Gardening in the Dog Days of Summer

The July garden is typically kind of a bummer for me. In years like this one with all of the rain, weeds abound making weeding an all to frequent necessity. Its also usually blatantly clear by July which of my Spring and Fall plantings didn't work. Unfortunately, with the blistering heat its hard to do anything about plant casualties until the Fall. This year is no exception.

I've had great success (maybe too much success) with my herbs and my side bed looks great, but some other areas aren't quite as I'd hoped. Rather than get down this year, I've decided to channel my gardening energy into planning for my Fall plantings.

I've already got a list of changes to make:

• In my side perennial bed, my Bee Balm is OOC (out of control) and totally dwarfing my Yellow Yarrow.
• Some Hellebore or Lenten Rose are getting too damp and need to be moved out of the path of rain runoff in the back by the pond.
• A few Hostas are getting more sun than I ever thought they would.
• Re-organize my mailbox bed. The drought tolerant plans have worked great, but my arrangement left a little to be desired.
• Move my Gladiator Aliums to a more showy location where they can colonize their hearts out!

In order to stay energized, I'm focusing my efforts to NOT on what is struggling, didn't work or is shriveling up and dying; but rather to what and how I want to use my Fall weekends. I'm getting out my garden magazines and problem solving and thinking about Fall bulbs. (If you are doing the same, consider Terra Ceia Farms (a NC company)). I'm also starting to ponder a new bed for the front yard which means sketches abound. No time for the blues!

Mailbox Plantings for Drought

When we bought our house in 2005, our mailbox was covered in several overgrown shrubs. A friend's daughter actually asked me if a racoon lived in our mailbox bed! Three years, one new mailbox and numerous outgoing loads of white landscaping rocks later... I embarked this week on replanting the mailbox.

Last fall, I purchased 5 Gladiator Alliums from Terra Ceia Farms (a NC business out of Pantego). They are in the garlic/onion family and should produce 3 - 4' tall softball sized pink blooms. They are coming up and the foliage looks great! I'm optimistic for good blooms in May. I'm considering moving them since I hear they can multiply and right now they aren't placed to bloom in mass (anyone with advice on when and how to move them, please let me know!)

I consulted my plant books to find other hardy and drought tolerant plants to accompany this dry setting. Here's what I decided on:

• Autumn Joy Sedum (1) - I love the idea of fall color and these are one of the most drought tolerant plants around. The dark green foliage also compliments the grays and blues nicely.
  
• Autumn Fire Sedum (2) - Similar to the autumn joy and boasted to be more brillant in color... we'll see.
  
• Artemesia (Silver Mound) (3) - Great silvery foliage and requires little water.
  
• Spanish Lavender (1) - A neighbor put this in last year and has completely neglected it and it looks fabulous. It's an herb, so I figure its got to be tough! I also love the purple blooms.
  
• Purple Queen (2) - Great purple foliage and triangular shape to compliment the greens well.
  
• Pink Dianthus (Firewitch) (3) - Great shorter plant for the front of the bed. I'm hoping the color will compliment the allium nicely.
  

I'm new to "sun" gardening (with the exception of a 8X6 herb garden, this is all the sun we have). We'll see how it goes.