Pixie Lou, you have a lot of nice lilies. I only have a few because of the RLLB. I just couldnâÂÂt keep them clean if I had too many. As it is, the âÂÂOraniaâ this year looked fine until after it bloomed I noticed the foliage has a fair amount of holes in it. You canâÂÂt cut the stalks back to the ground after blooming, right? I would like to have enough to smell them in the house, but nope. The âÂÂOraniaâ does make the whole front walkway a very pleasant trip when they are blooming. And thanks, glad the comparison of peppers was interesting. I think growing hot peppers does make a difference, they seem to be a more vigorous and shapely shrub that produces more and smaller peppers. The large sweet peppers seem to be more difficult to get more than a few per plant. Thyme2dig, what a pretty daylily border! IâÂÂm not always pulled to purchase a daylily and some of that is the way I see them being used. The way you have planted them all together that way without competition from other plants and with that great shrub border behind it, I really like it a lot. What is that dark shrub in photo #3? And is that Nasturtium at the base of your purple tripod? Jane, I donâÂÂt blame you about the FarmerâÂÂs Market next year. I took a couple of yearâÂÂs off from the vegetable garden and I missed it and here I am still doing it. :-) But is this year an exception? I think some years are not the greatest and this year just wasnâÂÂt. IâÂÂm going to try to salvage some of the season and go for some fall crops of Broccoli and Lettuces and Kale and other greens. This weekend IâÂÂm probably going to start. I have three squash plants without a squash between them. *sigh* Spedigrees, thatâÂÂs a good looking lily and the foliage is a lot cleaner than mine. :-)

I don't quite know what happened with my post. I've seen the text go to the right margins when a photo is too large, but my photos were all "normal" sizes....... Molie, now I just want to cry!! I ordered a paprika earlier last year to go in a bed where I have crimson Pygmy barberry and wanted a hotter colored bed. They shipped me cherry pie by mistake. Called them and they sent a replacement. Sent cherry pie again, so they must have had them all mislabeled. I kept both in the bed, but they're both going to get ripped out and moved because the cherry color just doesn't work and I really yearn for the orange. Now that I see what paprika really looks like in your garden, I'm going to try again to find them. Bill, your garden is VERY special. Don't ever underestimate it. You should self-nominate for the Garden Conservancy Open Days program. It's a real gem that other gardeners would really enjoy. I just looked at my camellia that I purchased earlier this year (thanks to your pictures!) and it has ONE bud! Woo HOO! It's such a little plant I really didn't expect anything. In your experience with smaller camellias, do you think the bud will actually open? I'm half expecting it to whither on the plant. Or have you bought all of yours a bit bigger? If its better to answer this question on your camellia thread that's fine with me.

Claire, we're in an outwash plain, so we have layers of sand, clay, and silt. I know we're not supposed to add improvements to the soil when we plant woodies, but if I just mix my soil and put it back into a planting hole, I get a fine grade of concrete. So, my Franklinias are in fairly large mixed borders that have had a fair amount of compost mixed into the native soil, and they're mulched (although I need to check on that soon, it's been awhile). I wouldn't call these areas damp - not by any stretch - and I'm not good at remembering to water. They might be growing a little more slowly than they would in a more well-tended or irrigated garden, but they seem to do pretty well. I did use soaker hoses on the beds for the first couple of years, but no water to speak of after that. I guess I used the hoses partly because earlier attempts to grow Franklinias failed - I bought them all from Forestfarm, in quart pots, so wasn't too invested in survival with my earlier tries.

wow the coneflower rage is still on! I have to tell you I'm loving the blanket flowers & think I need to do a little hunting. I know I got some seeds in trades last year. Margo, sounds like you got some really sweet deals! I'm neck & neck with mamasllamas! I'm not really competitive. I just wanted an excuse to say mamasllamas. tee hee. Love that name! :) Shirley, I was in Milford PA / Lake Wallenpaupack area. Nice because it is always a few degrees cooler there, higher elevation, more dense forest & waterfalls than NYC. There's also a raptor rescue center that always has some amazing events. There was one including a golden eagle, peregrin falcon & snowy owl, with a surprise cameo from a wild bald eagle that happened to be around. Crazy. Also the most amazing sugar baby watermelons & local raspberries. Yum. I love summer fruit. Suzanne, I had a black goldfish that used to play with me. I would stick my hand in the water & she would swim into my open hand until I lightly pulled on her tail & she would swim away & then swim back into my hand for more! It started with an especially hot summer where I kept sticking my hand in the water to check the temp in there. She also loved it when I added "air conditioning" (aka ice cubes). I know it's not supposed to be good for their scales, but she *loved* it & would swim around in the cold meltoff. Holly, Suzanne, send some of that rain my way, because my garden is suffering. Unless Margo wants to pawn her hubby off to me in this trade to water my plants (will he fit in a large flat rate? I'm assuming he's considered a perenial) :0 stay cool, folks. grace