Happy Friday!
It seems too soon for it to be the last day of June! Are you ready for July?
Today is Flower Friday. This year many of our gardeners have been facing challenges: drought in some areas, excessive rain fall in others but this week both Barb and Sue reminds us that there are predators to our lovely flowers too!
Barb said that the other day she was drinking her coffee when she spied a deer only 3 feet outside her window. They have eaten everything in her garden and nothing has deterred them this year. Could be the drought but also I should add, Barb lives near me. The only thing they left this year were these pretty Love in a Mist flowers:
Sue, who lives in a more rural area, shared this photo of false sunflower. It is growing inside the fenced vegetable garden:
Also in Sue's vegetable garden is this rudbeckia. She thinks it looks punky, perhaps because of the drought. I agree. I actually pulled a pretty sick looking plant from my garden yesterday.
Sue said everything outside the fenced garden has been devoured by what she refers to as "the hooved rodents."
Years ago, we had a trio of deer grazing through our gardens and we actually got photos of them. It was 3 p.m. and they didn't seem to care about the traffic. They were more interested in everyone's roses.
I'm not sure why we aren't seeing more here but we do have foxes in the neighborhood and that might be the deterrent. I just wish they would go back to the woods and the city parks and eat there!
Over here in our garden, we have two lace-cap hydrangeas that seeded in the garden. I had intended to give them to neighbors before the drought. Now we will wait until the fall. I call them "the twins" because one is blue and one is pink. They are growing side by side but it illustrates how different a soil can be throughout the garden (pink is more alkaline; blue is more acidic).
And in the back, some of the hydrangeas have bloomed and the butterfly bushes are just beginning:
Barb had written to me that she was looking forward to seeing blooms from successful gardeners. I wouldn't call it success but just dumb luck that the deer haven't discovered us (*knock wood*).
Wishing you a safe and happy holiday!
Your cottage garden looks lovely! Lots of pretty color. We don't have deer here, but some kind of bugs want to eat things in my garden. I planted new marigolds because something ate all the little ones that had reseeded themselves, and now they're eating the new ones!
ReplyDeleteWow what a beautiful garden! Thanks for sharing these photos as I enjoy them so much. Your blooms are far ahead of mine. The deer only eat one kind of hosta here luckily. I've noted it is the same one the ground hogs likes. I've not known either of them to eat flowers as such. We are still enduring that smoky air which is awful in so many ways.
ReplyDeleteLovely garden. We had a doe in our garden last night...first I have ever seen that close in our yard. So far, it was interested in our bird feeder, and left the flowers alone.
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