One thing is for sure, even if it is a droughty spring: If there will be rain at all, it will happen during peony season!
The recent three short rain events, each about three-eighths of an inch or less, were still enough to severely bow many plants, floppy from lack of moisture. Think xeriscaping going forward.
Summer is here
The annual summer solstice occurs on June 21, which means that summer is officially here. Now our planet begins its journey away from the sun. Energetically, the high point of the year is passing. There is a shift, which the cells of all living things under the sun sense. We with complex brains may be less able to chime with the change; nonetheless it is occurring.
Daylight begins to slowly diminish. Plants in gardens that have bloomed begin to ripen the seeds and fruits of those flowers. Soft green growth begins to harden off. Hens go broody. How is it possible, just when summer is here, that we start to lose it?
Flowery times
In the garden, as things are starting to look pretty good, it is time to step in to assure that they remain that way. The list of tasks and pleasures for gardeners is lengthy.
Deadheading continues apace in the wake of flowering. I love how chives have their very decorative moment, pink pompoms adding color to herb gardens and attracting varied pollinators with nectar. The pollinators’ work being done, now is time to chop chives back to ensure a continuing crop of tender green culinary leaves, and preventing tenacious little chive seedlings everywhere.
Alliums add to gardens ornamentally. The RHS June Plant Review contains an overview of smaller alliums, “Enticing Little Onions,” and I appreciated Andrew Bunting’s description of Swarthmore’s “Allium Invasion” in the June 2 Swarthmorean.
These spring-flowering bulbs in (mostly) lilac to purple to white are growing in popularity, due to their lack of appeal to deer and rabbits, and their very stylish appearance — towering, like space objects — as they provide elegant punctuation to garden beds.
Check fall bulb catalogues for the wide array of ornamental alliums. One drawback (apart from the expense of some, such as ‘Globemaster,’) is that their straplike foliage begins to die down before the flowers fully develop. Plant at the back, or screen them where other elements of the garden provide camouflage: e.g., spring-flowering nepeta, daylilies, Siberian irises, or peonies. However, even when flowers have gone by, their decorative value remains: They may be left standing for some time before needing removal.
A lovely color combo in gardens with spring blues, purples, and lavenders comes from the soft yellow spikes of Digitalis grandiflora, the perennial foxglove. Not only does it, like the alliums, lack appeal to deer and rabbits, but it also self-sows, though never invasively.
Once established, D. grandiflora creates drought-tolerant drifts that make a vertical statement. These continue to send up additional spikes intermittently throughout the season if groomed. It usually stands about 30 inches tall, sometimes taller, with soft yellow, tubular flowers, like biennial foxgloves, with interior brown netting, and narrow, soft green leaves.
Woodland and shade gardens with partial sun suit it, but perennial foxglove may also be grown in the open. Seedlings are easy to move into desired positions, but mature plants are best left in place. As with many perennial plants that self-sow freely, perennial foxglove is fairly short-lived; compare columbine, Verbena bonariensis, and gloriosa daisy.
I used to recommend deadheading rhododendrons and lilacs. If you have time, I still recommend grooming rhododendrons, but have gotten over lilacs, in recognition of lilac borer problems here. Making pruning cuts or deadheading lilacs during lilac-borer flight season releases the scent that attracts the borer females.
Lilac borer is a wasp-mimic moth that scents out lilacs to lay its eggs in. Eggs produce grubs that live protected in larger trunks, eating away at the lilac tissue. This causes reduced vigor, reduced flowering, and eventually dieback of the affected parts. Read more here: bit.ly/MiteGuide.
Buddleia and vitex: What happened?
The mild winter here on the Island encouraged plants to break dormancy early. The odd category of half-hardy/sub-shrub that includes buddleia and vitex is particularly vulnerable to late frost, which happened with the astonishing, negative-zero event of early March.
In one client garden with five buddleia, we are still waiting: Only two have sprouted from the crown. In another garden with both buddleia and vitex, the buddleia is sprouting from the crown and the vitex is slowly — very slowly — leafing out spottily along the branches. If new buddleia growth appears, old dead stalks may be cut away — otherwise, remove.
Water is life
Garden plants are in the overdrive that comes from ideal temperatures and abundance of light. Go out and watch that zucchini “adding cells” before your eyes! Dahlias too, are shooting up. They require water; we all require water.
Martha’s Vineyard, however, appears to be in an amplifying weather pattern that was first noticed in the Nineties: weather systems that contain rain miss us, passing the Island by. Xeriscaping in gardens seems like the new normal.
Mentioning limiting factors seems to be anathema in our culture. Reiterating annoying information, I remind all that our Island water comes from the sky. The mythic underground river from the White Mountains does not exist.
Rampant uncontrolled growth in development and rampant water usage mean that those water resources are under pressure in novel, modern ways: more people, more flushing, more irrigation, more luxury homes with multiple water-consumption requirements, more toxic substances (pesticides, fertilizers, herbicides, fungicides, antibiotics, outright carcinogens) added to the flow.
And more apparently suffering from nature-deficit disorder, lacking comprehension about how things work, especially in closed systems such as islands, and lacking the willingness to accept Water resources are not limitless. Sure, down-Island towns may meter water usage, but paying for it does not produce it. Before someone offers to barge it from the Great Lakes or lasso an Antarctic iceberg, can we please be appreciative and protective of water resources? They are not limitless.
