Fall in love with August
Unless you take the time to sit and observe, you might never see the bee ballet in the garden
August observations in the garden.
I used to cut the flowers off hostas because they’re mundane. Unless you have fragrant ones or types of hostas bred for bigger flowers, then the small, pale blooms sort of wreck the regal foliage.
But now I see bees zipping in and out of the tubular shaped flowers, like Fed Ex trucks at a loading dock. So bees need a break and the hosta flowers will remain.
Unless you take the time to sit and observe, you might never see the bee ballet in the garden. I’m as guilty as anyone of scanning the garden like a Twitter feed. Such rapid assessments will never take in the drama unfolding among the leaves.
Some of us can get pretty excited about seed pods. The best in my garden are found on the perennial Baptisia australis, commonly called blue false indigo. It’s not enough that this plant has gorgeous blue flowers in June, virtually no pests, and is among the longest-lived in the garden. In August, it also rewards us with shapely, charcoal black seed pods. As the seeds start to dry inside, they get loose, and the pod rattles when shaken. In fact, in olden times, kids did use the pods as rattles.
I always cut a few and keep them in a vase all winter. And just once in about 30 years, I got a new seedling from the mother plant. False indigo takes roughly three years to produce its first flowers but after that, it will be a mainstay in the garden. If you happen upon seed, it can be scattered in the garden in the fall, and maybe you will get a plant and maybe not.
It’s hard to tear yourself away from the garden in August. I’m writing this in the backyard and watching bees and birds at the same time. There are a lot of interesting birds around right now. I see them in my garden and hear about them via a Hamilton birders group. How else would I know there are great egrets just across the harbour right now? Between the wildlife watching and the lounging opportunities, the garden casts a powerful spell.
So I was neglecting my neighbourhood stroll until yesterday, when I went out to take inventory of what’s new.
On James North, a man with a very inventive garden has a new feature: a little kids’ car planted with annuals. It looks like a Mustang, and it’s quite suited to trailing sweet potato vine and asparagus fern. He was out when I passed by and inquired about the new feature. “It was my wife’s idea,” he said.
A favourite garden on Simcoe Street featured pots full of begonias, calla lilies and coleus. Another garden was dominated by big perennial hibiscus with pink flowers and purple foliage.
It’s always intriguing to see what people recycle for a new purpose in the garden. This week’s find was an old wooden chair repurposed as a planter for geraniums.
Now the focus turns to other specialties of the August garden. Perennial hibiscus, hydrangeas and two more perennials with great attraction for bees and butterflies: Joe Pye Weed, which is not a weed, and Japanese anemones. The anemones are tall and willowy and will produce flowers into the fall.
But let’s not talk about fall yet, when we can fall in love with August.