grassroots Horticulture : larkspur

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The Scents in My June Garden

The best scents in June are the numerous abelia in flower. The fountain shaped shrubs are planted along edges of the landscape underneath native oaks, post and blackjack. The filtered sunlight under the canopy provides a good balance of shade and sunlight. Several varieties of swallowtail butterfly use the abelia as a nectar source.

The Herb Garden

The herb garden is loaded with wonderful scents. Lemon thyme has a sweet lemon scent when rubbed and the lemon oregano a more savory earthy scent.

Fennel

Fennel is bolting and toppling over as a result of the winds and rains deposited by tropical storm "Bill".

Basil

Several varieties of basil are patiently waiting for the heat and sunshine to kick up to full summer strength.

Pineapple Sage

Pineapple sage has never been so robust.

Lavender

Lavender has finally found a happy location surrounded by a mix of allium species.

Lemon Grass

Lemon grass planted in a large pot made it through the winter. It is a very lanky grass and a true non-wafter. You must rub the leaves vigorously to release the essential oils. Lemon grass (Andropogon citratus) is related to Andropogon nardus,the natural source of citronella

Lovely, wispy, honey scent. If you have a very sunny spot the blackfoot daisy could become one of your favorite plants.

Daylilies

Before the rainy season started this daylily bed was clean and tidy. It is now jam packed with plants, many volunteers. Very pretty but rather chaotic. I try to harvest the larkspur seed in mid-June so it does not scatter. I add the seed back into the bed in the spring.

Yellow daylilies, blue larkspur, and red pineapple sage.

The purplecone flowers are volunteers but they look at home with the alliums.

Penstemons + Monarda

This bed started as a penstemon trial area and has evolved into a penstemon and monarda bed plus gaura, tickseeds, plumeria, white salvia gregii and purple lyre-leaf sage.

Swallowtail Amongst the Lantana

The sun loving lantana, in a border, attract the swallowtail butterfly. The gold lantana are intermixed with lantana camera to visually break the grouping of yellow flowers. The mass of yellow attract butterfly but can be too intense visually for human sensibilities so yellow, in a landscape, should always be softened or broken up with other colors.