Morning glory blooms

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Vinca

Nikon D850, Nikkor 105mm micro

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iPhoneography: Mandevilla

iPhone 8Plus, Camera+ 2 app in macro mode, Snapseed app border

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Red Passion Flower

Red Passion Flower (cultivar unknown), Nikon D850, Nikkor 105mm micro lens

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Stephanotis

Stephanotis (Stephanotis floribunda), photographed at Brookside Gardens in Wheaton, MD

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Clematis

I photographed this unusual Clematis (Klematis sp.) at Green Spring Gardens this afternoon. I have no idea what variety it is, but it was unusual in that the stamens spread out of most of the bloom, rather than being smaller and centrally located.

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Clematis

Clematis (Klematis sp.) blooming in my friend Gina’s garden

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Trumpet Honeysuckle

Trumpet Honeysuckle (Lonicera sempervirens ‘Leo’), photographed at Brookside Gardens

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Eye candy, batch #4

Sigh…culling through my archives, in preparation for my March/April 2012 exhibit, is making me want to photograph blooms and bugs right now.

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Same time, last year

Originally posted July 1, 2010

We’ve had two days of strangely cool weather here in Northern Virginia—which were preceded by a long row of 90+ degree days! It actually feels like spring today (and it’s July—unheard of!), so I got out for an hour to shoot at my favorite local garden (and donate 40+ gardening books to their library while there—don’t feel sorry for me, though, the loss hardly made a dent in my stash—I’m almost embarrassed to say).

I’ll concisely identify the plants below later, but I think that #1 is an allium—possibly Allium stellatum x nutans or something similiar (located in the lovely rock garden at the visitor center circle driveway), #2 is on the tip of my tongue (please stand by), #3 is a Ptilotus exaltatus ‘Joey’ or Pink Pussy Tail (also in the rock garden and a plant that I’ve not seen before today), #4 is one of my (and the bees) favorites—Purple Coneflower (Echinacea), and #5 is a type of Clematis. I’ll be diligent and get back to you with exact identification on the questionable ones.

The imaginative gardeners at Green Spring Gardens have added a new feature to the gardens near the visitor’s center—a wonderful summer-sky-blue stucco-textured wall atop a brick raised bed. They’ve mounted several “living sculpture” framed boxes filled with various succulents on the wall and the raised bed contains other desert-loving plants. It looks very southwest inspired and adds a great pop of color to that area of the garden. I’ll get photos of the blue wall feature on my next jaunt. The garden was buzzing with both bees and people—artists from a local art club set up to paint, joggers and walkers were out in full force, kids on tricycles circled round, and a group of kids on a field trip flooded the garden. Enjoy this most unusual weather while you can, folks—it won’t last long!

ID UPDATE: I’m pretty confident that the top photo is a Nodding Onion (Allium cernuum). These plants prefer sun to part sun, thrive in average well-drained soil, and are drought tolerant. They self-sow aggressively and need deadheading to prevent them from doing so. Deer resistant and hummingbird friendly! I had so much fun photographing these plants that I’m going to try to add a few to my own garden next year.

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Blooming in my garden: first ‘Heavenly Blue’ Morning Glory of the season

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White Clematis

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Blooming in my garden: Clematis ‘Nelly Moser’

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Clematis

Vivid pink Clematis flower photographed against a backdrop of purple Columbine blooms at Green Spring Gardens in Alexandria, Virginia

© Cindy Dyer. All right reserved.

Foxy on the fence

This is my neighbor Eric’s cat, Foxy. She is a frequent visitor to our garden (but she still hisses at me if I get too close—never did change her attitude!). No matter, she’s still welcome as long as she continues to model for me. I thought about naming this post, “Cat on a hot tin roof,” but it’s really an asphalt shingle shed roof. And it’s been raining all day long, so it’s wet and definitely not hot. And technically she’s on the adjoining fence, not the actual roof—-so Foxy on the fence, it is!

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Clematis ‘Nelly Moser’

As I write this, our backyard is covered in several inches of snow. It began about 3:00 p.m. this afternoon and didn’t stop until this evening. The snow fell fast and heavy and all the tree branches are outlined in white (a feast for the eyes, but not so good for the trees). Photographic opportunities abound tomorrow morning! Until then, I offer up some color from my garden last spring to contrast the white on white wonderland out there now. Could the Farmer’s Almanac really be correct? It is really only 52 days until spring?

This ‘Nelly Moser’ Clematis has been growing over our tiny backyard pond for more than nine years. In the spring of 2008 it had its most prolific blooming period ever. I wrote about it on this blog here.

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Skipper on Hyacinth Bean Vine (Dolichos lablab)

I was looking through my garden photo archives and came across this little Skipper. I grow this pretty ornamental vine in a pot outside our front door each summer. The purple seed pods are known as lablab.

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Blooming in my garden today: Passion Flower

I’ve been tending to this same Passion Flower plant since 2006—so this makes the fifth year I’ve been able to over-winter it in my studio office! As I was photographing this flower, I heard a creaking, croaking sound. Could there be a new frog taking up residence in our teeny, tiny pond again? I couldn’t find him, but I certainly could hear him! I’m crossing my fingers in hopes that I can get a shot of this new garden inhabitant.

Also blooming in the garden today: 22 bright pink and green downward facing lilies (they’re stunning en masse!), three huge white Casa Blanca Lilies, large clusters of Purple Coneflowers, two groups of Shasta Daisies, and one beautiful deep purple and white Dahlia. I’ll get some photographs of those this afternoon.

Passionate about Passion Flowers? Check out the links below to see more images shot in my garden over the past few years.

https://cindydyer.wordpress.com/2008/08/26/its-about-time/

https://cindydyer.wordpress.com/2008/06/22/backyard-blooms/

https://cindydyer.wordpress.com/2008/06/21/meanwhile-in-the-garden/

https://cindydyer.wordpress.com/2008/07/28/lady-margaret/

For more information on passion flowers:

Passiflora Online is a comprehensive website with growing tips, FAQs, plant ID, hybrid and species images, pollinators, and much more.

Plants in Motion has videos of a passion flower in bloom and also short clips of bees visiting the flowers.

Tradewinds Fruit has a great database of passion flower blossoms. Click on the “related species” section on the left of the site to see a wide variety of passion flower plants.

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Wordless Wednesday

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.

Blooming in my garden today…

Two passion flowers on the vine this morning…in our zone 7 area, passion flowers must be treated as an annual. I bought this vine from Home Depot and bring it indoors right before the first frost, put it just inside my office patio doors (where it gets filtered light and I keep it watered) and take it out again in spring. I’ve been able to keep it going strong for four consecutive years now—not bad for my $20 investment, huh?

I noticed that passion flower is spelled as one word and as two words all over the web—by experts and novice gardeners alike. In past postings, I’ve spelled it as one word. Which do you prefer? Are they both correct?

There are more than 500 known species and several hundred hybrids of passiflora. Most are vine-flowering, although some are shrubs, and a few are herbaceous. Just nine species are found in the U.S. and Southern Asia has the most native species–17. The most common species in the southeastern U.S. is the Maypop, Passiflora incarnata. Its edible fruit is sweet, yellow, the size of a chicken’s egg, and few pests bother it. It is the larval food of a number of butterfly species and important to local wildlife. Carpenter bees are important pollinators of maypops.

For more information on passion flowers:

Passiflora Online is a comprehensive website with growing tips, FAQs, plant ID, hybrid and species images, pollinators, and much more.

Plants in Motion has videos of a passion flower in bloom and also short clips of bees visiting the flowers.

Tradewinds Fruit has a great database of passion flower blossoms. Click on the “related species” section on the left of the site to see a wide variety of passion flower plants.

See more of my passion flower photos in the links below:

https://cindydyer.wordpress.com/2008/08/26/its-about-time/

https://cindydyer.wordpress.com/2008/06/22/backyard-blooms/

https://cindydyer.wordpress.com/2008/06/21/meanwhile-in-the-garden/

https://cindydyer.wordpress.com/2008/07/28/lady-margaret/

© Cindy Dyer. All rights reserved.