Our Garden Dirt: April 2008

The First Four O'Clock Blooms for the Year!

Wednesday, April 30, 2008

Early this morning I went out and sprayed all of our roses with a mix of water, Ivory & baking soda to help with blackspot and pests. Every morning, there is something new blooming and every evening there is something that wasn't blooming in the morning. This evening, our first Four O'Clock bloom showed it's precious face! I knew it was getting ready and actually was surprised that is was one of our White Four O'Clocks that were blooming first. The white ones are more delicate. I usually expect the Fushcia's or Yellows to bloom first. The white and the pink ones are not as hardy. So, it was a pleasant surprise as Four O'Clocks are one of my very favorite's and was my Daddy's favorite also. I took a couple of pictures tonight to post them on here. Bruce & I also planted seeds tonight in the Baby's garden. We planted some Pink Rosa Cleome, a Pink Cosmos mix, White Four O'clocks and Pink Four O'clock's also. We also planted some White ones in the "White Garden" (imagine that!) The weather has been just beautiful. It's not too humid and hot yet and the mosquitos haven't been as bad the past week. They were really bad the first couple weeks of Spring.

White Four O'clocks-First Bloomers this year!

The First Four O'Clock Bloom for this year!

Siloam Double Classic Daylilies

Marcia Faye Daylily

Lots of Four O'Clock seedlings are growing up here.

Be careful with Four O'Clocks if you don't want them

everywhere. They can be very invasive if you don't

keep them confined to one area. They like to get around!

This is a photo that I took early this morning of the partiere garden.

The Snapdragons are really beautiful right now.

We are already picking and eating a few Blueberries everyday. Yummy! This variety gets nice and plump too!

This totally depressed me the other day. All Gardener's know that along with the

good times, come the bad times in the garden. Right now we have tons of baby

Grasshoppers that are growing up very quickly and already trying to eat up

everything. We just got some more Neem oil to spray on everything. Hopefully

we'll get it under control soon because this sight is very discouraging!

" Nearly Wild" Rose

This is a Cassia which is growing quickly.

Wait til you see it next month!!! I'll have lots more soon! Keep checking back and Happy Gardening!

Everything's Coming Up Roses!!!

Saturday, April 26, 2008

All of our roses are starting to show the rewards of all our diligent, hard work! There are quite a few that are blooming and if not blooming, in bud. I love roses so I always look forward to this. When my roses start blooming in the Spring, I start getting the fever and excitement of another season of dreaming of all the roses that are yet to come. Tomorrow, Bruce & I are going to the annual Gainesville Rose Society Rose Show at Kanapaha Botanical Gardens. I'm very much looking forward to it. Below are just a few of the pictures I took of some of my favorite roses in the gardens yesterday. Enjoy!

This is "Louis Phillipe" Rose

This is "Souvenier de la Malmaison"~one of my very favorites!

This is Ella Bella (my elephant hose waterer)

This is "Belinda's Dream" which is an

outstandingly beautiful rose.

"Belinda's Dream " Rose

Happy Spring!!!

Wednesday, April 16, 2008

This April weather has been so great! It didn't stay hot very long and we got a cold front and the weather has been in the high 70's to low 80's again. Just beautiful. Tonight it is suppose to go down to 37! We also had some rain so everything is looking fuller, lusher and greener. We haven't had time to get out in the garden too much the past 2 weeks but that should change this coming weekend. I did take alot of pictures last week and I am posting just a few on here to show some of what's blooming. Hopefully, soon, I will have some more to write about on here but hope that you enjoy the pictures for now!

These are "Striped Panther" African Amaryllis.

They are gorgeous. The photographs do no justice.

These are some Native Azaleas

This is a "Smoke" tree that we planted recently

Our Strawberry patch is getting full of strawberries.

We've already gotten a couple of quarts

This is another picture of the "Striped Panther" African Amaryllis

The Grass Is Always Greener.........

Friday, April 4, 2008

Well, we didn't make it to the Spring Garden Festival at Kanapaha but we did wind up planting on Sunday. We planted a Red Maple tree, Drake Elm tree and a pile of Daylilies. We did alot of garden maintenance also. The weather was perfect! We love that Spring is here. I think it lasted for about a week! It's already creeping up into the mid to high 80's and getting humid. We finally had to turn on our central air conditioning today and close the windows. I hated to do that but it was time. Too sticky! The grass is looking so green and nice right now though. I love that! Over the winter it looks dead and brown and the past two weeks it just keeps getting greener and greener. Now I only wish we could head up to Pennsylvania and see all of our favorite Spring flowering trees, tulips, lilacs and all the great things that are starting to bloom up there this time of year that we can't grow here. Our roses are starting to bloom too. I had just given them a good pruning and fertilizing and the results are already showing! Love this time of year!