Even though I’m the main instigator, this late-season crescendo of growth astonishes me.
While the garden has morphed into a late-season mosh pit, there has been one summer-long standout that still rises above and coolly surveys the garden’s autumnal slugfest: Verbascum roripifolium, sown spring 2023. A verbascum that flowers in a towering cloud, not a spire, and has been described by plant nurseries variously as an annual, biennial. Three of the five sown spring 2023 bloomed gloriously summer 2023, never to return. Two plants out of five sown in spring 2023 did not bloom the first year, kept basal growth in winter, and have been in bloom all spring/summer/fall 2024, which makes them…what? A little long in the tooth for a biennial. Short-lived perennial? It must be this confusion as to its lifespan and handling that costs this wonderful plant more popularity. And because it’s as kinetic as a Calder mobile, photography is worthless for advertising its charms.
Unlike last year, when I selectively cut back stuff as it got battered by winter storms, I’ll be closing the door on this garden as it exists now, leaving it to wildlife and the elements, until I see it again in spring. Next post will be coming from Long Beach, where a mess awaits me there as surely as one will await me in Oregon in spring — thank goodness small gardens make small messes! I’ve always been drawn to the Japanese fairy tale The Boy Who Drew Cats, with the life-saving instruction “Avoid large spaces, keep to the small,” and that admonition has served me on many levels. (Except in spider season, when wider pathways in the garden would be a welcome luxury.) The monster in the story is a giant rat that rules an abandoned temple where an outcast boy takes shelter one dark stormy night. Having been ostracized for preferring drawing to “serious” pursuits, the boy reflexively covers the temple walls with drawings of cats to soothe himself to sleep. When the fearsome and murderous rodent appears in the night to dispatch the sleeping boy…well, once again the power of art saves a child. Just as the power of gardens has saved me time and time again. Take care, AGO
I love the story and Twynings After Eight. Will have to look for that one. There is something about the overgrown and occasionally battered look of the garden in the Fall that I find quite charming. Despite some flaws it really is quite beautiful. How fun is it to be able to garden in two very different climates.
South to Long Beach, that sounds like the perfect plan, got an extra bedroom? I look forward to seeing your future reports on that garden, as well as seeing how this one looks in the spring. Ah spring… can’t come soon enough for me.
As for those huge spiders, yesterday I dispatched two gargantuan ones that were planning to hitch a ride into the house with the bromeliads. No.
I love that story! (Was the giant rat orange by any chance?) Your end-of-season garden looks spectacular. An 8-foot tall Persicaria! A Szechuan Salvia! As to the spiders, there’s no path that allows us to avoid them here – heck, one has built a web that spans the driveway entrance here! I look forward to seeing posts from your Long Beach garden, whatever awaits.