Tuesday, August 6, 2013

An evening for garden visits...

Once high summer rolls around there are a few Monday evening open gardens through the Hardy Plant Society of Oregon. I love taking advantage of these later visiting hours, after all a warm summer evening is my favorite time to relax in my garden, it's nice to see what other people's gardens are like in that "magical hour." Of course on the downside the lighting in photographs can be funky, especially on a tree lined street like the one this home is on...

The side yard was a little sunnier. Natually I wanted to kick back in one of those chairs and hope someone would bring me a cocktail.

Such happy healthy plants!

I'm no good with the artful empty pot thing. I'll always end up sticking a plant in there!

I assume this is a blooming Veratrum nigrum...

Mine hasn't bloomed yet, it was nice to get a preview.

A cleverly hidden work area is behind that art glass...

This seating area (starting with that container above) is in what must have been a driveway in it's former life. You'd never know it now.

This water feature was very stylish in "real-life" I'm afraid my photo isn't doing it justice.

Orange, everyone loves orange (or so it seems)...

I should have asked someone to stand next to that astelia, it was the largest one I've ever seen. No way that has just been in the ground a couple of years so it must have lived through the the PKW's (phormium (and astelia) killing winters). I should have asked the garden/home owner but there was another visitor bending her ear.

Any guesses on the tree? An Albizia julibrissin and there wasn't a speck of bloom litter underneath (that I saw)...

So in this shot I'm leaving the garden we just visited and heading next door. These were side-by-side open gardens, how wonderful to have a neighbor who takes gardening as seriously as you do!

In front of the second garden, looking backwards down the path towards the first...

Huge podophyllum, I really need to move mine.

Yes it was as soft as it looks. Anyone know what it is?

Those translucent panels did an excelletn job of obscuring the "other" neighbors front yard as I swung around the house on the path towards the back garden.



Looks like the leaves on her Rhododendron sinogrande suffered a little scorching like mine did. It's tough on plants to go from cloudy, rainy and 70 degrees to sunny and 97 in just a couple of days time!

The light was making it hard to photograph (plus there were several people in the garden) but there are small bits of colored glass mixed in with the gravel here...


I rarely see the green Castor Bean, everyone seems to prefer the purple leafed plants.

I imagine youthful visitors to this garden enjoy playing with this mosaic.

That's a Schefflera delavayi in the middle, recently planted in the ground but having survived a brutal winter or two in a container.

This is the magnificent "gate" between the two back yards (the previous one with the huge astelia and the Albizia julibrissin and this one). I like how friendly, yet also private, it is.

Hey what's that in the container? Yep a Pseudopanax x 'Sabre'...

Nice!

This covered seating area came off the back of the house...


And there was a second seating area off another part of the house. This character was hanging out on an end table.


Back out front ready to leave I snapped a shot of the seating area on top of the garage. No space wasted!

En-route home I stopped at one other garden and was happy to see this Twisty Baby Locust (Robinia pseudoacacia 'Lace Lady'). It's a favorite of mine ever since I first spotted it at the Seattle Garden Bloggers Fling in 2011.


The use of groundcovers in this garden was fabulous! This is more Leptinella x 'Platt's Black' than I've ever seen in a single place.



I can't remember which Leptospermum Ozothamnus 'Sussex SIlver' (thanks Matthew and Max) this was but I wanted to take it home with me!

Leaving that open garden I glanced across the street and had to go take a closer look....

Spikes in the hell strip...

And on the other side bamboo and abutilon...

Dang we've got a lot of gardeners here in Portland!

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

29 comments:

  1. About that large Astellia: I talked to the owner about how she protected it through the PKWs and she said they covered it. If I remember correctly, there are metal rods in the ground to support PVC pipes, which then support a tent-like cover to prevent the snow from crushing and cracking the leaves. She said it was the weight of snow that was the biggest danger.

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    1. Interesting! Thanks Lisa, makes my wheels turn thinking about agave protection.

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  2. Wow - they are all such beautiful gardens. Love that water feature with the rocks - at my house it would be a bubbler for the raccoons.

    Is that a Leptospermum or Ozothamnus?

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    1. I can just imagine the fun the raccoons would have splashing and making a big old mess of that water feature. I'm sure they would thank you for such an extravagance on their behalf.

      (thanks for the i.d. correction!)

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  3. That Leptospermum-lookalike looks more like an Ozothamnus 'Sussex SIlver' to me. Far Reaches says it's hardy to 7b. I've been seeing it in the Big Box Stores lately.
    Max P.

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    1. Thank you for the plant name, and really? The big boxes are carrying something that cool? I'm surprised.

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  4. Portland must have more gardeners per capita than any other city in the PNW! I love the two adjoining gardens with the nice doors between the back yards. Monday evening garden opens sound wonderful!

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    1. I wish some of those gardeners lived on my street! I think I've got the least gardened street in the whole PNW.

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  5. It's so funny, I hardly recognize that garden...then again, it was 2 years ago that I visited...it really changed since then! I have a dream of having those Veratrum wands poking up through masses of grasses in the winter.

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    1. I heard Joanne had completely redone hers (maybe you told me that?) recently.

      Not even my white veratrum bloomed this year, and last year when it did a June rain caused it to fall over so no seed heads for me.

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  6. Okay, I'm now definitely convinced that Portland is a Shangri-La for gardeners. Evening open garden walk-abouts! Spectacular gardens right next to one another! Mimosa that doesn't drop masses of litter the second you finish cleaning up after it! Thanks for the tour (even if it left me with a serious case of garden envy this morning).

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    1. Kris are you considering coming to the Portland Garden Bloggers Fling next year? It will be fun and I'd love to meet you!

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  7. Thanks for sharing these lovely garden tours! I would love to have neighbors who are as into gardening as I am. Too bad the sparkly glass was so hard to make out in that picture of the gravel, that is what I have in mind for my gravel garden, eventually. I have to put some stepping stones in first. So much to do, so much inspiration, I just go from one thing to the next, hardly taking time to really put the final finishing touches on things. I love the idea of weekday evening tours.

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    1. Glad you're so inspired by the garden tours, you've certainly seen a lot this year!

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  8. Sensational tour. I notice that you seldom identify the gardens you visit. Is that a privacy thing, and if so am I breaking some unwritten rule by naming them in my blog? Matthew is right about Ozthamnus 'Sussex Silver'. We haven't quite mastered the pruning of ours so it looks pretty unruly. The fern in question looks a lot like my Polystichum setiferum. Mine is 'Pumoso multilobum' but there are several other varieties.

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    1. It's a privacy thing. I'm never sure if people want to be "outed" so unless I get a chance to ask them directly I usually err on the side of not. However I realize that means they don't get credit for the lovely garden they've created so it's not a perfect rule.

      I think you're right about the fern!

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  9. It seems your area is blessed with so many avid gardeners and it shows with all the private properties you feature that has beautiful gardens. The first two you featured here, the planting is not that dissimilar to the planting of your own garden, even with their choice of furniture. Love all those lime green chairs too btw!

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    1. That must be why I felt so at home there!

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  10. Holy Wow!!!! It's all fabulous. So many beautiful and beautifully grown plants in great settings. Wish I lived near other gardens and gardeners. the pickings are pretty slim in my area.

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    1. This is the time of year when my street is filled with golden (ugly) lawns. I so wish my neighbors would rip out their sod and become gardeners too...

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  11. dang dang dang! Both gardens are gorgeous. That astelia is insane. Like ridiculously, insanely wonderful. You're right about the size and the potential PKW survival - amazing. I naturally love the yucca gloriosa variegata in the first garden. And the use of musa basjoo at the corner of that covered seating area is one of the best I've ever seen.

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    1. Isn't that yucca amazing? I know I stood there staring at it for longer than I should have and I agree the placement of that Musa basjoo is just perfect!

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  12. These are just great great gardens Loree...in my jealousy over the HPSO open days, I bought membership the past couple years so I can peruse the guide and feel dramatically agonized over my inability to visit any of them. This year is the first in several that I have not been to Oregon.But next year ...Fling !

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    1. Next year indeed! And of course we Oregonian's appreciate your support of the HPSO.

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  13. I also have Polystichum setiferum and think that fern looks like it.

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    1. Thanks Lisa, I'm think I might need to track that one down!

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  14. Parabéns pelo Site é maravilhoso.
    abraços

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  15. Gorgeous! And to see not just one but several interesting gardens on this street. I envy you summer garden tours. Ours won't start up again until October. Just as well, as things are pretty crispy right now.

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