Good morning, and it's preparation time. Welcome to Saturday Morning Garden Blogging.
Denver has been enjoying beautiful early fall weather this week. We were pretty warm early on — the highs were in the mid-80s. However, on Wednesday and Thursday clouds and rain rolled in, bringing high temperatures down into the 60s, and blessing us with a half-inch of rain.
And the nights have cooled — lows have been in the high 40s to mid 50s, just where they should be.
We've had some good eating with the tomatoes, zucchetta and romanesco broccoli — and the dwarf honey dew melons. From the intertubes I learned that, starting in mid-August, I needed to cut way back on watering them. With a little experience, I learned that, when they are well ripe, the rind will start cracking a bit. In the last couple of weeks they've been coming on slowly, and yesterday evening I picked seven of them. The smaller ones are about the size of a softball, and the larger ones about double that size. I also learned that they're better if they sit on the counter for a day or two after picking — the rinds will have a slight bit of give when they are fully, perfectly ripe: when cut, the seeds fall out, the flesh is sweet and supple, but not mushy. The melons are a great success, and I definitely will keep finding room for them. Next year, though, I want to get them growing earlier so we have ripe ones in August, rather than September.
With the weather cooling down I've been planning on what plants need to be moved.
First up is the Blue Fortune Agastache. If you read the description, it's supposed to be 36" high by 18" wide.
This is definitely a case of YMMV. The 18" wide is fairly accurate. The height? Not so much. Mine must really love where it's at, because it's over five feet tall — way too tall for where it is. So it's going to go into the back yard where it can fight it out with some other really tall plants — a ten foot helianthus, clary sages and hollyhocks.
The Mister observed that a whirling butterflies gaura was starting to overshadow the calamintha nepata nepata. I think the gaura will swap places with one of the herbaceous peonies.
I had planned on moving the peony in any event for a couple of reasons: it's become overwhelmed by plumbago, and the only way to get the plumbago out of there is to dig the peony; and the two herbaceous peonies are too close together and I want to split up that springtime blooming action. Finally, the gaura will provide some much-needed height to that area of the beds in mid-to-late summer.
Near the front porch the bed has become overrun with volunteer Jupiter's beard and lavender. Lavender and Jupiter's beard makes a really nice combination, so I'm going to move some of the Jupiter's beard to the redstone planter boxes in the parking strip where I already have several lavenders. The volunteer lavender and more of the Jupiter's beard will go into a spot in the back beds that's somewhat dull and sparsely planted.
That's what's happening here. What's going on in you garden?