What's looking good in July 2012

It seems as though I have missed this thread

Some fabulous plants, everyone

Annabelle is guarding the entrance to our greenhouse



The zebra grass is just developing its horizontal stripes and in a few weeks they should be very prominent

 

The Veronicastrum are now topping 7ft and are an interesting plant




The individual flowers can be pointed or flat








and the attractive seven leaves radiate from one point on the stem and are spaced regularly up the 7ft stem

 

The Phytolacca, which is alongside and slightly behind the Veronicastrum is not having a good year. It's less bushy than usual and has only reached 5ft, which is a couple of foot less than normal.





We've already cut back some of our little woodland area





The verbascum chaixii is also a little shorter than normal





and the freemontedendron is coming in to its second flowering - it flowered heavily from April to the end of June, then had a pause and is starting again now. It will only flower lightly but will continue until the frosts. It's officially classified as a shrub but is more like a tree.

 

Thanks, alana

Annabelle is slightly different from most hydrangeas as it gets cut to the ground each winter. So there is no hard wood and no buds that need protecting by keeping the old flowers on during the winter. As it is all new growth the stems are green and soft and need some supporting - especially when the flowers get heavy with rain. We just run some string around it and hope it stands up to it.

It wasn't named after a female but after a town in America where it comes from.

 

Just in case you have a headache - here's some feverfew



Part of our herb garden with rosemary inbetween purple and variegated sage, and some bay behind



We only planted this pashionflower last autumn and it has spread 8ft along the fence



and a few others

 

Thanks

Bilboe, I'm pleased the Phytolacca have germinated well. Remember to give them loads of space in the garden

Jenny, it's a Panansonic FZ18. I don't bother to use any of the hundreds of different settings and just keep it on automatic. Where possible, I stand back to take the shots and use the zoom. It works especially well when you want close-ups as it sharpens up the subject and blurs the background (there's a smaller depth of field when on zoom - but you need better lighting).

These are typical of using zoom. The Lucifer in the first picture is about 40ft from the laurel in the background. If I had taken it close-up on wide angle (by putting the camera next to the flower) the laurel would have appeared in detail and detracted from the shot.

In the third shot the second set of leaves on the plant are already out of focus.