Flowers in the Garden Part 3

As fall keeps creaping in I feel the need to bring Spring to the blog.  So here is another instalment of 2010's flowers in the Garden.  This time we are moving to the side of the house .

The begin of Spring brought several beautiful Daffodils.

One of the Iris' that bloomed.  I love the coloring of these flowers.  The way that look like no other flowers.

The other version of Iris in the yard.  Also pretty in it's own right. 

The lilies that surprised me as well.  Since this was our first Spring in the house I didn't know what kind of beauty was lurking beneath the soil.  Gonna try to get a few other colors for next year.

Now these guys like the Irish have unique color patterns.  To me they look like they have frekles.  These guys are Rodadendrum

Here is a big of a close up of one of my other Rose of Sharon Shrubs.  This one is actually a double flower.  The center part for some opens just like the outer part and sometimes it just stays lacy like this one.  This shrub was covered in blooms this year.  And I am collecting seeds....

 And here we are to my pride and joy.  My morning glories.  This one is called Heavenly Blue.   And let me tell you when they first open they are very blue.  This one has touches of purple in it because it was a few hours old.  If you look to the left of the open bloom you can see a purple one.  This one opened the day before and is shriviling up.  The blooms are only good for one day but if you have a good healthy plant you won't even realize that.  I had some many blooms some days it was crazy.  You can cut them and put in water although the open blooms will only last that day but if you cut the stem so that there are other blooms ready they will bloom in the water.  In fact I had cut back some of the main plant because it was taking over my railing and I droped a stem with buds on it.  Even with out water apparently these guys can still be hardy....4 days after I cut it a bloom opened. 

This little beauty is actually not very little.  This is a Moon Flower, called Giant White.  Like the Morning glories it is only good for one day.  Actually for one night.  Yup these guys open at night.  Most of the time.  Every so often  a few of them got confused and opened early evening but not often.  Compared to the Morning Glories they are quite large.  They do have another big difference though in that they do sometimes last almost a whole 24 hours.  Where Morning glories usually don't make it past 12 hours.

Both of these two are vining plants and can be very aggressive though so be prepared for that.

Winter is comming - Now what!

So Fall has settled in here in the North which means Winter isn't too far behind.  Up here trying to grow stuff outside in the dead of winter isn't really possible.  Too much snow and cold weather for much to really grow.

But never fear there are other things that you can do.  As fall moves on think about planting some lettuce or another quick crop.  Or just get some cover crop seeds like grains.  Why?  Well because these guys can actually replenish lost nutrients in you soil.  Also as some you can just leave there till Spring then till it all up it will start to breakdown and create a compost of sorts.

Don't like that idea but want to do something?  There are always root crops.  Potatoes, carrots, etc.  Fall is a good time to plant these guys as by the time the soil freezes where the actuall crop is you will be able to harvest them. 

What about inside?  There are many great varieties of veggies, some fruits, herbs, and flowers that grow quite well in containers.  Herbs are always a good choice as long as you cook with them. 
The book that is listed on this page
http://www.gardeners.com/Vegetable-Gardening-in-Containers/35-793,default,pd.html
is a great book on container gardening.  He goes thru different ways to grow inside or out all in containers.  He even had a section on Winter.

Something else that is very important to cold weather gardeners is the planning of the next years crops.  More to follow on that though.