Garden Blogger's Bloom Day JUNE 2014

Today's photos are about a week old, but here's the best I can do for bloom day today!  Enjoy many more blogs by visiting May Dreams Gardens.

Trillium grandiflorum

Akebia quinata

Trillium cernuum

Lonicera tatarica

Geranium phaeum

First Time Blooms

Well, I missed Garden Bloggers Bloom Day.  
Meanwhile, back at the cottage...

A few of my newer plants are blooming for the first time ever.  The plant above came from a garden club sale last year, basically unnamed.  Might be Stachys grandiflora.  The honeysuckle (Lonicera) below may have bloomed last year, but I'm counting this as its first time.  Was dug up somewhere... long forgotten, and just last year  brought these pieces to the cottage.

Finally bought a little gas plant last year, Dictamnus albus.  Nice to see it blooms the first year after planting, unlike a peony.  I've always thought of these as similar in growth and lifespan to peonies for some reason, though I've never had one of these before.  

And even the tiny kiwi vines are blooming!  Will there be fruit?  I have never seen a little berry from the hardy kiwi, Actinidia kolomikta.  Hopefully these vines will one day cover the geodesic dome, with the help of some other vines there.  

Other new plants will bloom as the year goes on... a wonderful delight of being a gardener like me: a collector.  

Escape Along the Railway

Blackberry, Rubus sp.

The return of sunny weather this weekend called for a short field trip along the nearby rail line, no longer in use, sadly.  The blackberries are blooming, as is the high bush cranberry.

High Bush Cranberry, Viburnum trilobum

 This next shot by the tracks may just look like a thicket of young oak trees and such...  

But climbing high into one tree is a honeysuckle vine.  

Lonicera periclymenum?

Nearby, seedlings seem to be sprouting from the the rail bed.  Digging one out from there would be too difficult; I will likely try to dig up a bit from the rich soil along the ditch, where that large vine scrambles, now blooming at the top of the trees.

And, in the vicinity, I spotted a wildflower I'd not run across for twenty years, I'm sure.  See it here, amid the wild strawberry plants?

This is Broomrape, or Cancer-Root, a beautiful parasitic plant.  No chlorophyll, no leaves to speak of.  Just these blossoms that appear, seen by few.  Few humans, I'd guess.  But the insects surely are drawn in, as they are by any blossom. 

Orobanche uniflora

Yes, it is small.  But very attractive. 

A bit deeper into the shade beside the tracks, one clump of Jack-in-the-Pulpit is flourishing.  

Arisaema triphyllum

These were not large, as Jack-in-the-Pulpits go, but they were nice to come across.
     Why not take a short walk along an old railway?  You may be surprised at what you find.

My First Garden Blogger's Bloom Day

Over at the Cottage, the first crop of blooming things are making the most of the sunny days this weekend. 

The Striped Squill is holding its own (Puschkinia scilloides), and a Crocus clump is happy under a Dogwood (Cornus stolonifera flaviramea). 

Johnny-Jump-Ups rebound whenever the snow is off the ground (Viola sp.).  And even the raisin-like berries from the untrimmed Privet hedge are nice (Ligustrum vulgare).

Amid the buds of a honeysuckle shrub (Lonicera sp.) is the remains of a little nest from last year.  Likely belonged to a Sparrow or Yellow Warbler family.



The Daphne (D. mezereum) is fading, but the scent remains strong - it attracts attention.  

And back at the house, the first Grape Hyacinths (Muscari) are coming out, as well as the Periwinkle (Vinca minor).  I love true blue flowers, and spring is a good time for them.  Happy GBBD everyone!