Gingers Are Blooming

I love ginger lily plants!  They can color up a shade garden all summer long, never minding the heat.  The blooms on my 'Disney' ginger lily are seven inches tall and the plant itself is six foot.  This one is planted in shade, getting only dappled sunlight.

Curcuma, another ginger lily, also blooms all summer long.  They multiply rapidly, and should be divided more often than I do. 

My purple blooming curcumas are making me wait for their blooms, they're just getting started.

A nearly white bloom...

Hostas are blooming too...

Bleeding Heart Vines on the fence, white and purple.

My favorite new plant of this year is my Blackberry Lily, Iris Domestica.  Tiny flowers that remind me of toad lilies, about an inch and a half across.

I started these purple coneflowers from seed in February.  I'm thrilled to be getting my first blooms...

The coneflowers are planted in front of another summer bloomer, Tithonia,  Mexican Sunflower.

I'll save the rest of my blooms for a later post, and give you an update on my chickens.  They're about 12 weeks old now...half way to becoming egg layers!  We let them out to free range every evening, but 'free' has it's limitations.  No, they are not allowed in my shade gardens, but they have plenty of area to roam.

This one looks mean, but she's a sweetheart...they all are.

They rarely stand still when they're out, unless they dig up something good, so this is what most of their photos look like.

Until next time...

At last...sweet potatoes!

Today was the moment of truth...did I have sweet potatoes, or just a big mess of vines?  I've never grown them before, so I waited out the months just hoping something was happening under the tangle of foliage.  I planted 9 vines in half of a 3' x 12' bed, okra got the other half.

First peek under the vines...so exciting!  

I think it's a decent yield for a small space.

First bucket.

I've taken over my Honey's work table in his shop.  They'll cure here for a while.

This is what else is going on in my vegetable patch, which was planted Monday.  First, an array of greens...

Collards

Five different kinds of lettuce...

I also have cabbage, tomatoes, and squash planted.  I hope to get onions put in this week.

Now for some color!  I was doing a  little clean up in the shade gardens this morning, after digging the potatoes.  The coleus are so beautiful this time of year, I want to share some of my favorites.

OK, I'll stop.  I have to show you just one more...remember this little guy that seeded in a rock...I posted him in spring.

I don't know how he keeps growing, he's rooted in the moss on the rock, but here he is.

Just a few pictures of the shade gardens that are thriving in our wetter, slightly cooler, weather.

Good bye for now~happy gardening.