Articles for the Month of October 2021

Garden Blogger’s Bloom Day October 2021

Amarine tubergenii ‘Zwanenburg’

It’s Garden Blogger’s Bloom Day as we move securely into the Fall.  The leaves are changing but we see no signs of lower temperatures in Maryland as yet.

The Amarine above is a first time bloomer for me, but comes with a little background.  I bought it just this Fall from Quackin’ Grass Nursery and then as it was coming into bloom I discovered that I had another one that I had bought from the same place this Spring.  No sooner did I put those two in the ground but I then found that I had bought a smaller bulb of that plant from Rare Plants back in 2017 and it too was now coming into bloom (for the first time).  So apparently this plant is consistently appealing to me.  It is a hybrid between Amaryllis belladonna and Nerine bowdenii.  It’s somewhat questionable whether it will be hardy for me here in zone 7 (Nerines would not normally be hardy here), but I have planted two of them and we shall see.

Since it’s related I should mention that Nerine sarniensis (from the Greenhouse) is also flowering now bearing out my continuing interest in Nerines.

Nerine sarniensis

The above picture is from the kitchen and right nearby is a bowl full of vegetables showing the wonderful bounty from this year.

Vegetable yield in October

We’ve also had a lot of pears that we are still enjoying for dinners and desserts.  And the raspberries are still making their appearance.

Raspberries still coming in

The flowers outside still have a lot of the same participants that we’ve had for the past few months.

Double Decorative Dahlia Purple

Dahlia ‘Bodacious’ still yielding

Cestrum ‘Orange Peel’

Cosmos in the wildflower patch

In addition there are a few new faces on the Fall horizon

New England Aster

Japanese Anemone ‘Whirlwind’

Colchicum ‘Giant’

Colchicum ‘Dick Trotter’

Toadlilly (Trycyrtis ‘Sinonome’

In addition I thought it was interesting to note that I completely missed the start of flowering for the fall camellias.

Camellia sasanqua ‘Double Rainbow’

Camellia x ‘Survivor’

There are lots of buds on these and other Camellias so I need to pay more attention.  And similarly I’ll end by paying attention to the many oxalis showing up in the greenhouse now.

Oxalis hirta ‘Gothenburg’

Finally all summer long we’ve a beautiful showing of flowers from the potted plectranthus.

Plectranthus ‘Mona Lavender’

I’ll need to find a place in the greenhouse for a part of this plant over the winter.