Let the Wild Rumpus Start!

"And now," cried Max, "let the wild rumpus start!"

That thrilling line from Maurice Sendak’s “Where the Wild Things Are” is the most festive declaration ever and it is my credo for my long-awaited reward for revamping a neglected garden – the chance to plant anew.

Remember my darling Heuchera ‘Plum Royale’ that I bought before I had a garden, then froze it, then saved it? Well, it is safely tucked in the ground and has some new neighbours.


Yes, we laboured over selecting trees and shrubs for this bed – and there are more decisions yet to be made there. However, I have started planting one skinny, tapering end of the bed that I know will not be having any more major structural plant material additions.

So I put my little darling, the plant I promised a garden to, in a spot I can see out my kitchen window beside a selection that Hubby picked out. His plant choice was the Athyrium Otophorum (Eared Lady Fern). The tag says it is a “smaller, more compact fern with dramatic foliage…wine red fiddleheads…fronds unfurl to silvery blue-green, accented with maroon-purple stems.”

Sounds dramatic, hey? Well, it wasn’t really. When Hubby showed it to me at the nursery in the midday sun; quite frankly, it looked rather washed out and a tad sickly in colour.

What a difference the shade makes. Particularly the dappled evening light. It pops!

So we have a gorgeous plummy plant with shiny pewter highlights on the leaves and a glowing frond dancer.

Watching over them in the background is the lovely Astible x arendsii ‘Bridal Veil’.

I think my new little garden is starting to grow!

If, like me, you enjoy seeing a gorgeous example of just how beautiful an addition to your garden the Heuchera can be, check out the very talented Northern Shade's post here.

To Beckon You into the Garden

We planted some Foxglove (Digitalis Purpurea 'Foxy') along the side of the house leading from the front of the house to the garden gate. It is a sheltered, south-facing location in dappled light from a neighbour’s nearby spruce tree.


This was another neglected garden site, with just a lonely cedar; probably a Thuja occidentalis ‘Holmstrup’, and the ubiquitous gravel that was everywhere. There was a narrow concrete sidewalk very close to the house that was bordered in rubber edging at sharp right angles which scraped my ankles more than once as I turned the corner. We took out all that gravel, concrete and rubber, trimmed the cedar and gave it a good soaking and feeding, amended the soil with generous helpings of compost and peat moss and then added a thick layer of bark mulch.

We are going to say good-bye to the right angles there and make a curvy walkway lined in stones and woodland plants, and probably a hydrangea or two, to guide visitors to our garden.

The ‘Foxy’ foxglove is a biennial that actually blooms the first season. This foxglove is hardy to USDA Zone 4a so whether it will set seedlings here will be seen next year. It really brightens up this spot and the bees are scrambling over each other to get to it. Of course, I also hear the fairie folk rather like it as well.

Two Woodland Mystery Plants

On our little field trip into the ravine the other evening, I managed to get a few pictures of some wildflowers and a flowering shrub along our trail. I looked them up in my handy guide book, Alberta Wayside Wildflowers by Linda Kershaw and published by Lone Pine Publishing (2003).

Looking up the plants was kind of exciting as it was my first time using the book for reference rather than just browsing. It was also frustrating as there were two I couldn't positively identify (at least I think I positively ID'd the rest!).

Here are my best shots at identification:

Top: native viburnum (V.trilobum) This is a cheat, really, because I got the identity of this shrub compliments of the very helpful Gardening Zone 3b

Middle (L to R): L: Anemone canadensis (Canada Anemone); Centre: unknown (a prostrate plant almost flush to the ground on a steep, mossy, shaded outcrop); R: Cornus canadensis (Bunchberry)

Bottom (L to R): L: Mertensia paniculata (Tall Bluebells) - notice the visitor in the bottom left blossom; R: unknown (the blossom looks kind of like the False Solomon's Seal and the leaves look like an Astilbe....hmmmm.

Any suggestions on the two mystery plants, savvy readers?

PS. I just have to add, I was at the Edmonton Horticultural Society meeting tonight where the guest speaker was the totally great Donna Balzer. Heard conversation between two cute white-haired gentlemen behind me:
First man: "I got six mls of rain so far - that's it!"
Second man: "A man could cry more than that!"

This is why I love gardeners -- they are all poets at heart!

Edit: I may have (at least partially!) solved the mystery of the plant in the bottom right. A look over at the excellent post on shade foliage by Northern Shade has given me the hint I needed. I think this mystery plant with the white bottlebrush flower may be a Cimicifuga simplex. I don't know if it would be a native species (I'm thinking not) or an escapee from someone's garden (more likely). Now if only I could figure out the plant in the middle with the yellow flower and most interesting leaves on spiny stems.

PPS: My guess above was wrong, Home Bug Garden solved the puzzle of the Bottom Right plant. See comments below for the answer. Many thanks to HBG!

The Evening Hush in the Woods

We went on a family walk in the nearby ravine Saturday evening. My little stream that was gushing enthusiastically in April has now quieted

A drift of starry snow from the poplar trees floats down it now

Hushing everything under its soft blanket

Now, if fairie folk still walked these woods, I think this is what they would be stuffing their duvets with for a soft summer sleep, don't you?

(My little son, enchanted by it all)

“Child of the pure, unclouded brow And dreaming eyes of wonder! Though time be fleet and I and thou Are half a life asunder, Thy loving smile will surely hail The love-gift of a fairy tale” ~ Lewis Carroll

A Subtle Beauty

I mentioned in the last post that my Dad came for a overnight visit on Father’s Day weekend and – yes – there was a garden nursery involved!

I took my Dad to Sal’s to get him a hardy rose for Father’s Day. Up against the front of his house (south-facing) he has the same tough old rugosa rose that has probably been there for twenty years or more, just blooming its heart out. You know the one, kinda magenta, about six feet tall. Tough as nails. He really likes roses but I don’t think he realized there were so many new hardy roses available that he could add to his garden.

So, while Dad picked out the Morden Fireglow to dazzle passersby his front garden, I succumbed to the temptations there and picked the subtle and sweet Morden Snowbeauty for my back garden (among a couple other treasures you shall meet soon!).

According to the Canadian Rose Society, the Morden Snowbeauty, one of the Parkland series, “is a hardy, recurrent-blooming shrub suitable for mass plantings or as a specimen. It is named for the lovely snow white flowers produced during the growing season. They are slightly fragrant, average 8 cm across, have an average of 12 petals and are produced in clusters of 3-5 flowers.”

They say the scent is slight; however, it is delectably citrusy and quite mesmerizing up close. The rose is hardy to zone 2b (I am in 3b so that is awesome) and bred to be resistant to diseases such as powdery mildew and blackspot.

This is all good news to me as I have long drooled over roses that are out of zone. I am really a bit of a romantic, I think, when it comes to my vision for the garden, and roses will definitely be a part of my sunny borders. So the fact that there are people out there working to create gorgeous, tough and hardy roses delights me. (Thanks, rose breeders! We prairie gardeners deeply appreciate you!)

Of course, besides all that good stuff, the blooms are white, which I so love, and it is so perfectly sweet, that I will find a sunny spot for it in the southwest-facing area of the yard.


Now who else can I take to the nursery? Hubby has been talking trees...hmmm!