surprises in the garden during this dry season!

new Calla Lily shoots, September 2014

My garden, just like most other gardens, never looks great in September. Most plants are barely in bloom, leaves are turning yellow as the fall season approaches. And of course, with the drought, everything looks a little drier than usual, because we never water the lawn anyway and our other plants and shrubs are watered once a week.

So you can imagine my surprise as I was picking up dried vines, trimming rose branches that turned to wood, to find fresh growth in the ground! The most surprising to me was this lamb's ear stalk. This time of year is when you would be cutting down the tall dried stalks that have nourished bees throughout the summer. And here is this little new stalk with fresh purple blossoms. Lucky bees!

lamb's ear stalk, September 2014

I was also surprised to see the Calla Lily shoots (photo at top) already poking up through the debris from fallen redwood branches and dried up maple leaves (I don't clean this up - this is great compost/mulch!).

I didn't give much thought when I stuck 4 dried up branches in a row along the stonewall facing the sidewalk. I just wanted to create some kind of barrier until I plant some shade plants there in the spring. But suddenly one of those sticks is turning green and sprouting leaves ! - it's from our giant geranium shrub in the backyard and happens to be a favorite food for hummingbirds. We'll see how big this gets...