Garden Photography – Gardens For Goldens

Live in Each Season

“Live in each season as it passes.” ~ Henry David Thoreau

Having lived through the wet of winter, the erratic fits of spring, and the scorching heat of summer, it is time to rejoice in the mosaic of fall.

I love the chaos of the fall garden.

All the little starts and shoots have grown tall and wild.

Their well-defined contours are now a tangle of color and cascading form.

They lay all over each other like summer camp friends clinging on – knowing a goodbye is ahead.

Like the joy in seeing my little foster charges grow up and go home, the fall garden is the culmination of winter dreams, spring plantings and summer labors.

And then it starts again.
I walked through this weekend and made notes about what worked and what failed…
which to divide and which to let stand and go to seed.

Maria brought gifts from the plant sale that found new homes adding to next year’s bounty.

And planning is underway for a wedding in the garden next September.

Fall is full of chores – all in good time. First – a breath and a moment to sit, soak it up, and take it all in. Living in the season.

Yellow: The Color of Summer

Nothing says summer like the color yellow. The spring garden is full of pink, lilac, blue and white. In the autumn, I want depth: oranges, reds, deep purples, golds. But yellow is for summer.

This shaggy rudbeckia grandiflora thrives and returns each year where others fail. It is beautiful in a chaotic, messy way – as if it couldn’t be bothered to fully dress itself or comb its hair in the morning.

“Deep summer is when laziness finds respectability.” ~ Sam Keen

I gave up on the drama of planting huge sunflowers. The jack in the beanstalk varieties required constant watering and staking for big floppy heads that wilted and dried almost as soon as they bloomed. So much work – and they seemed out of place.

The Helianthus annuus – or Delta Sunflower – is so carefree that you will find it growing along the freeways in our region. It loves heat, makes do with little water, is not fussy about soil, and it is poetic in its profusion of dancing stems.

It feels right at home in our garden. I’m sure the birds miss the giant seeds – but they have devastated the grapes again – so they can make do!

Helenium looks like little Mexican sombreros to me.

So happy and sunny – it should be a painting!

The daylilies spread their short-lived happiness – from sunrise to sundown.

Gaillardia blankets the garden from June until September,

while beautiful bulbine puts in repeat performances in spring and late summer.

Yellow flies and flutters through the garden. On dragonflies –

bees –

butterflies –

even this yellow bird has taken up residence in the garden.

I have not seen it before…a Western Kingbird, I believe.

“How wonderful yellow is. It stands for the sun.” ~ Vincent Van Gogh.

And Yellow Labs, too. 🙂 Meet Carter. He’s looking for home.

To My Wayward Gardeners

The roses and I thank you for your pruning assistance last winter…

they are repaying the effort in their magnificence.

Please feel free to stop by to help deadhead them soon.

Miss you! 🙂

Return to the Garden

“Where will you begin?” she asked.
“At the beginning, I guess.”

This sign was posted over our shed door. The weeds are indeed laughing. Two hours after the last puppy of Irish’s litter was adopted, in rolled the van with six more! I can’t show them to you due to a promise we made to the kind human who brought them to us. She saw that they were in need and intervened. We won’t give her up as she may yet return with more.

Needless to say, my hoped for return to the garden was again delayed. And the weeds took full advantage. The blueberries were overrun, the paths were overtaken, crabgrass invaded, and the garden shed disappeared in a mass of cobwebs.

Maria refused to weed the herb garden bed; she said that it was all to be gone or she was washing her hands of it. I couldn’t bear to see it all dug up and sitting empty; we have months to go before the winter. So it has been reclaimed as a community bed. Let the whining begin.

As the last litter numbers dwindled over the course of a week, I was able to spend a little more time in the garden. Bit by bit, it is getting there. And with our last two little fluff balls now safely home, the garden is ~~mine~~ ours. And the weeds? Well who is laughing now?!

The Dahlias are beautiful.

The blueberries are once again peacefully co-existing with the California poppies and smothered in the pine needles they love.

The grapes are still producing…in September!

And as our rivers are still full from our long wet winter, I am watering, watering, watering to bring the garden back to life.

Now that the weather is beginning to cool, the gardeners, too, are making their return. Maria is planning her October display, Dee cleared out the daylilies,

Rob rebuilt the leaf mulch container for fall,

and Ina cleaned the garden shed!

Puppies are a joy – and they need what they need when they need it. Many of their new families stay in touch and I delight in seeing the pictures of them growing as fast as the weeds in the garden. (This is Mocha with his new big brother.)

I am so proud of them. I miss them a tiny bit. Still, I am happy to be back in the garden.

Wordless Wednesday: Swirling

Wordless Wednesday: Moonscape to a Bee

Wordless Wednesday: Butterfly in Progress

Summer Upon Us

Everybody in the pool! The dog days of summer are upon us.

We’re getting a taste this weekend of what promises to be a long hot summer.

In the morning, everyone is busy trying to get in their work,

play –

and tussles

before the heat calls for a long, lazy nap.

The good news: as the thermometer brushes 100-degrees, the searing sun kills the black spot fungus spores that have invaded our roses.

Never before have we been faced with this scourge. But never, in the garden’s history, have we had such a long, cool, wet winter. While its spread is, so far, limited, I wonder: remove the offenders now – or prepare to do battle as the seasons change?

This is a simple, inconsequential thing to ponder in the scheme of things. The decision for our new arrival, Eddie was a little harder.

A recent transport from a rescue group we work with in China, he had been hit by a car and his little leg – left untreated – was growing in crooked. With one growth plate progressing and the other halted, the leg would eventually adopt a 90-degree angle ensuring a painful break in his future. Our Doc decided it was best to say goodbye to the leg now – while he was young enough and resilient enough to recover fully.

It’s hard to see him go through this trauma at such a young age and so soon after his arrival, but we know that putting the worst behind quickly means a better and happier future ahead.

Ina suggests patience with the roses; so they will remain for now. Which is just as well. It is TOO HOT for another chore.

We opt instead for lounging on the grass.

A dip in the pool.

And lazing in the shade.

It is May. And the dog days of summer are upon us.

When All Is New Again

“April hath put a spirit of youth in everything.” ~William Shakespeare

The garden in April is both young and old. New friends appear…

Old friends are reborn.

The season was never over. It was just waiting for us to find it again.

From cold ground covered in earth and leaves, springs forth our long-lost friends looking new and refreshed; ready to write another season –

another chapter in our garden’s journey.

“Age is opportunity no less,
Than youth itself, though in another dress.” ~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Gracie is finding a second chapter, too. At 10, she was found stray and sent to a local shelter. Her owner was contacted, but never bothered to reclaim her – as if this beautiful life was done.

Not done – just waiting to be found again by a lucky someone who will recognize that under this sugar face is a young and loving heart.

“Every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end.” – Seneca

Gracie’s new beginning starts now – in April – when all is new again.

Drinking up the Garden

The garden is overflowing with petals produced by the rain, and the little creatures who feast on them.

After the Rain

After the rain…

and before the deluge…

moments of beauty –

the company of dogs,

filthy, muddy play,

and a banner weekend for getting dogs home.

There were absolutely no appointments on the board when I arrived early Saturday morning, and then they came, one by one.

Thankfully, we had a full complement of adoption counselors on hand because – by the end of the day –

eight dogs had found their forever families.

In this mix is a very special story; an unexpected little miracle. Our volunteers will recognize it, but the rest of you will have to wait a bit – just to make sure it sticks. Keep those paws crossed and I will bring it to you soon.

Until then, keep bailing –

And thank the heavens for rain in California.

Hint of Fall

The Aster knows what the forecast denies: autumn is coming. Eventually.