Six on Saturday – 28MAY2022 – Mosquitos

I don’t haven any photos of mosquitos – I’d just like you to visualize them. Stepping outside early in the morning, mug of coffee in hand, wandering through the kitchen garden and flower beds, reaching down to pluck away a dandelion about to scatter seed amongst the Iris, and, at the same time, scratch your leg, because there’s an itch, and you see the cause of the itch. One, two, no – three, jurassic size mosquitos right below your knee (because you’re wearing shorts, of course, it’s such a lovely morning), happily sucking out your blood.

Well.

You learn quickly to wear long sleeves and long pants with the cuffs tucked into your socks if there’s any sort of gardening to be done before a rising sun drives the whiny insects into the cool woods. But venture forth gardeners (and photographers) do, long sleeves, bug spray and all, because at this time of the year something new is blooming every day, and there’s seldom enough hours in each day to do and see everything you really want to do and see.

That said, Six on Saturday is a gardener’s meme hosted by The Propagator – if you visit his site you’ll see gorgeous gardens from around the world. Here’s a bit of my garden this week.

The large Allium have started now, including Purple Sensation (in the feature photo at the top) and Mount Everest.

I love how just a few Ipheion will, in just a few years, multiply into a glorious mass of starry blooms. Not only that, but their seed seems to be carried by insects of some sort because they’re appearing here and there over a wide part of the garden now.

Siberian and various bearded Iris have also started.

Whereas these charming (but highly invasive in some circumstances) violas have been blooming for several weeks now, peeking through tall grass in a rather wild part of the yard.

Two beds in the kitchen garden – the herb bed, on the left, with lots of lettuce along with tarragon, dill, basils, oregano and a lone strawberry. The garlic bed, with jalapenos along the edges and spinach staged in the middle. (We had the spinach for the first time at dinner last night – Tasty!)

My Shasta Viburnum (Viburnum plicatum f. tomentosum ‘Shasta‘) is looking better and better every year. Last year there was a single lacecap flower, this year there are a few dozen. Have a great weekend everyone!