What do you see on your garden walks?

[Weiser]

Here is some of what I saw on a stroll today, after work.

[Kelaidis]

Boy, John, your garden looks terrific right now: I'd sure love to visit again.

Although not really MY garden, I will post three pictures I took yesterday at Denver Botanic Gardens of Plantasia Steppe, the South African Plaza, and Dryland Mesa

[Weiser]

PK
Thank you so much for your kind compliment.
It's been very cool to cold around here. With a little warmth it should explode, with color. I will keep an eye on it and post more shots later.

[Hoy]

OK I call you John?

Your garden is very nice! I would love to take a stroll in your garden and study plants on close encounter if possible. My garden is very untidy and quite different from yours. Here are some shots I took this afternoon.
The first is from my front door.

Apart from some 30 rhodos I have not many plants in flower for the moment - or rather they are dispersed all over my property.

[Weiser]

Trond

So lush and green. That is one color we don't have enough of around here. Lots more of the Gray tones. Do I spy a couple of Yuccas by the steps in the first photo???    I must say your woodland with the Rhododendrons is very natural appearing and that woodland slope is assume!!

[Hoy]

Trond

So lush and green. That is one color we don't have enough of around here. Lots more of the Gray tones. Do I spy a couple of Yuccas by the steps in the first photo???    I must say your woodland with the Rhododendrons is very natural appearing and that woodland slope is assume!!

Lush and green are the right words! Even my house become green due to green algae so I (or my wife really) wash it every second or third year! Moss grows everywhere and other plants like grasses germinate where they shouldn't.

But I have to disappoint you  - it is not Yuccas but Cordylines (C. australis 'purpurea'). They stand in pots because I have to move them indoors in the worst winter days. It is also two New Zealand flax (Phormium tenax) there. They are hardy here but stand in pots too.

My garden is steep and difficult to access with heavy tools so I have to carry what is needed. The vegetation is mostly natural but I put in plants I think fit there like the big Skunk Cabbages in the background.

I have a couple of Yuccas (Y. filamentosa) though but they don't flower for me. I haven't found the right site then for they flower in other gardens.

[Todd Boland]

OMG!  Such greenery!  I'm still waiting for the trees to leaf here!

[Spiegel]

June 26, 2010
Photographed in the garden this morning.
1. Daphne velenovskyi 'Balkan Rose'
2. Daphne sp (label indecipherable)
3. Daphne (planted in natural rock crevice and regularly pruned by deer)

[Spiegel]

And more .......

1. Zinnia grandiflora
2. Paederota bonarota setting seed
3. Onosma albo-rosea with left-over seedheads
4. Tufa cliff in Irish stone trough
5. Acantholimon sp finishing bloom
6. mystery grown from seed and not what the seed pack said!  I.D. please
sorry, 5 and 6 interchanged

[Kelaidis]

Your mystery plant is Pterocephalus: I will let you check my three pix and choose the one you think. They are notoriously bad germinators from seed, incidentally...

I am very fond of these, and am very anxious to obtain their cousin, Pterocephalus spathulatus, from Spain where I trod upon it one October by the acre in the Sierra Cazorla. It has powerdery white leaves and stunning pink flowers for contrast...and NEEDS to be in my garden...

The first is P. depressus from Morocco (the easiest in my experience, blooming all summer)
P. parnassii (or P. perennis v. parnassii) from Greece and the last P. pinardii from Turkey.

The genus is much larger, including taller, coarse herbs from Eurasia that I have not hitherto succeeded in overwintering.

[Nold]

Pterocephalus spathulatus caught Dwight Ripley's eye too; "... heads of rose-colored flowers sit almost stemless on the wide, chalk-pale cushions .."
There's been an empty space in my garden for this plant, ever since I read that description.

[Lori S.]

Incarvillea zhongdianensis is in bloom here now:

[McDonough]

Lori, nice plant.  I see the ridged winged stems and nodding buds of Allium nutans nearby... would like to see a photo of it when in bloom.

[Weiser]

Great garden shots all around!i

I am seeing a lot of Opuntia polyacatha blossoms scattered around the Garden this time of year. Here are a few, to wet your appetites.
Opuntia polyacantha var. polyacantha (North Dakota)
Opuntia polyacantha var. polyacantha (Idaho )
Opuntia polyacantha var. polyacantha
Opuntia polyacantha var. erinacea- syn. var. ursina (Mt. Charleston,NV)
Opuntia polyacantha var. hystrucina
Opuntia polyacantha var. polyacantha ("Crystal Tide")
Opuntia polyacantha aff. nicholii
Opuntia polyacantha var. polyacantha-syn. var. rhodantha (Idaho)
Opuntia polyacantha hybrid “Snowball”
Opuntia polyacantha hybrid Claude Barr selection

[Spiegel]

Your mystery plant is Pterocephalus: I will let you check my three pix and choose the one you think. They are notoriously bad germinators from seed, incidentally...

I am very fond of these, and am very anxious to obtain their cousin, Pterocephalus spathulatus, from Spain where I trod upon it one October by the acre in the Sierra Cazorla. It has powerdery white leaves and stunning pink flowers for contrast...and NEEDS to be in my garden...

The first is P. depressus from Morocco (the easiest in my experience, blooming all summer)
P. parnassii (or P. perennis v. parnassii) from Greece and the last P. pinardii from Turkey.

The genus is much larger, including taller, coarse herbs from Eurasia that I have not hitherto succeeded in overwintering.

I think it must be P. pinardii.  That seems to ring a bell.  It seems OK in the lime bed. Thanks