Fall in the Garden

Coming on the heels of two spectacularly beautiful Fall days with ample sun and lovely warm temps, we are being inundated with rain today; so much so that the normal width of the ‘river’ that tends to form in our backyard swale is now at least three or four times larger than normal. Thankfully I took the camera out yesterday into the blinding sunshine and captured some images of the last hurrah happening in my perennial garden. It’s really hard to photograph anything in bright sunshine as you just can’t be sure how it will turn out, so I am doubly pleased with the quality of these photos. This time of year invokes a sense of melancholy in me; the end of bright sunlight and cheery waving flowers that greet me every time I turn the corner into my garden. Sometimes my walks out to my garden patch are so highly anticipatory because I just don’t know what I will find when I round that corner, and for the most part, I am awed and delighted with the results.

The pretty Aster patch- the brightest spot in my Fall garden. Every year this expands and takes over more space and I couldn’t be happier come Fall to see what it does.

Two types of Hollyhocks come up in my garden each year; one is a lovely Peach color, the other is this vibrant red. Most of them are done now, but this one decided to give it one more shot, standing ramrod straight and proud

The Hen & Chicks. I love this succulent and it’s ability to withstand just about anything, including my occasionally stepping on it, and the fact that it tends to get flooded during heavy rain as it’s in a low spot. One of them even escaped and set root in my garden path among the stepping stones, kind of like exerting it’s own independence.

My ornamental Flax bloom prolifically all season long, their cheery blue flowers and foliage are so delicate.

Pink in the garden; here are the perennial Chrysanthemum,

And of course, the Echinacea, or purple Coneflower.

Lost among the wild stems and ravaged seed heads of the standard purple coneflower is one lone gold Coneflower plant I found this past Spring. I eagerly await next year to see how it blooms.

The one sad thing about the garden this year is the damage that resulted from the August hailstorm, mostly to my sunflowers and tomato plants. Both were lovely and vibrant and each now lay in a mass of tangled and torn stems, with pocked rotting tomatoes on the ground. I guess that’s the way Nature goes, hmm? I can manage drought with well placed hoses, I can withstand the deer, rabbit and other critters who wish to supplement their diets in my garden, and I can work any amount of organic matter into the soil to turn it into black gold, but when Nature decides to wreak havoc, I can do little but stand aside and let it happen, then hope that next year may be better. The one thing that did survive was the volunteer squash, and I am seriously crossing my fingers that it isn’t just errant gourds that took root.

For more wonderful garden photos and a soothing place to visit, please stop by another Kate’s garden and see how lovely she has made her corner of the world. Especially gorgeous are her photos of her stencil work she did on her garage this past year.

Enjoy!