textures, and varieties of bloom shapes rule!
The days are shortening, and gradually cooling. But the gardens are going strong. Resist the urge to tidy up or cut back as those seed heads will soon provide nutritious food for birds, especially American Goldfinch! Heavily layered, complex gardens support pollinators with food and habitat. White elements help create focal points and add interest to the design.
Here’s what’s blooming in The Big Little Garden in September!
(click an image for a larger version and hover for plant name; click to right or left of image to see more!)
Of course, the pink spikes of persicaria speciosa ‘Firetail’ top my list for see-through plants. The tiny purple poppers atop sanguisorba ‘Red Thunder’ add a touch of whimsy to the mailbox garden. They are also finding their way inside to grace my cut flower arrangements! The bronze fennel is still going strong and can still be cut back to encourage new bloom until first frost. Molinia ‘Skyracer’ grass is now over 6 feel tall and is so ethereal and wispy, lightening up the heavy south facing perennial bed.
The glaucous-y white foliage of pycnanthemum muticum ‘Mountain Mint’ never ceases to amaze me. It’s super long blooming and adored by all the bees, wasps and flies. Adjacent to Mountain Mint is a huge colony of calamintha 'Marvelette Blue’ that has entirely engulfed my small seating nook. It’s too pretty to cut back!!
I am a big fan of dried seed heads and NEVER deadhead my echinacea, eryngium and agastache plants. The result is natural bird food for our goldfinch and other song birds and beautiful structural elements that carry interest all through winter months. The Vernonia noveboracensis, New York Ironweed towers over the sunny garden and this too will remain standing all through the winter as a valuable source of seeds for the birds.
The Perovskia ‘Little Spire’, Russian sage has grown to enormous proportions in the gravel garden, and it’s impossible to count the number of bumblebees who feed on it all day long and even sleep on it all night! Behind it at the base of the lamppost is the native Bouteloua gracilis, aka ‘Moustache Grass’.
Spigelia marilandica ‘Little Redhead’ is blooming for a second time and the red trumpet blooms really pop against the limey-yellow of Hakonechloa ‘All Gold’ Japanese forest grass. A few feet away, the late blooming Japanese anemone ‘September Charm’ is just opening and will bloom until Halloween. What a show!
Despite my attempts to eradicate this beautiful, but aggressive native, Impatiens capensis, ‘Jewelweed’ is blooming again in Mr. Peanut. Hummingbirds and bees love the orange cornucopia shaped blooms. I’m trying to capture the seeds before they explode all over the garden…with only mixed results! It is aptly named ‘Touch me Not’, and I’ve managed to get a few in my hands (not easy!) and have scattered them back in the woods. It’s probably too dry back there, but will be fun to see if they establish.
Geranium/cranesbill ‘Rozanne’ is billowing all over the goshen stone walkway and will look great into November!