Overnight last Thursday, Friday and Saturday we had below freezing temperatures and woke to frosty white lawns and leaves, not to mention petals on the remaining garden flowers. It’s much warmer this week but the damage has been done, and although Calendula and Antirrhinum (Snapdragons) have held their own, the Zinnias, Salvia, strawflowers and Dahlias have all succumbed.
I was kinda thrilled that a Dahlia I’ve been waiting all summer to bloom finally fully opened – just the day before that first frost! ‘Verda’ is an almost all white semi-cactus variety; in a year with more rain it would likely have a much larger bloom, but I’m really tickled to see it at all. I cut it, as you may notice, a day too late – some of these petals are wilting from frost death. Joining it are two additional Dahlia varieties – the mini ball yellow ‘Ferncliffe Spice’ and the orangey, yellow, mauveish ‘Ferncliff Tropic.’
Cathy, at Rambling in the Garden, encourages home gardeners to showcase a vase of cut flowers every Monday. My vase this week is new to me, a pressed glass bubble vase I found at a local vintage shop. I put it in a window for these photos, thinking the sunshine might look interesting coming through those bubbles. Not sure I succeeded, but hope everyone has a great week!
County Gardening 