October 2014: 2.More Garden and Meadow

Tagetes 'Villandry', a French Marigold that makes a plant big and loose enough for us. Its relatively long stems make it good for cut flowers. We pick a lot as frost threatens.

Silky, silvery seedheads of Turkeyfoot, Andropogon gerardii

Switchrgrass, Panicum virgatum, in the west meadow

Common milkweed, Asclepias syriaca

Hayscented Fern,
Dennstaedtia punctilobula, in autumn color under Gray Birches at the edge of the west meadow

Sunrise lights and colors the grasses of the west meadow.

From a studio window

Looking across the big island bed from the entry courtyard. A Bluestar, Amsonia tabernaemonta, has spread under the rock wall into the gravel of the courtyard; it is starting its good autumn foliage color.

Black chairs in the entry courtyard

This bed separates the entry courtyard from our driveway

Spiraea betulifolia 'Tor' has given so-so creamy white flowers in spring, but its autumn foliage color can be spectacular.

An ornamental oregano, Origanum 'Rotkugel' and the scarlet foliage of Spiraea betulifolia 'Tor'

Our house volunteer, self-sowing nicotianas have Nancy Ondra's 'Green Mix' and the pink and white species Nicotiana mutabilis, in their background.

Nicotianas with a white Japanese Anemone, Anemone x hybrida 'Andrea Atkinson' (and Verbena bonariensis) in the fenced garden

A monkshood we bought as Aconitum fischeri, apparently an invalid name-- but possibly useful to gardeners for indicating a relatively short form of A. carmichaelii

In this warm autumn our favorite home-grown seedling daylily (likely a cross between Hemerocallis 'Autumn King' and H.'Autumn Minaret') has just kept opening good flowers. When nights are too cold, daylily flowers do not open well.

We love the way its tall stems float this daylily's flowers high above its own foliage and surrounding plants.

Cuphea cyanea on the back deck

The hummingbirds who sipped its nectar left in September, but with mild weather the plant blooms on and on.

It will be worth bringing the not-quite-too-large pot indoors on freezing nights-- but we haven't had those yet.

A Japanese Anemone, Anemone x hybrida 'Andrea Atkinson'. The flowers last if the cut stem ends are sealed by dipping in very hot water.

Anemone x hybrida 'Andrea Atkinson' in the fenced garden

One of our resident strain of nicotiana hybrids

Chrysanthemum 'Hillside Sheffield Pink'

Tagetes 'Villandry', a French Marigold with a loose enough growth habit to be at home with us, combines here with Coreopsis 'Full Moon'-- the marigold is a even a little taller than the coreopsis.

Nicotiana hybrids, this plant resembling its 'Nancy Ondra's Green Mix' ancestors

Asclepia tuberosa, Butterfly Weed

Asclepias tuberosa with Symphyotrichum oblongifolium, Aromatic Aster

Chrysanthemum 'Hillside Sheffield Pink'

Looking across the big island bed and the circle terrace; but the big show is in the colors of the native woodland beyond.

The curves of the circle terrace echo the mound of Phudd Hill in the distance

Amsonia tabernaemontana foliage is turning yellow, but even the russet-pink dried flowerheads of hydrangeas behind it look gold in this early morning light

Frost at last, here on mullein leaves

Frost on Stachys byzantina 'Big Ears': silver on silver, with red gold from a stem of Rosa 'Corylus'

A first-year mullein rosette, silvered by the frost

Seedheads of Downy Sunflower, Helianthus mollis, with the bright colored stems of a Red Twig Dogwood cultivar, Cornus sericea 'Cardinal'

Harvest time: Jack, back from a morning run with wild blueberry foliage

Actaea pachypoda, Doll's Eyes or White Baneberry

Crisp and changing autumn light: the fenced garden in sunshine, the hill across the valley in shadow