Mears Garden news- Summer week 1- June 21, 2009

It is really and truly summer. It is also difficult to pay attention to the garden or photographs of flowers, as people are beaten or worse in Iran. I remember watching the news reports from Tiananmen Square, twenty years ago. I was getting my first daylilies just about that year. You feel engaged by the drama, but even more helpless than with the drama of our own election a year ago.
But the opposition movement in Iran has chosen green as their color, a good pick. So in the tiniest gesture, the blog goes green.

And with a little effort I will think about the garden. It can be a way to maintain the calm that is so needed. Think caladium. This humidity. Think daylilies. Think mosquitoes.

So it is summer. All of a sudden the temperatures at night are above 60. They even stayed above 70 degrees 2 nights ago. Going outside in the afternoon for 20 minutes of weeding is somehow not as attractive as it was a month ago. But my goodness, how everything is growing.

The Asiatic lilies are bursting forth. The first daylilies are blooming. A few of the caladium even have big leaves. It is time to buy impatiens on sale at the farmer’s market. Did I mention slugs?

I do have pictures for you this week.

The first picture is a native wildflower, called at least someplace, the Michigan lily. It dangles from tall stalks that increase by 1-2 each year. There are now 6-7--
Did I mention the tornado siren? I guess the Shakespeare in the park will not get through the play tonight.
Later….










The second picture is this wonderful Asiatic lily set in with the gold coreopsis.











This orange amaryllis is about the last amaryllis to bloom, since I moved them outside. A blooming amaryllis can dominate an area just the way you draw it up. Please check out the picture in the bonus section.











Finally here is the speckled Asiatic lily, Latvian Promise. Speckles are really in these days.










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In last week’s poll the Iceland poppy edged out the columbine and the pink orchid cactus. Sometime I should post the best of the Iceland poppies over the years. It would be quite the set of pictures.

For the abbreviated bonus section there is Long Stocking, which is an early spider daylily, another Asiatic lily, complete with side shot, and the first Caladium picture of the summer.
I close with the long shot of the orange amaryllis in the front parkway, dominating the scene.












































Stay cool and pray for the people of Iran.

Philip