Wow, so lovely!! I don’t see much in my garden yet besides the annuals I just planted. Snowball viburnum is about to do its thing, eager for that! My blue shadow fothergilla look awful and my bloomerang lilac is half dead, but has a few flowers on the still-living side. Waiting on irises and rhododendron. I have a lull in my garden after my daffodils bloom, I definitely need to do better! What are the pink flowers in the first photo and the purple flowers in the third? Beautiful!!

I’ll play rouge, Although not much going on yet... just mainly groundcovers.

So good GH.

What I like about your photos is that they give the wide view of the garden. Spectacular GH. I would love to visit.

Thank you rouge. Next time you’re down this way you’re more than welcome for a tour😀

After a very cold dry April and a very cold wet May, my garden is basically green on green.

Sandy thank you. I love your photos! Are you using a camera? They are so crisp and clear. Great shot of the buntings!

Lovely blooms, everyone!

I've been enjoying the Phlox divaricata and fothergilla blooms. The Koreanspice and Burkwood virburnums just finished, the scent was lovely. Not much else going on right now, I don't have a lot of early spring bloomers -- the show should start here within the next week or two, right on schedule.

Rouge, what is that lovely pea-family 2nd photo?

I just posted a bunch on the New England forums 'what's blooming in May"

Didn't think to post here and it's too late (too tired) to re-do. Please look if you're interested.

I've always loved the big-picture photos. I love vignettes too. But from my own gardening experience I believe it's easier to make 2 or 3 plants into a stunning combination. It is much harder to convey a 'big picture' that has grace and rhythm and variety in the landscape.

We all start somewhere. I certainly started with 'small pictures.' It's taken me and the garden nearly 25 years to start to grasp something more.

Is that the case with some of you?

My Bloomerang lilac is starting to look better, though still very small; ‘‘twas a Home Depot $11 special last year! My tiarella sugar and spice, which was planted three or four years ago, gets smaller with each passing year, boo hoo.

Adding photos re: my upstream post:

Fothergilla. The pic really doesn't do them justice, they really are lovely, like tufts of cotton, and have a light honey-like scent. They're right in front of my home office window for me to enjoy.

From the other side (the spruce dominates this pic, but the blooms show better in this view):

Trollius; thought it was Golden Queen, but I'm not so sure because all the other ones I have (maybe 9-10 others) were labelled GC, and this one is the only one that ever blooms this early, and the foliage is a bit different. I love her whatever she is!

Phlox divaricata. Lovely scent, and I adore the blooms.

It looks like everybody is having a great spring bloom, even those who are having a dry spring like us! Looking at our rain records, the last time April and May was this dry was 2012! But I noticed when weeding yesterday and today, the soil below the top 1/4" was still surprisingly damp. The last rain we had was 8mm. (about 1/3") on May 4.

I just posted pictures of our wisteria on the Waiting for flowers thread - they are the key spring bloomer in the front garden in May. The 'green and white' garden in the backyard has a lot of green and white going on! :-) Some pictures from this morning:

GardenHo, yes, I'm using an old Sony camera. The Indigo Buntings were taken through a window and it focused really well.

Marie Tulin, even though I'm more of a plant collector than landscape artist, my goal was to have lovely gardens that showed well in the big picture. I think a lot of us would like that! But I'm reaching the point of acceptance of my garden's limitations, along with my own. Kudos to those who can achieve it! .....I'll check out your pics on the NE forum.

lovemycorgi, Tiarellas seem finicky. I've tried a few, including the very cute 'Sugar and Spice', but 'Spring Symphony' is the only one that comes back for me. I'm not sure if it's the variety that does well or the place it's planted.

rouge ??? I notice but have no idea why.

woodyoak, I know I would sure like some rain asap!

Sandyslopes, Although I don;'t have any now, I also found 'spring symphony' tiarella lasted longer than others. It was a variety that returned well.

Marie, Rouge’s second picture is a Corydalis. I’ll leave it to her to say which species. Maybe nobilis?

Wet, wet, wet ...

green, green, green .....

Dry, dry, dry....still green.....for now.

My tiarella sugar and spice, which was planted three or four years ago, gets smaller with each passing year, boo hoo.

I love this tiarella but I experienced similarly ie vigorous for a couple of seasons and then slowly but surely vanishing :(.

All the tiarellas I have planted over the years disappeared. I have given up on them and don’t bother planting any new ones now!

But you do agree \woody', that they are cute as a button while they are alive!

Rouge - indeed, they are so cute....but so disappointing when they disappear!

Yup. I take it personally :(.

I only take it personally if I think about what I did for work that earned the money to buy the plant AND that I personally with said money rescued that plant from a life in a small black plastic pot where it’s roots were bound and it’s expression of flowering potential was repressed.

yes, it shows a real lack of gratitude to up and die or peter out. I’m surprised I’m still standing after experiencing thousands of such disappointments. Actually maybe that’s why I can hardly stand somtimes.

The heat kicked up and things are finally starting to bloom.....

allium

Clematis ‘pink champagne’ (Excuse the ugly fence) Year 2 and this one seems to be much happier than my others

FINALLY got my email working on my phone so I can send myself photos, so now I can play too! Too bad my phone doesn't take great photos (and I have trouble seeing the screen outside so I can't focus hahaha!)

Anyway, these were taken a week ago.

Lilacs

Spanish bluebells

NOID hellebore

Lily of the Valley. Here for 25 years and now taking off in the last two years. I don't mind. I so adore this that I keep it and just rip out lots of it the last two seasons to keep it in check. If you look closely you can see the remnants of Virginia bluebells to the upper left and upper middle. One lone daffodil around the right of the tree

Two of my favorite hostas, the one on the right emerging much later. May have to move these. The tree you see is really only a 6-foot stump, the remnant of my lovely triple-trunk oak. Now this shade bed gets lots of sun and the hostas have burned the last two years. Deutzia just to the left of hostas. Will get a photo of it soon - in fuller bloom now

Hostas and deutzia from another angle

Lastly, bluets in my "lawn". Love these little beauties!

GH your garden is spectacular as usual, and mxk, LOVE the trollius! You reminded me that I used to have some. I wonder what happened to it....? LOL!

:)
Dee

The shrubs really seem to be outdoing themselves this year.

Syringa microphylla 'Superba', little leafed lilac

Deutzia

This is the first year it has really bloomed, since it has only been in the ground a couple of years.

Peony Coral Fay

The first time I saw fernleaf peonies, I thought they were about the coolest thing. Coral Fay is a fernleaf hybrid, and given when it starts going dormant, I'm no longer interested in the real thing. It is a very nice plant.

Some of the early roses I have blooming

Rosa altaica with Rosa hugonis in the background.

I didn't get pictures of the Virginia bluebells this year, or the daffodils. I don't really need pictures of everything, do I?

LOL, MG, by the time I got around to getting a picture of my daffs, this is what was left:

The last of my Quail daffs. Love these and wish I had taken the photo earlier!

I saw your rosa hugonis in another thread and thought it was lovely. I'll have to look into that one.

:)
Dee

Thanks Dee.

Dee thank you. Your photos are great! That’s all I’ve ever used is my phone too. I don’t have the patience to transfer photos, but a camera can sure make a difference. I love your Spanish bluebells. Patiently waiting for my lilac to bloom...love the fragrance!!

Woody I love the photo with your shed. Always a favorite view...

Mad your shrubs are beautiful!

We finally got a little bit of rain...Yay!!! It was so badly needed....everything was starting to curl and wilt :(

A rarity in my garden... A large happy lupine

More allium with new black eyed Susan annual. I’ve heard they are vigorous growers so I thought I’d try one this year....

I’ll be fighting off the hosta to ensure it doesn’t eat it...

Clematis guernsey cream and a rhododendron that may be Percy Wiseman. it fades to white but that works well, too, with white Clem. One poster is certain it’s Percy. I bought one long long ago but have no memory if this is it.

Noid peony with cercis rising sun

”probably” Percy and a view of wood peony (to left )in bloom that I didn’t know I’d photographed. It had 10 open flowers which were blasted the next day by high temps

in front a fresh spring mishmash of

hardy geraniums, epimediums, small narrow level hostas, European ginger

R. “Mother’s Day” & Jacob’s Ladder in foreground

Its on my gardening "bucket list" ie being able to grow lupines. GH can you give me a little of the history of that healthy clump of yours?

I love those lupines! I wintersowed some years and years ago,and they did very well, and reseeded for several years as well. Then after about 8 years they petered out. I tried wintersowing some this year but my seed was quite old and I got no germination. I'll definitely have to buy fresh seed. Even the foliage is beautiful!

Marie that clematis is gorgeous! I bought a Romantika about a month ago, an impulse buy as a replacement for my 2-year-old Jackmanii that didn't return this spring. I put it about six inches from where the Jackmanii was. Three days ago I see a shoot coming up - yep, the Jackmanii. And I bet both of them will bloom a week after my Zephrine Drouin anyway....

:)
Dee

Rouge unfortunately I can’t tell you much about this lupine. I have planted so many in this area. Some have returned the next year but most have not. So imagine my surprise when this one did...then grew so large! (it’s the only one left now)

I do have a shady area that i’ve had better luck in, although this year I see only one has returned...so I guess not so lucky :(

Last year I planted several yellow ones not too far from the one pictured. Only one has returned and I’m anxious to see the color.

I can say that this plant has been very finicky for me.... I wish I knew the secret to keeping it happy!

I've never had any luck with lupines. Whatsoever.

Here’s another one I had a hard time getting to return...geranium ‘Bill Wallis’.

To my surprise it has happily reseeded all over!!

A little past its prime here

What a lovely color combination GH!

I'm so enjoying the view from my office window.

I went outside to take the pic so there'd be no screen, so the angle is a bit off and my actual view is wider, but this is the main view. Disregard my messy cutting garden (I do!) It's not planted out yet so it's just mostly a bare patch of leaf mulch

:)
Dee

Dee thank you (I thought it kind of looked washed out myself) and what A wonderful view! Are those columbines? I’ve never tried growing them as a fellow gardener told me years ago they get terrible powdery mildew. That sure doesn’t seem to be the case for yours if that’s what they are?

gardenho. ive Not heard of or seen PM as a major problem on my columbine

BUT I’ve never seen a columbine without leaf miner damage by the end of June. the leaves are disfigured but it is

- sorry don’t know how font got big and bold-

Not fatal. I just cut back the foliage.

Don’t you find lot of plants‘ foliage get ratty as the season progresses?

I stostss

Stop me from trying a plant at least once.

this formatting glitch is crazy. it just went back to Normal’

The font corrected itself when I hit submit I wasn’t having a delusion.

Marie maybe it was leaf miners she spoke of, it’s been so many years ago. She had such beautiful gardens, so I trusted her opinion/experience. I am now seeing them this year in the garden centers/nurseries more than ever. I’ve been tempted as they are so unique and pretty. Maybe one day....

The pink and purple are columbines, and there are white columbine to the upper right, but there is also a pink deutzia (Cherry Blossom or some such name??) kind of in the center - from a distance it's hard to distinguish it's blooms and the blooms of the white columbines.

I have issues with leaf miners as well, but it's usually later in the season after bloom, and other things grab my attention lol. I guess it's not a bad enough problem for me as I let the columbines reseed freely. A little TOO freely, lol, as this is my red/yellow/orange bed at the moment:

I'm trying to be more ruthless and rip more of these out and/or move their seeds to a more pink/purple area of the garden, but this is actually my favorite grouping - much more impressive in person. I guess the good thing is the flowers are mostly gone before the red, yellow and orange blooms come.

:)
Dee

Dee they are very pretty...All of my favorite colors! It’s a shame I’ve never tried them.. my beds are so full now, I’m having a hard time finding places to plant what I have now. I guess I’ll just have to admire yours for now....

Thanks GH! It doesn't matter if I have room lol. They go where THEY want! I let them bloom then rip them out if they're in the way. I've got so many I don't worry about moving them, just yank em. I like the spring blooms so much it's worth it to me.

:)
Dee

As May draws to a close, here's another peony photo...

I just love May. We start with a couple of tulips on May 1st.

Second up is the creeping phlox (May 16th photo). This was originally 3 plants of each color but the white have really crept.

By May 24th the purple spikes of Ajuga is putting on a nice show. This beautiful purple stripe started as a left over plant near the retaining wall that refused to die even when plucked out year over year. We never saw it bloom so didn't know it did. Then one year at the gardening swap someone had brought one. We recognized it and looked it up online. After we saw it bloomed my husband dug up and brought forward the plants the came in next to the retaining wall. It only took a couple of years to get the whole front edge filled in as it really propagates it self nicely when in the sun.

Purple broom is busy attracting bumblebees. I never knew we had big giant bumblebees in the area until we planted this purple broom.

By May 28th the ice plants are starting to really show their stuff. Here is Orange and Raspberry Granita, two of my favorites. White Nugget Ice plant (at the bottom of photo is my earliest ice plant bloomer)

They are joined by Hardy Yellow ice plant and an orange helianthemum. I love rock roses for their brilliant color and long bloom cycle.

The creeping phlox are starting to fade.

Snow in Summer is starting to showcase around the fountain.

Immortality Iris is starting to show off a bit also.

June should be a good month. We have worked hard over the years to make sure we get quite a bit of color all season long and finally it is paying off.

Sorry I’m late to the party! Had some issues with my GW account and could no longer post.

Beautiful pictures and gardens, everyone! It’s so nice to look at other gardens and get inspired!

This is what I had blooming in May. I did not take many pics because I’ve been working on new garden beds, which will look very bare for a couple of years, and also redesigning two other beds because we now need privacy when we didn’t before. Most of my beds now look like work in progress so I will only post pics of what does not! :)

Sorry I’m late to the party!

You are cutting it close mazerolm with June 1st tomorrow :).