Six on Saturday: Latecomers and Whims

12.08.2023 - 18:13 / ramblinginthegarden.wordpress.com / Cathy

Some plants, of course, are naturally late bloomers, like asters, helenium and chrysanthemum, but what about those that ‘should’ flower from early summer, but don’t? I am rather disappointed with the annual Chinese aster, callistephus (above), this year, as it is only just coming into bloom, especially as this variety, C ‘Duchess Blue’ is such a glorious shade. I am also growing C ‘Hulk’, which I think may be a greenish flower, which is even tardier. I have only grown these once before and was disappointed with their short flowering period, so with delayed flowering to take on boar too I might not bother again.

I had almost forgotten about Ammi visnaga ‘Green Mist’, sown in early March and planted out in May, until it began developing flowerheads:

Clematis texensis ‘Gravetye Beauty’, however, is always far later to flower than other clematis here, and never flowers particularly well. I was coming to the conclusion that it may not be in a sunny enough position, affected by the shadow of the house, but when it reaches the horizontal support it does seem to receive a good dose of sunshine and, this year, it now has a relatively generous sprinkling of blooms:

Having tried growing various monarda (bee balm) over the years, without success, I was pleased to finally have blooms a couple of years ago on the one below. Sadly, it didn’t repeat this last year, so it was a surprise to have first a plant and then blooms this year, albeit rather later than expected. It is not the most gainly of plants though, and might look better surrounded by other plants instead of a corner of border location, although it was in line for total removal until it bloomed!

Our blackberries vary considerably in when they ripen, with picking beginning early