NHBabs, the butterflies have arrived here, too. I brought many indoors to finish growing and have several chrysali now. Last year I saw so few I think it was less than ten. This year is much better. Beautiful picture with the JPW. Yours is pinker than mine. Overall, my mums seem to struggle, and I don’t know why. Yours look fantastic.

I’ll post some photos I put on other threads. Actaea/bugbane is almost ready to bloom in front of Aralia Sun King. My burnet has just started blooming.

The gardens look lovely! Deanna, the butterflies are RTHawk’s, not mine. I tried several times to load a photo, but had no luck with it. I will try again today.

Calico aster is filling the small field we walk through every day.

The flowers are tinybut prolific. For scale, the dog is only 20 lbs.

My garden is a big hot, dry, flopped-over mess. At this point I'm enjoying the little spots of color that pop up here and there and trying to avoid the "big picture" lol.

Took these today. Apologies if some are blurry - quite windy here before the rain moves in tonight!

First bloom on dahlia Lora Ashley. Some bug is enjoying it as much as I am.

Cosmos Cupcakes

Cosmos Sea Shells

Zinnia Benary's Giant Bright Pink

Zinna Queen Lime Blush (minus most of the blush lol)

Strawflowers or paper daisies (always mix these two up!)

No matter how much they flop, I'm STILL enjoying my rudbeckia triloba. I like to call this a cascade, not a flop lol.

Looking back here, I notice two things. One, I seem to have a lot of pink in my garden! I do, but it's not all pink, trust me lol. Two, the not-so-great camera on my phone really doesn't capture the colors of these blooms.

:)

Dee

Dee, I love Cosmos and Zinnias but can't seem to grow them without powdery mildew.

Deanna, that Cimicifuga with the Aralia Sun King is a fabulous combo!

RTHawk, I'm sorry I looked incorrectly at the butterfly and mum source! Right now I have one caterpillar inside and seven chrysali. One caterpillar had tachinid wasp eggs in him. The remaining seven look fine for now.

Dee, all your pinks are beautiful! I cannot grow zinnias, so I am jealous. Any photos of zinnias are always so nice to see. I keep hoping for Rudbeckia triloba. I finally got good germination this year and have had NO time to plant the seedlings. What a weird year.

Thanks for the compliment, Sue!

A few September shots...

Ligularia Britt Marie Crawford with Aralia Sun King and Aralia Silver Umbrellas.

Allium senescens glaucum and Sedum Autumn Charm

Monarch on Tithonia

Physostegia Variegata

Caryopteris Summer Sorbet finally available at Broken Arrow again after a many year hiatus.

Our fire pit project is coming along. Still much back breaking work to do.

I didn't get a photo, but I was surprised to see a rhodie bloom today! The rhodie already bloomed this spring, but there was one little purple bloom. Odd!

:)

Dee

Dee, I have one white rhody that has put out a few fall blooms for the last three or four years. I don't know if it did before that and I just didn't notice, or what. That was around the time I did some much needed pruning to reduce legginess, etc. It's so weird. It also probably explains why the spring bloom is not as dense as other rhodies!

Sue, what is the plant with dark foliage and red flowers with the Caryopteris? All photos and plant pairings are beautiful, for sure!

Deanna, that is a Dahlia Mystic Sparkler. The flowers are actually dark pink with a yellow eye. It's very showy.

Looks like I haven't posted to September at all. Well, I usually have something to post. I normally have a lot of Chrysanthemums, but I took a lot of them out in the spring, thinking I would leave them potted and wait for them to bloom and add them back in. But some insect had a field day with them and not sure they are even salvagable.

Still have some roses blooming, and grasses that have loved all the rain. Sedums. not a heck of a lot else. Everything does look very green and in good shape to go into winter. I would love to be starting to renovate beds and prepare for the spring, but I've pulled some muscles in my arm and shoulder and starting PT tomorrow. Of course, it's on my dominant side too.

Sue, looks like you are already hard at work at projects. That fire pit looks like it's going to be great! Didn't expect to see Alliums blooming with Sedums. Nice. And Monarchs on the Tithonia. I'm not seeing many and last year I had a lot on an Aster that is just opening.

Dee, that Queen Lime Blush is very different coloring for a zinnia. I like it. And the shading and coloring on that Dahlia is very pretty.

Babs, that has to be the smallest Aster flower I've seen. [g] I'm thinking it's native and beneficial for pollinators this time of year.

Deanna, nice stand of Bugbane. I love the dark foliage.

RTHawk, that's a lot of berries on your Winterberry! With all the rain, we have a lot more berries than normally. Gray Dogwood produces white berries, which haven't turned white yet and we have Aronia that are still green. What has really surprised me is the Taxus - a TON of berries all over it and normally if there are a handful on the whole shrub, I'm surprised.

And some rebloom on the Hibiscus that I thought was done for the season, that I posted on another thread.

That's about it. Not a lot to show. I may have some Mums in a few weeks that open late and that should be about it for the season.

PM, the Allium is one of my favorites, A. senescens glaucum which blooms later in the season. The foliage is bluish and slightly curly.

Which Hydrangea is that with the Hibiscus? I love the colorful way the flowers are fading. What a perfect combo with the sedum and the Hibiscus.

I bought this cutting of Brugmansia Charles Grimaldi in late June at an end of season greenhouse sale. Years ago I grew one until it got too big for me to move in and out any more. Love it and the fragrance at night is intoxicating.

Salvia uliginosa is the perfect shade of blue. And it reseeds.

Migrating Hummingbirds are enjoying this Cuphea growing in a container out on the garden. Soon they will be gone for the season which always makes me sad.

This thread has some beautiful combinations and vignettes! I think I will need to revisit as I plan for next season!

Sue, that is Little Lime from Proven Winners. I have a 2nd one that was from Bluestone and I notice a difference and I like this one better.

Years ago when I first tried winter sowing someone sent me seed for Brugmansia and I seem to remember they sprouted from winter sowing. I know I grew them one season. That is a pretty one you have there. I remember how fragrant they are. They are said to be pretty toxic though, right? I think some recommend gloves to handle them. With our little puppy, who puts everything in her mouth, we've being overly cautious of toxic plants. Not that I've been growing them anyway, just info for anyone unaware of that.

That really is a very pretty blue on that Salvia. Will that come back for you? What is behind it, an orange coneflower?

I’m very jealous of your Cuphea. I still have 3 plants but they don’t look half that good and I haven’t seen a hummer in over a month. What variety is that? It looks nicer than the Vermillionaire I have. Either that or yours is just growing better. [g] What do you fertilize your containers with? Will you bring a lot of your container plants in for the winter?

We just had a downpour this morning. Good timing, I might have needed to water a few things this morning otherwise. I haven't emptied my rain barrels once this season.

CT zone 7a - new blooms on hydrangea, a first for me this late in season. So much rain!

The best monarch pic I’ve taken and it wasn’t in the new butterfly garden.

First year from plugs and the New England Asters are big. I am alreasy expanding this area to give more space for the native plants. It is filled with all sorts of bees this week.

And one of my 5 morning glory “towers” - I just love them!

PM2, yes, Brugmansias are toxic but so are many plants. I've never used gloves to handle them but when I had dogs I only grew them outside of the dog's fenced area. Same with Castor Beans. The salvia behaves as a gently reseeding annual here. A month or two ago I moved a couple of plants from the front garden to the back in an attempt to get another crop of seedlings next spring.

I went out and checked the tag on the Cuphea and it is Vermillionaire. It looks like a regular Cuphea ignea to me so I guess Vermillionaire is just yet another example of Proven Winners taking a regular widely grown plant and tagging it with a cultivar name so they can sell it for more $$. I feed my containers every couple of weeks with water soluble fertilizer at half strength. Some of the container plants will come in, mostly the ones that are hard to find. The rest will become part of the compost pile.

Nice pictures Brdrl! Great capture on the monarch. I grow Aster October Skies in a few areas of the garden and despite a hard prune in June, it still fills a three foot circle.

Jurassic corner is really taking off. Fingers crossed that an early frost doesn't take this out.

Echinacea Green Twister is a new acquisition. Love the flowers on this one.

Containers take center stage this time of year.

Hydrangea Bobo and friemds.

Sue

Sue, You’re right, so many plants are toxic, once you start looking. I’m just focused on those that cause the most serious problems, like death. [g] Taxus was a big surprise that is on the top ten list. I don’t know where Brugs and Castor Beans fall.

The last dog we had, I never had to think about it. She never paid any attention to the plants or shrubs in the yard, except for borage. The new dog, even goes under the shrubs and starts chewing on the lower branches. [g] But now that she is a year old, she’s not as bad as she was as a young puppy. I am hoping she will grow out of it or get bored. Lol

I LOVE that photo of your tropical corner. The Brugsmania fit there perfectly. They look like a line of bells getting ready to ring. The flowers are such a pretty color and so big! A very inviting corner. And pretty red grass in your container.

Love the Jurrasic Corner, both the name and how it looks!

Jurassic Corner is fantastic!

PM, your aster (Alma Potschke?) looks wonderful. Mine are VERY floppy. The native asters are upright, but my AP are bending way over. I'm not sure why. My Raydons Favorite asters and mums are slow to bloom now. Also, your sedum is beautiful! I had sedums in NH, but I did not like the rusty color, like they died trying. Yours have a soft pink that I'd love to have in fall! Your roses really are rewarding you! You've encouraged me to plant some, and I must say your blooms in September are amazing!

Brdrl, I had more monarch this year than last year, which is encouraging, even if this years were still only a few. Thanks for sharing your photos.

I tried to post this photo earlier, but Houzz isn't making it easy. Sue said containers are taking center stage, and it's the same here. I do believe I prefer shade containers over sun now. The plants don't seem to get overtaxed due to excessive blooming and look healthy well into fall. I love the color combos for shade plants now, too. The begonias in the little pot in front are actually about five plants that I grew from seed and they are just now blooming. After this winter indoors they should be much bigger for next year.

Deanna - Thanks, I love Alma Potschke. I am disappointed though that it’s more of a purple than a pink, which is what I thought AP was. But - that’s where my disappointment ends. It’s about 5ft tall at this point, covered with flowers quivering wtih bees for the past couple of weeks and some butterflies as well. It makes me feel so good to see how much late season food it supplies for pollinators.

Yes, mine is floppy too. It was erect until it started to flower and was rained on repeatedly. Last year and this year, I’ve thought I should have provided some support. It’s a little much to expect a plant that tall to stand erect on it’s own. Last year after it started flopping I just put one stake hidden down around the edge and tied some string around the whole thing. That worked fine. Then I forgot to give it some support this year.

It was really large though, so I divided it in the spring. Potted up two divisions and left one in the ground. The one in the ground is just as large as it was before I divided it after one season. [g] Meanwhile I just planted the other two divisions, so now I’ll have 2x more of them for the bees next year. I have a couple of other asters that I don’t remember the name of and they are floppy too and very airy, delicate flowers but like a cloud of them. I like them, I just wish I could figure out how to use them better.

I have always enjoyed Sedums because they are succulent, so easy, bullet proof and stay neat and tidy and healthy looking all season but you hit the nail on the head for the only thing about them I don’t enjoy - the rusty color of the blooms once they peak. If they would just stay that nice rosy color for more than a week. [g] That soft pink color in my photo is fleeting. I can easily post a photo when it gets to the rusty color so you know mine are no different.

The roses seem to still have a couple of buds on them. Julia Child looks finished. Prairie Sunrise still has 2 open blooms and a half dozen buds on it and Savannah and Beverly have shot up these 8ft tall canes and have a couple of buds on them still. Savannah last year, also had a pretty color change to the foliage when it got cold. I am enjoying them. And Beverly, after I thought it was dead and it didn’t show growth until late June, has had a great season and never saw a healthier rose bush. So I’m happy with them. The climber New Dawn on my fence really only blooms once. I also have Penelope rose mixed in with it and one of those is producing red hips right now. It is a tangled mess there right now and a lot of pruning due in the spring.

I usually have a pretty good showing of leftover blooms in September and expect to have a few more in October. I’ll try to keep posting them so you can see how late they keep flowering.

I’ll want to hear what you decide for a rose for next year. A fun project to figure out over winter.

Love those Begonias! One of my favorites and have tried many times to use them as a houseplant but, can never get the humidity right.