Monday, July 15, 2013

Blooms for July…

When I was younger I was obsessed with birth-stones and birth-flowers (as well as horoscopes). I always felt a little cheated because my brother’s birthstones were the diamond and pearl while I was stuck with the ruby…yuck. Their flowers have never been favorites (daisy and rose) where as mine, larkspur, was (and still is) a virtual unknown to me.

However since July Bloomday in my garden always means Yucca filamentosa flowers (love them!) I’ve decided to adopt them as my official birth-flower, tradition be damned…Yucca flowers for July babies!

Even this Yucca filamentosa 'Color Guard' decided to get in on the celebration, this is the first year this plant has bloomed.

Here’s a glance at some of the other things blooming in my garden in July (in roughly alphabetical order too! Because that's how blogger uploaded them)...

Acanthus mollis

Agapanthus NOID

Alstroemeria isabellana

Crocosmia Lucifer

Echinops 'Arctic Glow'

Eryngium+agavifolium

Eryngium venustum

Eucomis 'Sparkling Burgundy'

Euphorbia horrida

Genista aetnensis

Grevillea victoriae 'Murray Queen'...not quite there yet but when those blooms start to open...it's gonna be HOT!

Hesperaloe parviflora...there are 5 of these bloom spikes in my garden this year and the hummingbirds are getting very territorial...

Hosta NOID (it's rare hosta blooms get to stick around...)

Hymenocallis zwanenburg, also rare are bulbs in my garden. My mom gifted me a few of these earlier in the spring and boy am I glad I took them, I really enjoyed these flowers.

Kniphofia, part of the "popsicle series" from Terra Nova.

Lewisia NOID

Lysimachia Paridiformis F. Stenophylla

Manfreda undulata 'Chocolate Chips' when it first started to open...

And now...

The plant underneath that 5 ft tall bloom...

Musella lasiocarpa (Chinese Yellow Banana)

Since this would be the first July Bloomday ever on my blog without a blue Hydrangea (ours went away last spring) I thought I'd share my neighbors plants along our driveway.

Opuntia humifusa, I'm hoping maybe some of last years fruit will breakdown and result in a seedling or three.

Did you notice the bee?

Sedum angelina

Sempervivum NOID

Because July also means tomatoes I had to share a 'Sungold' bloom...

Verbascum bombyciferum 'Arctic Summer'

And that's it! Happy July to everyone, isn't this just the best month? For more blooms visit our hostess Carol at May Dreams Gardens.

All material © 2009-2013 by Loree Bohl for danger garden. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited.

51 comments:

  1. These are so beautiful! I love the variety of colors and textures. Seeing the blooms is one of my favorite parts of the month :)

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  2. I think I'll have to find a Hesperaloe parviflora, and maybe the Eucomis too. Love the Lewisia bloom but pretty sure I can't grow that here.

    No opuntia blooms for me this year. Guess they really wanted to get out of those pots :(

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    1. I bet a Hesperaloe parviflora would be very happy in your garden, and probably the Eucomis too (how cold do you get in the winter). I've got a round of opuntia blooms coming up soon on another plant who hasn't ever bloomed for me...I can't wait to see what color they are!

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  3. Yucca flowers are beautiful aren't they. Which is why I am so jealous of all of yours. None of mine ever flower. I just bought a Yucca filamentosa 'Color Guard' maybe next July that will be the first.

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  4. July is definitely the best month as I always have two weeks off work!

    Your blooms are looking great Loree :)

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    1. Yay for vacations! Are you going anywhere special Adam?

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    2. Hi Loree,

      I have just come back from 3 nights away with my family and in-laws at Peebles Hydro Hotel. It was good fun.

      My trip abroad was the last week of June when we went to The Algarve in Portugal.

      Do you have any summer holidays lined up?

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    3. The San Francisco Garden Bloggers adventure was the big summer trip, there is also a long weekend at beach (Oregon Coast) to celebrate my parents 50th wedding anniversary but that's about it...

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    4. I can see from your photos that you enjoyed your SFGB adventure a lot!

      Congratulations to your parents on their golden wedding anniversary :)

      That's a great achievement.

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  5. It's all beautiful!!!! I love Yucca flowers. I really need to include them in the gardens here somewhere.... Hmmm... I'll probably have to dig up more of the front lawn

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  6. Happy GBBD, pal! Your blooms look great! Love that crazy manfreda bloom and yucca blooms always surprise with their size and number. I got a 'Color Guard' early this spring and now, still in its pot it is throwing up a flower spike.

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    1. Blooming in its container huh? It must really like you.

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  7. No flowers on any of my Yuccas yet. You can bet they would have been in my Bloom Day post if they were. I love the idea of you just deciding Yuccas should be your birth flower. It works for me. My birthday is in December, and I have no clue what my birth flower is. I don't know of anything that blooms then. I'm thinking maybe I'll be arbitrary too, and make Semps my birth flower.

    I need some Hesperaloes in my garden. Hmm...I'm thinking next year.

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    1. Yes you do need a few hesperaloes! I went the longest time without any blooming (other than when I bought them) but now it seems to be a regular (annual) occurrence.

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  8. I looooove your birthday flowers! They are a great celebration! I too felt like ruby was a sad birthstone growing up. But it kind of sums up the summer loving spirit!! Big, bold, warm, summer loving goodness! Happy birthday month!

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    1. Thank you Louis, I do like the ruby better now than I used to.

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  9. Funny juxtaposition: rubies, yuck; yuccas, birth flower of choice. I agree that we should not be stuck with some symbol handed down from on high. Good for you, and Happy Birth Month (birthday celebrations should go on for at least a month, IMO).

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    1. I agree, month long (or at least week long) celebrations are a must!

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  10. Congratulations upon throwing tradition aside and declaring yourself free to pick your own (appropriate and beloved) birth flower! Seeing your Hesperaloe reminded me that I need to find one (or more) of those for my own garden. Thanks for sharing your Bloom Day posts.

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    1. Wow I'm so glad my garden is inspiring so many people to need/want hesperaloes!!!

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  11. And here I've been oblivious to birth stones. I couldn't tell you what mine is (early April?) Opals would be cool, but I doubt that's mine. The more I know about you, the more interesting you become! I'm seeing 'Sparkling Burgundy' local as a dark flower with green leaves, which is what mine is too, when what I want is the dark-leaved eucomis. Maybe if I order 'Oakhurst' I'll get the dark leaves?

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    1. I think you've got the diamond Denise...

      Oakhurst is definitely worth trying. I've got a couple of both and can't tell the difference.

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  12. We can choose our Birthday Month Flower...awesome! Love the Verbascum!

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    1. So what's yours Scott? (birthflower I mean)

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  13. Love the pale color of your acanthus and your robust yucca blooms! My Y. 'Color Guard' was a poor show this year and has already departed to bloom heaven. I have that same NOID sempervivum (which now I can't help but think of as Hens and Dicks, thanks to Alison!) As for your Hesperaloe blooms - totally jealous!

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    1. Yep me too (Hens and Dicks)...perhaps she needs to come up with her own hybrid and patent that name.

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  14. Those yuccas are something else. Love the Manfreda undulata. And thanks for introducing me to a new form of Lysimachia. Very cool.

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    1. That lysimachia is a fav, so cheery with it's yellow flowers forming the center of a green leaved flower.

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  15. That's so funny, my birth stone is diamond/CZ but I always wanted something more interesting, like a ruby or sapphire. Why not pick your own flower or birth stone? They were just made up by a marketer inside Hallmark, right?

    Eucomis blooms always look like a little man wearing a hat to me, much like the man on the Pringles can. :) That Hymenocallis bloom is so cool!

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    1. I think the American Gem Society might have had something to do with the birthstones but a company like FTD probably came up with the flowers...pretty close to Hallmark!

      Andrew is a Pringles addict yet I can't even picture what the man on the can looks like!

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  16. I love the euphorbia horrida - it's so surprising and the name is perfect. The lewisia is so pretty, even though I'm not usually drawn to pink. Lewisia is definitely on my plant want-list. And I'm a sucker for all sedum!

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    1. Those Lewisia flowers start out much more orange, I wish they stayed that way.

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  17. The picture of Verbascum flowers is amazing. Very pretty, as always.

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  18. I'm amazed at the number of yucca blooms you have and they do look beautiful. Manfreda blooms have to be the tallest blooms from the smallest plants around.

    The Larkspur is my birth flower too and it's a common native here so I have plenty of them in the spring.

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  19. You may not like rubies, but at least you are fortunate enough to be born in the best month to have a birthday. Recently I went to a pot luck dinner where someone brought wild harvested yucca blossoms, minus the more bitter pistols and stamens, that had been stuffed with a slightly sweet cream cheese mixed with tiny wild harvested blueberries. They were delicious.

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    1. Indeed, I have always loved that my birthday is in July. Well except when I was a kid and jealous that I never got the birthday attention other kids did in school.

      Someday I'm going to try eating a yucca bloom...

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  20. AnonymousJuly 15, 2013

    Great idea to pick your own birth flower! I actually have no idea what mine is, but now you have me intrigued! But if I had to choose, it would take me a while to do so.... so many pretties!! Anyway, your garden looks fantastic! That verbascum is so cool!

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  21. July is a fabulous month indeed, the best! BTW, the three of us share the same birthstone ;)

    And yes, we're also more than happy to adopt Yucca flowers as birth flower, with its spectacular inflorescence why shouldn't it be?

    Great selection of blooms, just shows how wonderful summer is!

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    1. Really we're all July babies? I wonder if July babies are pre-destined to become plant lovers? Indeed why not? Especially if Shirley has larkspur blooming in the spring...that's wrong! It should be something that blooms in July.

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  22. Your garden is so incredible! I would sure love to see it in person one day. But your photos are so great if I didn't I would still be satisfied. And hey does the chocolate chips die after the bloom?

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    1. Nope, thankfully it's not monocarpic, or at least it shouldn't be. Mines not the most robust plant so I hope this doesn't take too much out of it.

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  23. The Yuccas put on quite a show here this year. Unfortunately I learned the hard way that deer like to eat Yucca flowers :(. And Opuntia. Who would have guessed? Still trying to find those popsicle Kniphofias around here...

    Happy GBBD!

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    1. Come out to Portland next year for the Fling and you can ship yourself home some popsicles! (I'd offer to divide mine but I just planted them so they're still really small)

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  24. Your garden is so exotic. I like your red Hesperaloe and Alstroemeria, anything for hummers. I have Crocosmia 'Lucifer' blooming too, as well as lots of tomato flowers.;-P I'm a December birthday, which kind of sucks. I did finally embrace Turquoise, I found an artsy pendant I like, and flower is Narcissus, which at least is very fragrant. I am growing Larkspurs this year, they are a lovely blue. I used one for my Blue Monday post. I have been noticing a lot of Yuccas blooms when driving around recently. They must be getting more popular. I had no idea they were edible.

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  25. Annual larkspur (native to Europe and the Mediterranean) is commonly grown here in central Texas as a substitute for heat-hating delphiniums, and also because it's easy to grow from seed. We sow the seeds in the fall and get larkspur flowers in spring -- definitely not July. Obviously the person who came up with birth-month flowers lived in a much more temperate climate!

    At any rate, your post caused me to look up my October birth-month flower: Calendula/marigold. That works for me. :-)

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