Harvest Monday, September 9, 2013

Welcome to my Harvest Monday post, to see what other people are harvesting from their gardens, click on the link for hostess Daphne's Harvest Monday.

Here are the tomatoes I just picked, I will have to make sauce again, the large tomatoes are really ripening fast now-

Shapka Monomakha from Sample Seed Shop, a large heart-

Cucumbers Eureka, Diva, and Tanja.   Sometimes I don't look carefully enough and the sneaky cucumbers are hiding  at the base and getting humungous.

A few Uncle Steve's pole beans, they are excellent and stringless.  I didn't get out early enough to pick many beans today.

Glenora seedless grapes, they conveniently rooted a plant right behind my bean trellis so I can see the many bunches of grapes just hanging there.   Most of my grapes have become a jungle.

Thanks for visiting, Hannah

Blue Macro Mandarin Orange Yellow Monday, September 9, 2013

Blue Macro Mandarin Orange Yellow Monday, September 9, 2013

Welcome to my Monday post, I'm linking to-

Blue Monday hosted by Smiling Sally

Macro Monday 2 hosted by Gemma Wiseman

I Heart Macro hosted by Laura

Mandarin Orange Monday hosted by Lorik

Monday Mellow Yellows hosted by Gemma Wiseman

This is an original copper enamel piece I made quite a few years ago using a "water color" technique, "Tree planted by streams of living water"-

This is my needlepoint rendition of Klee's 'Senecio'- something orange and yellow-

My variegated Hoya vines in a west-facing window have 12 flower clusters in bloom on them, they are a "yellow-line" plant- if they were put on the yellow line of the highway, they would live as long as no one ran over them.;-)   They make it on my short list of house plants I can grow.  I love their geometric pentagonal form that splits into 5 triangles on top to fold back the 5 petals and reveal the 5-pointed star within-

In addition to being beautiful and fragrant, they exude a wonderful sweet nectar.  Some other nocturnal critter somewhere must love them.

or cameras are macro

-Hannah

Gardenia Frost Proof, my favorite this week, September 6, 2013

My favorite plant in the garden this week is Gardenia 'Frost Proof'.   That is strange because I wasn't going to risk growing another Gardenia, but I was in the nursery spending my "Shorty's Bucks", which gave me $10 to spend, and here was a lovely Gardenia making wild claims with lovely foliage.   In spite of so many other nice hardy plants I could have picked, I succumbed, once having fallen in love with that wonderful fragrance it's hard to resist having it around again.   I did manage to keep my last Gardenia alive in the house for a couple years, and let it live by my sink where I could smell it, but after I got brave and planted it in the yard, it didn't last long.  Kleim's Hardy and 'veitchii' have both regaled me with fragrance but are no more.   So I got home and felt like I should have my head examined, but this week something wonderful happened, it bloomed!

Not only is it double, but the biggest Gardenia flower I have ever seen!   And the fragrance is excellent.  It is slowly turning brown, but the plant is still looking very good and covered with buds, so there is hope for many more to come.

Sorry, my camera doesn't do well with the glare off of white flowers.   So, favorite plant of the week smells divine.  I hope it sticks around.   I looked it up on the Gardenia forum of Gardenweb and reports on its hardiness in the ground were not good.   It doesn't seem to live up to its name.

To see more plant of the week favorites, join Loree on her Danger Garden blog.

Hannah

Harvest Monday, September 2, 2013

Welcome, I'm linking for the first time to Daphne's Harvest Monday.

I'm posting photos of several day's harvest.

August 24, tomatoes are still only a trickle, cucumbers are slowing down, here Eureka and North Carolina Pickle, pears, Harkness Delight, Rescue,-

Beans are most heirlooms, Uncle Steve's striped pole; Italian yellow Shrimp beans, Annelino Giallo;

Grandma Robert's Purple Pole; Super Marconi Romano Pole, Yer Fasulyasi Romano bush, a mystery light purplish pole; and Park's Speedy-

August 26, this is one of my big Cocozelle Italian striped squash, the biggest so far was 4.75 lb., over 2 Kilos.  Cucumbers are Tanja, Diva, and Eureka-

Beans, some are the early Pisarecka Zlutoluske heirloom yellow wax beans that are already dry, and a few dry heirloom Yer Fasulyasi Romano bush beans, most are the same as the above beans except some darker purple pencil bush beans from Park called Velour-

August 31, some yellow Crooknecks, so buttery and nutty flavored; finally an avalanche of tomatoes, I'm growing heirlooms from saved seed so results can be variable- Verna's Orange Oxheart; Black Sea Man; Napoli (not true to description); Heidi; Tegucigalpe; San Marzano; Gogosha, has been my heaviest yielder; local favorite Legend which is late blight resistant; new varieties I'm trying from the Sample Seed Shop, Orlovskie Versaki; Monkey Ass; Shapka Monomakha-

San Marzano-

I'm still getting pears, the early apples (Prince William below) are over, and later apples still to come.   

Blueberries start with early varieties in May, most of the midseason are about gone, but a couple of evergreen blueberries have been insanely loaded, sorry the photo is a little dark, they are Misty and Sunshine Blue.   Legacy had some.

Thanks for visiting me, Hannah

Blue Macro Mandarin Orange Mellow Yellows Monday, September 2, 2013

Welcome to my blog, to see other posts click on the links below.  This week I am linking with:

Blue Monday hosted by Smiling Sally

Macro Monday 2 hosted by Gemma Wiseman

I Heart Macro hosted by Laura

Mandarin Orange Monday hosted by Lorik

Monday Mellow Yellows hosted by Gemma Wiseman

Nemophila-

This year I bought 6 new species of Solidago, Goldenrod, and have a couple already in bloom, they tend to bloom in late summer and on into fall.  S. 'Little Lemon'-

from above and sunnier-

S. Golden Fleece-

A tiny leaf-hopper, one among several that apparently discovered the plant that they blended in with the best-

The tomatoes have finally had enough heat to start ripening in numbers-

or cameras are macro

-Hannah

Wide Shot September 2013

I'm joining other bloggers showing wide shots of their gardens.   To see more, click this link to Xericstyle's blog.

This is my 2 acres from the street.  I have a garden of mixed foliage plants to the right of the driveway, with Nandina, a weeping Mulberry, a Bird's Nest Spruce, Japanese Barberry, Elaeagnus ebbingei variegata, Hypericum calycinoides, and striped Phalaris grass.  The dominate trees in my yard are Red Cedars and Big Leaf Maples, I have planted a lot of nut and fruit trees.  The bamboo poles on the left are supporting wires at 8' around my 1 year old big vegetable bed.

I need deer fences because of-

Cute destructophiles.

-Hannah