The garden is quieter, and I am busier, so this Wildflower Wednesday instead of focusing only on South African wildflowers as I usually do – I bring you whatever is yelling ME ME in my garden. First our locals. The garden remains in a blue mood. Swathes of Plectranthus spires, on which the tiny flowers spiral around, keep on giving, defying the summer heat as it rolls in with warnings from the weatherman of Hot and Uncomfortable.
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| Plectranthus neochilus |
My signature blue sage begins to turn blue. Here the flowers come in a double hierarchy. First in neatly matched pairs, with the pairs borne on a trellis of branchlets up the main stem.
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| Blue sage |
Christmas advances with Agapanthus in her arms. Altho these flowers will probably be faded and gone with ‘I’m dreaming of a White Christmas’. They do provide a cool welcome along the gratefully afternoon shaded path to our front door.
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| Agapanthus |
Another Christmas promise is our pompom tree Dais cotonifolia. Gets a little flustered and thirsty in Porterville, as it comes from the summer rainfall East side of South Africa. ‘It has been cultivated in Europe since 1764’ – Keith Coates Palgrave’s Trees of Southern Africa. Those pink balls have a light fragrance, but the jasmine turns my head as I pass.
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| Dais cotonifolia |
My Hypoxis rooperi was chosen and planted for the three ranks of long leaves. Starry yellow flowers are a generous bonus.
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| Hypoxis rooperi |
Karoo Rose was just showing off, but pride comes before fall. November is running with extreme weather. Gale force Southeaster ripped off some roofs in Monte Bertha last night.
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| Karoo Rose |
In a pot of bulbs from my neighbour Betty, I was surprised by this! Maltese cross or Jacobean lily, comes from Mexico, but the Latin name is Sprekelia formosissima (Formosa is an earlier name for Taiwan). Maltese Cross is for me, first the name of a rock formation in the Cederberg, near Driehoek and the Cape mountain leopards.
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| Maltese Cross |
The edibles in our garden are all foreign. Granadilla (I will learn to spell that Spanish) means little pomegranate. Comes from South America.
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| Granadilla |
While the garden has colour, I need to fill vases. On my to do list, once the wind drops.
Pictures and words
by Diana of Elephant's Eye
- wildlife gardening in Porterville,
near Cape Town in South Africa
(If you mouse over brown text, it turns shriek pink. near Cape Town in South Africa
Those are my links.)
the tour of your garden is like a breath of fresh air, its a blizzard here and so cold! Chocolat is so cute, thankyou for sharing your slice of heaven
ReplyDeleteI am so enjoying posts from where it is summer! Today here in Italy it was defiantely the first day of winter; an icy wind and rain, then even when the rain stopped. the cold remained. I like the lilly, a lovely pure colour and an interesting form. Christina
ReplyDeleteI have never seen that Maltese Cross or Jacobean lily before. Yours is sooo nice! There is a herbaceous perennial called Maltese Cross that I grow (not very well) that has the same colouring and the flowers are cross shaped.
ReplyDeleteWonderful to see your beautiful summer flowers while we are freezing in a heavy frost! Love your maltese cross, what a beautiful flower, we will just have to enjoy all your flowers while our gardens are rather bare!
ReplyDeleteWe have just entered winter here in London, it is bitterly cold and we are expecting frost tonight. Looking at the photos from your garden makes me smile and long for the summer. The Sprekelia formosissima was new to me, had to look it up. Looks like it won't survive most winters in my garden, shame, it's gorgeous, would have loved to have a few!
ReplyDeleteI love your pussycat, Diana, and I love the vibrancy of your garden, especially as I too face a summer ahead, and need to deal with rainfall and blazing sun issues.
ReplyDeleteCan you really see the Elephant's Eye from your garden? It's amazing, an amazing piece of scenery.
We do see the Elephant's Eye as we sit on the verandah. But only in winter, does the low sun throw the shadow that opens the eye. Trees and houses obscure the lower slopes. My header picture is taken from the farm at the edge of town.
DeleteAgapanthus at Christmas! Great. I plant I want to use, but know I never can.
ReplyDeleteAww, what a lovely photo of Chocolat.
ReplyDeleteMy agapanthus haven't flowered yet, the miniature ones are just starting to send up flower stalks.
V. jealous of your "lavender" sage with the mountain background.
ReplyDeleteI was imagining having agapanthus around Christmas time. What a wonderful thing that would be. I would fill loads of vases with them with red ribbons. That would be a fun tradition!
ReplyDeleteCrazy that spring is Christmas. I mean...I understand it....it's just so interesting to me:) Whenever a cat rolls around on the floor, I have a hard time resisting the cute factor:) That Pomegranate is quite different from ours here in Tucson. I'm curious about the flavor. Enjoy!
ReplyDeletethe granadilla will wrinkle and turn purply-brown as it ripens. Passionfruit? MUCH easier to spell.
DeleteSo beautiful..and so nice to be reminded of gorgeous flowers at this time of year!
ReplyDeleteSo lovely to see all your colorful blooms--my garden is now brown and gray:) Chocolat is a beauty!
ReplyDeleteYour Southeaster sounds like our Noreaster this time of year...roaring wind but wow yours is fierce...such lovely flowers and so hard to think of Christmas in a summer garden...I have always wanted to travel the world during Christmas to see how it is celebrated all over...hard to imagine it without snow.
ReplyDeleteMy Swiss Ungardener agrees Christmas should have snow. Usually the Southeaster in Porterville is a gentle afternoon breeze.
DeleteIt's nice to see your lovely Christmas bloomers! I have considered planting agapanthus here. There were some beautiful specimens in a local nursery earlier this year. I rejected them, thinking of the pitiful agapanthus in a friend's garden, wondering if they were doomed to look like that for me, too. But yours are are so beautiful. I must reconsider again next year.
ReplyDeletepitiful Agapanthus? Guilty. Until I realised that they expect summer rainfall, so need watering now for those flowers.
DeleteThe Aggies are looking fabulous this year, here in my garden too. Much taller than usual, wonderfully long stems. Love the Maltese Cross flower.
ReplyDeleteI also have Plectranthus neochilus in flower in the garden at the moment. I love them.
ReplyDeleteTrust a cat to find the most comfortable spot in the garden. At least it is a pile of hay and not a beautiful clump of living grass that ends up squashed flat over the summer as in my garden
ReplyDeleteThe Maltese Cross is very beautiful - I like spidery flowers. Such a contrast to the cool blue of the Agapanthus.
Hi Diana,
ReplyDeleteThank you for your many visits and your many kind comments.
In my last post you ask about the baubles. They are vintage and I collected them over some years from flea markets in London and I bought some on Ebay.
A couple of weeks ago you asked about the fabrics that I used in Autumn Colours. The fabrics are new bought from a shop in London called Beyond Fabrics. They specialise in patchwork and quilting. www.beyond-fabrics.co.uk
All the best,
Ingrid x