Plants flowering in the open rock garden.April May '09

[Lori S.]

LOL!

I don't know where I should post things, but as these are undeniably alpines (I think!), I'll try here...
Gentiana verna, from seed last year, starting to bloom
Saxifraga 'Riverslea', almost done blooming, while Phlox kelseyi starts in the background.
A little bitty Androsace chamaejasme, a very fragrant native.

[maggiepie]

Lori, these are real cuties.
What sort of scent does the Androsace have, I hope you are better than me at describing scents.

[Sinchets]

Some lovely alpines, Lori.
One year from seed for the Gentiana is good going eh 

[Lesley Cox]

I have a Salix x Boydii aged at least 65 years, but rather the worse for wear now. (Aren't we all? )

[maggiepie]

I have a Salix x Boydii aged at least 65 years, but rather the worse for wear now. (Aren't we all? )

hahahahahhahahahhahaha, Lesley, I wish you lived near me ( near meaning within 50 kms).

[Lesley Cox]

Actually, I understated as I was given it in a large pot for my 21st birthday, by an elderly woman who was giving up her small alpine nursery, to go to a warmer clime. It was known to be at least 30 years old then, so it must be at least 75 years old. I've tried cuttings a few times but they have never rooted which bears out the general nurseryman's knowledge that cuttings of woody plants root best and quickest, from young plants. I only get about 50% to root from my much younger (15 yrs) plant.

Has anyone thought of planting a black garden? I'm thinking about it now, having seen some stunning new flaxes (Phormium cultivars) in a local garden centre this week. One is called 'Black Rage' and it just about is truly black. Add the very darkest heucheras, the black Ophiopogon, a black viola or two and something sinister will be the intersting result. Any further suggestions would be welcome. There are some incredibly black bearded irises of course.

[Lori S.]

What sort of scent does the Androsace have, I hope you are better than me at describing scents.

Errr, don't count on it, Helen!    The fragrance is certainly sweet... perhaps jasmine-ish?  Since they are only a couple of inches tall, one has to hunker down to sniff them... a half-acre of them would smell great, though! 

One year from seed for the Gentiana is good going eh 

Yes, what a good deal! I did rely on the magic of GA-3 though... that's not cheating, is it??   

[cohan]

Very interesting thread. I've been too busy lately to post anything. So here some plants from my gravel beds:

wow--magnar----i have never seen most of these tiny saxes--amazing!

i havent had time to check out this thread til now, and working backwards!
simon, i also started long ago--but then lived many years with no outdoor space...there are just a few plants that survived here since those days--a few actual plants, and some other re-seeders...--a native dwarf willow (about 3 feet tall, not much wider), a sedum(phedimus), a native heuchera(white/cream flrs, i think), a tiny native bulb i forget the name of, a zigadenus, (i think), some antennarias (hardly counts, as they could have grown where i planted them, anyway) and an artemisia... none look impressive after years of neglect and being overgrown probably 20 years or so, but i'm still impressed they are there at all!

[cohan]

I've never seen an actual Astragalus myself, and had never heard of Oxytropis until someone posted a pic of a nice purple one recently.  Are they something that isn't common/available, or just something that isn't fashionable at the moment?  So many of the pea family are spectacular, but we really don't see that many of them in our gardens (well not here in Aus anyway).

this subthread surprised me--i thought Astragalus and Oxytropis were very common in rock gardens--maybe more so in north america? i'm sure i have seen lots of pics of them in gardens, and certainly there are plenty on lists such as beavercreeks and wrightman's here in canada..
locally we have more vetches etc, but i think they have a lot of possibility for the garden too...

[cohan]

Maggi, the only bugs I had to worry about in Oz were mozzies, thrips, aphids, white cabbage moths and that's about it, oh and citrus stink bugs.
Here, there are still heaps I have yet to ID.
Apart from june bugs ewwwww and huge big green ( hard ) grubs, flea beetles, stink bugs (  lots of different types), black flies, mozzies the size of helicopters, deer flies, horse flies, noseeums, yellowjackets, sawflies, trillions of grasshoppers, colorado potato beetles, and last year the wee harlequin bugs turned up.
These are just some I have managed to identify there are lots more!!!!!!
 I thought it would be too cold here for bugs, HAH!!
Simon, sounds like the blackflies found you.

i'm surprised you have blackflies--i thought those were up north in the bush--i've never seen them in person..
we certainly have tons of mosquitoes--they have a much longer season than plants do! in dry years, their breeding spots dry up in mid-late summer, but not since i've been back here--wet!
those are about the only bugs that bother with people, though we certainly have many many others! i havent really seen any on my plants, thus far (apart from sitting, pollinating, chasing each other, that they do in droves..)..but it may come yet, now that i am planting veggies etc... when i was a kid, we never had insect pests in the  gardens, but that was at the main farm, not here in the bush..
the one thing i know i will have to use some strong language with is ants! they are absolutely everywhere here--our old house was made with local logs, and the ants ate it... there are a few spots i want to plant where i will have to insist they move out of...lol

[Lori S.]

Starting to bloom - very tiny flowers!
Dianthus myrtinervius ssp. caespitosus

[cohan]

Roger - So we don't scare off visitors let it be known that most cities in Canada do not have these nasty rural bugs (aside from the outermost suburbs).  Winnipeg, the mosquito capital is the one exception I can think of.
johnw

thats right, john--i have lived in edmonton, toronto and montreal--no biting bugs in any of them usually--i remember one wet year where there were mosquitoes in dwntwn edmonton, and in toronto i would encounter them in lake and riverside parks;

even here in the bush of west central alberta, we have only mosquitoes from the ravening horde of biters  described
we have horse flies, but it is very rare to be bitten; not sure what a deer fly is; no black flies(never seen one as i mentioned); lots of bees, wasps, hornets, and i have been stung, but not regularly...lol

i'm surprised by lori's lack of insects in general though--the air is alive here, and the ground, and anything moving or standing still--just not biting insects mostly, except the mosquitoes... its not the cold nights that keeps them out of calgary--our nights are plenty cold, and there is some kind of small moth, for example, that seems to come out  especially in fall when there are nights well below freezing, and there are millions of them! i've seen them backlit by a sunset, and it was almost like snow in the air!  it is much drier in calgary than here, however, so that could be an issue;
we do, also, have a lot of birds--this time of year its a positive (joyous) racket with trees and grass full of them, and the never far away sloughs (wet areas from marshes to ponds) full of waterfowl and singing frogs...

ok--i'm moving on to some other thread--too many posts from me here!

[Lori S.]

Hey, I'm from Saskatchewan, so I do know bugs, LOL!  I swear, there are very few biting insects here (Calgary, and nearby mountains); when people encounter 3 or 4 mosquitoes in an evening, after an unusually rainy period, they start yelling about bringing DDT back!    
At home, mosquitoes remain a constant irritation in the evenings, or in the shade.  We used to fish "up north" (the boreal forest of Saskatchewan) almost every summer weekend for years in my early adulthood... lovely days fly-fishing for brookies (stocked) on little streams but also a constant plague of blackflies, deerflies, horse flies, and non-biting flies (that, for no apparent reason, had to walk around on you constantly!)  Heat and DEET - an unpleasant combination for camping rough, LOL!  At night, replace deerflies and horseflies with no-see-ums and mosquitoes... the loud hum of all the insects outside the tent was honestly a little frightening at times.  No wonder caribou run like they are mad!  (Oh, that reminds me, our first tent didn't have "no-see-um netting", i.e. screening that was fine enough to exclude tiny biting flies; the choices were constant pinpricks of fly bites or asphyxiation/heat prostration with your head under the covers.)    Fly-fishing in the foothills in Alberta was an incredible difference... where'd the bugs go?  Other than "hatches" (emergences or mating flights) of aquatic insects (caddis, mayflies, etc.), we found very few biting insects; same here along the Bow River.  When we hike in the mountains here*, we always have some insect repellent wipes with us, but have only felt the need to use them a small number of times over the years.   Strange, but true!

*In the interests of accuracy, I should mention that my husband has complained of bad mosquitoes on some of his marathon back-packing trips...  boggy valley trails through northern Banff and Jasper.   So it does vary, as one would expect... thankfully, I've missed the bad parts. 

[Luc Gilgemyn]

I've only had the luck to visit Canada just once and clearly remember a visit to a (for tourists) quite well known little canyon near Maligne Lake (if my memory is correct).
We came out after an hour or so, almost devoured by some kind of mosquito's (?)...  never been bitten like that before... (nor later..  )

On a more positive note : your Dianthus is a little stunner Lori !  Thanks for showing it (and so many other things) ! 

[Sinchets]

I like the Dianthus also, Lori- your garden seems to be in real rush to make up for lost time!
Cohan, we lived in a top-floor flat in Aberdeen for 3 years. By the time we left to move south we had to hire a self-drive lorry to move the plants- all in all over 1000 plant pots (mostly terracotta) - the furniture fit in the car. I think this is the reason why I am so happy now to grow plants in places other than pots 
Lesley isn't Salix x boydii the plant found but once in Perthshire? Amazing to think that there are plants around the world all as a result of propagation from one plant.