Barbados Cherries

Hibiscus Althea Alba

Currently loaded with blooms...

UPDATE: I just came back from a very quick (and I mean quick as I was under a canopy of lightning) bug search and rescue mission. Perhaps, search and kill mission, describes it best.

I found a trend in the garden: large, multiple, white flowers attract beetles by the ton. I don't want to get rid of the Iceberg rose bush, but I might just get rid of the hibiscus in the photo. I want no part on inviting pests into the garden by planting a buffet of non-vital plants.

I am still on the fence as to whether we have Japanese beetles or Chinese rose beetles. I lean toward the latter since our beetles don't have the iridescence so typical of the Japanese beetle. Either way I am definitely doing something about it. The white fluffy Dahlias that I love so much and the white multiple hibiscus will be history this week end.

Barbados Cherry.

Viburnum macrocephalum

AKA Chinese Snowball Viburnum. What a beauty, I tell ya. This deciduous little shrub does best in part shade & the literature out there says that it does not really require much to thrive. It grows to a bit over 10 feet and blooms in early to mid spring with these huge hydrangea-like white pompons. Pretty, no?

Snow Ball Viburnum

Plumbago buds

Firespike

Right before it opens its tiny blooms.

Polygala myrtifolia

Its name sounds like someone whom you would not want to be friends with or some sort of fatal illness...but this is a lovely shrub for Florida.

If you love pea flowers, then this plant is for you. There are more photos of the actual flowers in this blog (buds only shown here) and you can see them if you just scroll down a bit (or a lot, not sure :)

Drought tolerant & grows up to six feet if left unpruned.

Positives: attracts pollinators, drought tolerant, low maintenance, gorgeous flowers most of the year.

Negatives: will tell you in about a year if I find any.

Bolivian Sunflower

This pretty flower comes with a huge, scratch that, humongous shrub that grows freakishly fast. And freakishly large.

Although I love the flowers and I love how bees like to 'sleep' on their blooms overnight I need to make room for our upcoming blackberry bushes...so this pup will have to go to its new home at my neighbor's backyard. This plant is perfect for them because they have a huge empty yard and no plans for making it into a full blown garden or planting much else. In other words, they don't care how big it gets.

A win win.

Firespike flower

If you see it get it! Low maintenance. No pests. Hummingbirds love it. Brings color to the garden through colder months. Drought tolerant...blah blah blah you get the point...

Leonotis Leounurus

AKA Lion's Ears...our first bloom of the season! Hummers love this little shrub...most of the literature out there says that butterflies love it too, although, in our garden it is not popular with the winged ladies at all.
I am yet to find something negative about this shrub. It is drought tolerant, not fuzzy about soil type as long as it drains well, flowers when other plants are napping, it transplants very well...this one was transplanted three times....and it is about to be transplanted for what I hope will be the last time in January. That's when we'll get the blackberry bushes we already ordered.

A busy week outside

Below I posted some pics to track the progress of what I did this week, what I planted, mulched, observed, etc. Hubby & I weeded for five days!!!! I replaced the mulch in the entire front garden. 93 bags, thank you very much! ☺

Here is a pic of a Rabbit's Ears shrub. This one is tiny but it should grow to a nice 5 feet or so. Its flowers literally ooze nectar, but I have not seen any hummers drink from it...yet. Below are two more pics of the same plant to give you an idea what the flowers look like. I am going to try and propagate this one to share with friends, when I do successfully root some plants I will post it here in case anyone would like a cutting or seedling.

The red Chinese hat plant is blooming like crazy!

Fire Spike

Allamanda Cherries Jubilee

Love, love, love this shrub.

Negatives: it is a thirsty plant & attracts tons of bees and wasps, so if you are allergic to their sting don't plant it in high traffic areas.

Clerodendrum Ugandense

Tacoma

I just love this part of our back garden this time of the year...

What's new?

This beauty has began to bloom (for the life of me I cannot remember its name! will post it later), I was gone weeding for a few days...weeds were so out of control hubby had to send the Canadian Mounted Police to search for me on day two of my ordeal.

We are getting ready to finally lay down the recycled side-walk concrete patio in our front garden. I will seat behind a lot of plants (which will hide us from our neighbors...yeah, obviously an antisocial designed it like that)...and eventually there should be some grapevines climbing over our heads in a year or so.

Other than that, I am completely drowning in books. I found a bunch of fascinating reads and -since I could not decide which one to read first- I am reading them all at once. None of them are gardening-related...I figured I'd try and expand my one neuron here :-)

Here they are:

On Being Certain-Believing You Are Right Even When You Are Not, by R. Burton
The United States of Arugula, by David Kamp
The Lost Continent, by Bill Bryson (the only novel out of the four)
Proust Was a Neuroscientist, by J. Lehrer

Good stuff. See you in two months! ☺