Six on Saturday: Aug 8

The Sidewalk planter

For this SOS in early August, six things outside the potager that are pleasing. When isolation began, I worried that since I couldn’t get out to buy plants for the planters that are on my deck and rails they would be lacking in interest and color. Instead, I just used plants that I’d started from seed and was already planning to use in the gardens, along with a couple of cannas that had wintered over in the basement, and a struggling lime sweet potato vine that had wintered in a windowsill upstairs. The vine looked pretty sad, but yielded a few cuttings that took off quickly. The one above sits on an upturned pot on the sidewalk at the entrance to the deck.

Deck pot and rail planter.

The “Golden Jubilee” agastache returned, having survived outdoors in its pot. It is a magnet for butterflies and bumblebees. The snapdragons and marigolds were excess from the potager’s exterior border. The “Twinny Peach” snapdragons have been lovely all season, but the last bout of heat caused them to take a rest. Now that we’ve had a bit of rain and ten degrees cooler, they are beginning a comeback! The rail planter got a piece of the agastache from the pot, along with some sweet alyssum leftover from the Fairy Slope plantings. I love walking out on the deck and inhaling its perfume.

My favorite sunflower this season!

Often, volunteer plants are ruthlessly weeded out in order to “stick to the plan” but this year, most were left. This lovely sunflower came up outside the potager’s fence. I love the rusty color better than all of the sunflowers I actually planted!

Hibiscus Blue River II

I grew this variety of perennial hibiscus in the Moonlight Garden at the herb farm for decades. It’s dinner plate sized blooms never fail to make me smile, and you should see them in a full moon! I should have moved it from the farm when I sold, but I didn’t and it took me 2 years to finally find a replacement, during a Garden Writer’s field trip. There’s a tomato plant on the other side of the fence behind it, and I think the hibiscus appreciates the extra watering it gets as a result.

Zinnia “Queen Lime Orange”

These zinnias were planted late, after the daffodil foliage had browned and been removed, but they are certainly making up for lost time. I love the color, and the butterflies adore zinnias of all types. I’m glad I have these, because the rabbits ate all that were planted in the Cutting Garden.

Zinnia “Profusion Double Salmon”

These low-growing zinnias (8-10″) grow along the sidewalk in the Front Garden, and have just been a blanket of color since mid-May. Normally, they are self-cleaning (meaning the finished flowers are usually covered over by new flowers, so they don’t show and therefore don’t require deadheading) but I need to do some clipping of browned flowers caused by my sprinkler getting stuck and not rotating. By the time I noticed it wasn’t moving, a streak of poor zinnias had been drowned but I think they are recovering and will look fine once I clip off the dead flowers.

That’s Six on Saturday for this week from central Indiana. If you’d like to see other gardeners’ picks just go to The Propagator who hosts this interesting meme. Better yet, pick six things that make you happy, or provoke thought from your own gardens and join in! Be safe, be happy, stay busy…and wear your mask!

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