilies.

Looking around after the recent freezes (moderate one last week, two light ones this weekend), I am glad to see the lemon verbena has squeaked by, the rosemary and roses look great, the schoolhouse lily foliage is undamaged. The ruellia look like hell but they always come back; and the pansies (which I left outside) and violets (which came in) are thriving and blooming their heads off. Probably because they get watered more when I'm worried about them.

I have ordered a Moonstone rose to replace the croaked Tiffany -- nothing against Tiffany and I'd like to find a place for that variety if another opportunity arises. But Moonstone is the kind of rose that is my particular weakness -- a show-quality bloom that is mostly white with a pink edge and looks like a delicate china cup. It's a relatively new variety I had not heard of before and I have high hopes.

Speaking of, Jason and I have found a location to park my rose arch, so the Don Juan and High Hopes from my old condo patio can finally go in the ground. They've held up well, High Hopes particularly, and I look forward to seeing how they do freed from their containers. The bonus of the location is that it will also obscure the view into our yard from the neighbors down the culdesac -- a view that was opened up when we got the trees heavily pruned. Two birds with one stone!

Roses along the fence have put on much new growth in past two weeks. In between the freezes, it's been 70 and sunny, and I've watered them both weekends in advance of the freeze, and they are really responding.

Rain equals roses

It's been pouring rain for what seems like weeks, and the rosebushes are responding. I had given up on this mid-season, actually, on the logic that our long hot growing season is actually broken up by a dormant season in the middle. But all the July rain brought out blooms on Brigadoon, Mr Lincoln, Double Delight, Belinda's Dream, High Hopes, Don Juan and, here, Tropicana. For future reference I will say the flower really is this rich color, maybe a shade warmer, and even lovelier form.

Elsewhere the daylilies are quiet but still green, the oregano is blooming, the lemon tree has put up new suckers and the ruellia many new blossoms also in response to the rain, and there is no sign of life as yet in the area of the oxblood lilies. The greenery from the jonquils has long vanished, though there is something that looks like ophiopogon poking its heads up in that area.

I guess I expect the oxblood lilies to start putting up leaves soon, since it's called schoolhouse lily as well for its autumn start.

Not to be too confident about it, the entire row of rosebushes has made it through the first part of the really hot season and right now looks fairly healthy, except for ailing Tiffany. No bugs, strong new growth, etc. If they put down good root growth they may yet all make it.

Daylilies blooming

'Scarlet Orbit,' 'Chicago Petticoats' and 'Pandora's Box' have begun to bloom (observed first on Mom's birthday).

'Pandora' is a little earlier than billed, and should be followed by 'Little Maggie' and 'Marcia Fay,' then 'Pardon Me' and 'Rosella Sheridan.'

I did them a disservice by planting them under the baby oak tree and not next to the minisprinklers, but then it's so hard to get a hole dug in this nasty soil that the expedient thing to do was just plop them in the spots where the previous homeowners' plants had been! Getting them planted quickly was a good thing, at least.