I love your photos!! I would add some soil to that urn on it's side, perhaps buring it somewhat and see if you can't plant a few inside it to complete the illusion that the 'river' starts there. Was also just going to add that you should watch the muscari closely. It can spread rapidly from both seed and bulbets. What you have going on with the river is awsome, so I'd hate to see your river become a lake or ocean (although both would be a sight to see) of blue in your bed if left unchecked. I too am in zone 6 and not sure how 'invasive' the muscari can be here as I've just planted some here myself, but have read gardeners in zones 7-8 are wishing themselfs rid of the stuff. Just a little food for thought. When mine produced flowers and those flowers were spent, and they started producing seed, so I clipped the stalks before the seed could ripen and drop. I wanted to enjoy the blooms as long as I could and the lower blossoms seemed to be the ones that withered first and had already started producing seed pods before the tops has fully begun looking spent. Thanks for sharing!!! Shannon

Sanju, From the list you've mentioned, I can warmly suggest Jubilee Celebration. It's the best from the list for this climate type. It will repeat well, and produce lots of blooms till May in Melbourne. But it's a big one: goes in back of the border. Pat Austin ... It will get burned in January/February. It has big, gentle petals, and somewhat fragile. First flush is lovely, but when the heat hits 40 C in few days, it looks .. well .. :-( Also, petals will drop within 4-5 days from opening, no matter what weather. Be careful. Sharifa Asma is not too bad, but there are much better English roses suitable for this climate. Try Miss Alice instead: it grows better, and is overall a much better rose. Munstead Wood is a new rose this year, and it reminds of WS2000. However, sources say it behaves a bit better than WS2000, has a neater form and it's not as notorious in shooting long canes as WS2000 does in this climate. But it does shoot long canes nevertheless. JumboJimmy, we cannot still ascertain is Munstead Wood poor repeater or not; not yet. Many factors contribute to that and I don't always trust what nurseries say, because there roses live in somewhat extreme conditions compared to our gardens. Sanju, if you like myrrh scent, I'd avoid mishy-mushy Tamora and plant Ambridge Rose. That's one of the best English roses ever for this climate too. Period. It's strong, healthy and reliable, blooms first and ends last. Mayflower is fantastic, but makes great sense to plant few of them for best effect which then reminds of a thicket of Gallicas. All in all, very few roses from DA's Old Rose Hybrids group are fit for Australia. St Swithun is one of them. It's big, but it's an amazing rose. It has a very strong myrrh scent. Leander group, however, and Hybrid Musks Group are much better overall because they have scents that activate better in warm climates, petals that are not too thin, shallower flower shapes that won't burn in the sun. And all are strong growers. Another great one for Australia is Teasing Georgia. William Morris too. Pegasus has the most powerful tea scent, but tends to sleep later in season. Crown Princess Margareta is lovely and will grow big. However, they're all, as you can see, bigger ones. This season I've seen a new Strawberry Hill, and it looks very, very promising. I felt very tempted! Tea Clipper and Port Sunlight are other two to check as well.

I wouln't limit yourself to just perennials and I'd make each bed do double duty re time of interest. My seed grown Angel roses fit the bill and give a long season of interest. They start blooming in late May/early June, have their biggest flush of bloom in June/early July but then continue to bloom into fall. In fall they are covered with small bright red hips that the birds love. I've never seen them in a garden center so you have to grow them from seed. In a few years you will have a dense, showy hedge of them. In June: In Oct./Nov.: A mass of smaller hardy hibiscus are great and, since they are VERY slow to wake up in spring, you can plant lots of spring bulbs with them for a spring show and then have a late summer show from the hibiscus. In spring: In August: Peonies are great to mass with tulips too. Angelique tulips look like peony flowers and bloom about the same time as the peony foliage is developing, so it looks like the peonies are blooming early. Then the peonies hide the dying foliage. Queen of the Night tulips make a wonderful third companion. If you have a long, not too wide, bed of peonies, the staking of them is easier because you could just make an ornamental 'fence' (use black plastic chain strung between short posts painted black?) around the whole bed at the height needed to keep the peonies from flopping over. A bed of fall asters or mums would be another one that could be a spring bed first.

Chandra, I don't know that I'd trust that lady bug thing from the Farmer's Almanac. I've had lady bugs for 3 or 4 weeks now and had frost just a few days ago! Jhart, I agree with the others on Sprite, Lime Green Salad, Garden Peach and Paul Robeson. Of those 4, Paul Robeson has gottest the tallest--about 4 feet but it just doesn't like me and tends to die before producing ripe fruit. I don't know why. Maybe it is my soil. Baker Family Heirloom is very large and should grow in the ground. Razzleberry is a determinate that gets about 4 or 4.5' tall so it could be grown in a large-ish container. By large-ish I mean at least 7-10 gallons. Winsall did not get as large in my garden as I expected an Indeterminate to grow, but I grew it in a year when we had extreme drought like this year and the other year when I grew it we had excessively heavy rain and all my tomato plants sat in really wet soil for too long and stalled and stunted. I haven't grown it in a 'normal weather year' because I don't think we have those kinds of years here. For me, Indian Stripe grows like Cherokee Purple--taller than your average determinate but not a huge indeterminate. I usually grow it in the ground, but I've grown it in 20-gallon containers and it did just fine. I grew Lillian's Yellow in a year we had exceptional drought (the most severe form of drought) and it only got 3 or 4' tall, but I think it would have gotten taller in good moisture. Yellow Brandywine is a huge monster so I'd only put it in the ground. Rio Grande is a determinate but I would put it in the ground. It grows very vigorously (wide! thick! full!) and puts out a huge load of fruit. Because paste tomatoes like Rio Grande are prone to blossom end rot, and because moisture is hard to control in containers, and because uneven moisture contributes to blossom end rot, I'd put it in the ground. Hope that helps. Y'all. Unless you are going to water like a maniac or are in one of the far NE OK counties that has had plentiful rainfall, expect smaller than usual plants in this year's drought conditions. That will allow you to space them a bit closer than usual (as long as you're NOT using overhead watering) and to grow some Ind. in containers because in these conditions they won't get really huge. Please realize that if we are already in Extreme drought now (as any of you are), the next step "up" is to Exceptional Drought. I find it hard to water enough to keep a garden going in exceptional drought conditions. There's only so much water any of us can afford to pour onto the dry ground. In these conditions, water well early (in April and in May) in an effort to get your plants to grow well and set fruit. However, once fruit are sizing up nicely, you need to be very careful not to water excessively or your fruit will have bland flavor. It is a delicate balancing act. Dawn