July Garden

We've hit the end of July and I realized all the photos I intended to take of my blooming gardens this month, never happened. Last month I jumped in on a garden link up, so I thought I may as well keep you posted on my blooms in July too. 

This is the small flower garden Lily is tending this summer. I've had the yellow evening primrose for years now and they are a good, hardy perennial that keeps on coming back. Lily's choice was to add a mix of pink and red/white petunias. These have been a great grower in this location and she's been good at keeping them so prolific.

Natalie's Garden is filled with blooming lilies of all sorts and colors, but many shades of orange and red are currently in season.

The other end of the garden with more lilies and a number of daylilies, spiderwort and hostas. I have a row of Four O'Clocks planted in the very back which should be blooming soon. 

It's hard to tell below, but that would be our potato garden (all 99 hills of it) and then my rows of flowers in the background.

A couple of you mentioned in the combox on this post that you wouldn't mind knowing more about the cut flowers I planted this year. I decided that having fresh flowers for the table would be a nice addition to my gardening so I planted a couple of rows. I don't have the exact specifics on the varieties that they are, but I know I found specific seeds that made good cut flowers. I had a couple varieties of Burpee brand zinnias found at my local country store this spring. This variety is one of them and I also have a variety that is a bigger bloom, but I can't find the name. I am really happy with the choice of the zinnias that are hardy, needing very little attention and have been in bloom for three weeks already. 

The yellow flowers below I cannot recall their name. I am thinking they were a type of daisy, which again came from seed. 

This spring I just really scoured the seed packets to find annuals that could be planted, were little work, long bloom time and could be cut flowers. I'm looking forward to planting more next year so that I have more for home and to take in to church for a part of the summer.

The garden is growing and I've only had to turn the soaker hose on once so far this season. It looks like I'll need to turn that on some more this week though. The beans started out well, but don't seem to be lengthening their growing season at all, which is concerning for our winter needs. The carrots seem to be doing well, the squash vines are climbing the fence and have blooms. While the tomatoes are growing for the most part, some of them already have blight (grr!!) and that may keep down the productivity. Gardening and gardening in MN can be so uncertain based on so many variations in temp, rain, soil, etc. 

Happy August!

Come on back later this month as we wrap up the summer and the end to most of the color in my gardens.