Clinopodium, Myrtle Leaf Orange, and Other Mid-July Snapshots

Posted by ruddygardener

It’s mid-July, and after two weeks of rain the heat has come back to Alabama with plenty of humidity. I just started a new outdoor job, so I have endured it first-hand. This week I learned how to drive a tractor and a forklift. I am a city boy who is learning these things for the first time.

In the garden I am working mainly on maintaining everything. I had my first grape tomatoes this week. My Petunia integrifolia, a trailing petunia species with small purple flowers, is blooming again after cutting it back a week ago. I am taking some cuttings of a few plants I want to increase.

Here are some recent photos:

Clinopodium coccineum ‘Amber Blush.’ It’s a southeast native that has tubular yellow-orange flowers in fall. I got it from the Birmingham Botanical Gardens Spring Plant Sale. There are some full-grown specimens in Auburn University’s Davis Arboretum.

Citrus myrtifolia, myrtle leaf orange. I repotted it today.

Lilium ‘Black Beauty’ is continuing to open. That’s Agastache ‘Tutti Frutti’ in the left corner.

Stachys officinalis. This poor plant wilted and withered to the ground in early summer while I was gone for a few days. It recovered, though. I have read that it doesn’t grow well in the Deep South but thought I’d test it for myself.

Asclepias tuberosa is flowering (center). Stachys coccinea (right edge) is growing back after I cut it back last month. It has had two flushes of flowers this year so far.

Bronze fennel

Posted by ruddygardener

Bronze fennel (Foeniculum vulgare) is starting to flower here. In spring it rises from dormancy in dense smokey plumes that really have the complex colors (dark reds, purples, greys, and greens) of patinated bronze. By midsummer it loses some of its compactness. The stalks rise to four or five feet for me and expose prominent lightly-colored petioles as the plant becomes more open. At this stage, the compound umbels of small yellow flowers appear at the top, attracting numerous small pollinators as well as bees and butterflies.

Eastern Black Swallowtail caterpillars use fennel as a host. I saw the first black swallowtail laying eggs on fennel this week. She spaced the eggs evenly across the group of plants, usually at the tips of leaves. They are small green or yellow translucent spheres. A female ruby-throated hummingbird at a nearby lantana observed the butterfly on the fennel and flew over to scare the butterfly away. The butterfly left, but she already laid her eggs. Afterward, the hummingbird tried to sip nectar from the fennel flowers (without success) and went back to the lantana.

Fennel flowers, 2012

Scarlet Sage in the Morning

Posted by ruddygardener

I love reading about or discovering for myself things that experienced gardeners know but don’t talk about or what isn’t found in most garden books. The best garden books are those that share these insights. On a tour at Birmingham Botanical Gardens‘ Kaul Wildflower Garden, I learned that the anthers of mountain laurel snap up, projecting pollen when they are touched. Or, on a plant identification class at Auburn, I learned that the crushed leaves of the Alabama croton (Croton alabamensis) smell like apples. Isn’t it fun to learn these things for the first time?

The last time I grew scarlet sage (Salvia coccinea), I was a teenager and, like most teenagers, not much of a morning person. Since I’m in my twenties now and have work to do, I get up early, which has allowed me to notice things in the garden I wasn’t awake to see when I was younger. Scarlet sage looks best in the morning. Not just best, but spectacular. Is there a more vibrant red to be seen among the banished children of Eve?

By mid-afternoon, whatever flowers haven’t been ravished by bees and hummingbirds look paler and tired under the heat of the summer sun. By sunset, most of them have fallen to the ground.

For this reason, I would plant scarlet sage where it can be admired over coffee and breakfast, where one can sit and recollect while watching the hummingbirds, or next to the spot where one stretches after a run.

Scarlet sage has the usual square stems and opposite leaves of mint family plants. The leaves are heart-shaped, with short petioles, and pubescent. Mine are 2-3 feet tall. Deadheading of the spent inflorescences results in continuous production of new flowers.

Spider Lilies and Jonquils

Posted by ruddygardener

It has rained here nearly every day. I wanted to get outside and work in the garden, so I took the chance when it stopped raining on Monday. I moved some spider lilies (Lycoris radiata), which are dormant right now, that were growing in an inconvenient spot.

Lycoris radiata bulbs.

While I was at it, I repotted some jonquils (Narcissus jonquilla) that I grew from seed I collected. They are now four years old and have flowered for the past two years. The seeds were collected from Narcissus jonquilla var. henriquesii sold by Brent and Becky’s Bulbs.

Narcissus jonquilla bulbs.

Bulbs from Seed

Lilium ‘Black Beauty’

Posted by ruddygardener

Lilium ‘Black Beauty’ is now flowering in my garden. Six years ago I planted the bulb in a place with full sun and sandy loam. Now the clump has seven flowering stems totaling 70 flower buds. The largest stem is five feet tall with 25 flower buds. ‘Black Beauty’ provides a bold answer to the question: Can lilies thrive in the Deep South?

Yes!

Lilium ‘Black Beauty’

Lilium ‘Black Beauty’ Background

Dr. Allan Armitage of the University of Georgia describes ‘Black Beauty’ as “a vigorous hybrid resulting from the cross between L. henryi and L. speciosum. […] These normally incompatible species were hybridized using embryo culture, a powerful technique for the development of future hybrids” (Herbacious Perennial Plants, Third Edition, p. 637).

The Pacific Bulb Society website notes that ‘Black Beauty’ is a sterile diploid lily hybridized by Leslie Woodriff (who also created ‘Stargazer’).

The North American Lily Society ranks ‘Black Beauty’ as number one on the Hall of Fame Lilies.

From my garden in 2011

Personal Observations

‘Black Beauty’ rises as a rosette from the ground in March with wide, glossy leaves. In April and May the stems grow to five feet and flower buds begin to form, developing through June. In July the buds, which point downward at angles away from the central stem, begin to open, starting from the bottom. Each flower consists of six recurved tepals of a red-purple, berry-like color, whitish on the edges and back sides, with raised darker spots on each tepal, called papillae, and with an angular indentation (nectary) at the base of each tepal of green edged in white. The overall appearance of the flower is like many Oriental and Orienpet lilies, but this one appears more wild or less highly-bred, which I adore.

I have not noticed any fragrance. Nectar is in the center of the flowers, which bees and ants sometimes visit. After flowering, which continues into August, the stems persist until frost. Then, they slowly turn yellow and dry out, after which a gentle tug easily pulls them out of the ground for composting.

Lilium ‘Black Beauty’ is a tough plant. It thrives in my hot, humid, Alabama (USDA zone 8) garden. For the first several years I grew it between the edge of a lawn and asphalt in full, all-day sun with no mulch and no supplemental watering. During these years, it increased. Then, I unknowingly planted a China rose on top of it one winter. The next few years it grew through the rose, flowering and increasing. Finally, I transplanted the rose elsewhere and ‘Black Beauty’ now occupies a prominent place in a new perennial border where I fertilize it with compost and compost tea and provide deep watering in the absence of rain. This year it is the largest ever.

I do not plant lilies with afternoon shade. In my experience, lilies need sunlight from all directions in order to grow upright. Even in full sun, the largest stems aim slightly southward and the smaller stems aim away from the shade of the larger stems. With afternoon shade, lilies I have grown become lanky, growing strongly in the direction of sunlight and flopping over under the weight of their flowers, which aren’t numerous anyway.

The ‘Black Beauty’ lily is one of my favorite flowers. I look forward to its blooming every midsummer.

Buds in late June

Ants visiting the flowers in 2011

Ruddy Gardener

Posted by ruddygardener

My name is Ross. Welcome to my garden blog. I will post original horticultural photos and observations from my garden and travels. I am a young horticulturist with a degree from Auburn University in Alabama, USA.

I have been gardening since I was fourteen years old. In addition to my degree, I have professional experience in retail horticulture and landscape maintenance. I have gardened in central Indiana (USDA zone 6a) and north and south Alabama (zone 8a).