New blooms in 2013

As I was looking at my flower pictures from 2013 and I realized that a lot of the flowers that I can't wait to see again in the spring or summer were new to our garden in 2013.  Some of these plants I had researched for a while and had on my MUST FIND list. But some, I just discovered on the spot and knew that I must try.
I will share with you a few of these beauties:

Poppy Mallow, Winecup or Callirhoe involucrata (zone 4-9). It prefers a sunny dry location.

This perennial I noticed in a splendid local  garden during 2012 Hudson Home and Garden Tour and nobody that was available around had any clue what it was. Some of us assumed it was a perennial geranium but the flower cup shape and size didn't match one of a Hardy Cranesbill.  I later found it accidentally in an article from FineGardening.com named Tough Ground Covers and I said to myself  BINGO!  I found the plant I was looking for. So I asked around at every nursery I visited this spring and to my delight one local nursery had it in stock. 

Poppy Mallow or Wine Cup is not a neatly growing plant but it is a HOT plant for a HOT spot in the border. If you have a sunny slope, this is the perfect plant for that situation.

Apparently this plant doesn't like wet winters so I am very curious how it will survive the first winter in my garden. 

Dwarf Meadow Rue or Thalictrum Kiusianum (zone 4-9). It prefers a shady moist location

Thalictrum or Meadow Rue is a genus that apparently has 120+ plants but I didn't know much about it until I researched a native plant  that I found in my woods and matched it to the name Waxy-leaf Meadow Rue or Thalictrum revolutum. Very intimidating name! 

From the description of the many varieties I first thought that I will never take an interest in it, but when I heard that some varieties can be quite showy and tolerate part shade to shade and moisture, I got interested. As I was looking in the nurseries for several tall thalictrum varieties I discovered that it is very hard to find them around here and I only found the above Dwarf plant. I placed it close to my kitchen window where the conditions seem to match its liking and it looked very happy when it bloomed mid-June. The bloom lasted a very long time (about a month) and its dainty foliage and flowers made me fall in love with it. 

Yarrow or Achillea milefolium "Saucy Reduction".

Every perennial book or catalog I ever opened starts with this genus: Achillea. I always passed it by really fast and always said: Not interested! It looks too much like a weed! Plus, I do not have a lot of sun and if I would have an available spot I will grow more roses!

But that all changed this year when I got my hands on not one but three different varieties! I learned early in the spring that this plant can be the answer for my west facing bad soil border that only gets three-four afternoon hours of sun. I learned that Autumn Sedum , Daililies, Hostas and Alchemilla (Lady's Mantle) can take clay, dryness and afternoon sun but that was not enough for me. There were weeks and weeks in the growing season when nothing was in bloom in this tough border. The plant above I got for free at the garden exchange this past year.

Yarrow or Achillea milefolium  "Paprika"

In the middle of the summer I found  variety "Terra Cotta" on sale and  in the fall I found variety "Paprika" which holds well its red color in bright light. The blooms last long and break well the border monotony. The feathery foliage is also adorable. It makes a great fresh and/or dried cut flower for mixed bouquets but I haven't allowed myself to cut a bloom yet.

Red annual poppy. My mom gave me some seeds of this red poppy two years ago. I seeded this directly outside in May of 2013 and only got one plant with this beautiful bloom! I scattered the seeds from the seed pod in the summer and I am hoping for this to come back.

Oriental Lily "Garden Pleasure"

As I was researching for a tall flowering plant for the month of June, I realized that Oriental Lily is something that may work well in the back of my sunny border on the Northwest side of our property. Once I started looking at this genus it was hard to decide which variety to buy. I realized that I like them all but can't have them all..yet... so I had to settle on two: the two tone lily above and a white oriental variety below.

Oriental Lily "Pretty Woman"

The dusty pink bloom of Sempervivum or Hens and Chicks

I didn't know it blooms!! Did you? And it is a cool bloom that lasts for a month or so!

Rosa "Zephrine Drouhin" - climber

I got an e-mail from a garden club friend that another gardener is trying to find a new home for this old Bourbon rose. I immediately answered that I am interested to provide a home for this "baby" and 1 hour later it was planted in my part shade raised border by the backyard alley. Part shade, you say? Yes! That is all I have and apparently this rose has a good tolerance to some shade. We got only two blooms this year but these were fragrant and perfect! I can't wait for next year when this climber is going to need some kind of support because it grows very fast.

Oriental Stargazer Lily

I tried this popular lily many years ago when I had no knowledge of how important good drainage is to bulbs like lilies. After killing three or four varieties after one winter I stopped buying them. This spring I could not resist the temptation to try it again but this time I placed it in my best raised bed where the roses thrive and the blooms in July were magnificent. We are having a hard winter now so I am curious if the raised bed will make a difference in having this genus come back.

Weigela wine and rose

This year's obsession has been buying and planting shrubs and dwarf trees. The above is a spring flowering shrub with great foliage and the bonus hot pink flowers so I had to try it. I placed it in the center of my tough back border that has only a few hours of afternoon sun so I am curious how it is going to do there after the winter.

Pinks or Dianthus "Scent First Tickled Pink" (zone 5-9)

When we redesigned the front borders in 2012 I was on look-out for evergreens and hostas with blue folliage but at the end of the season I found this variety of pinks with such a neat blueish foliage that I had to break hubby's rule of NO PERENNIALS in the front borders and I planted a few of these pinks in. We enjoyed their  foliage and the pretty blooms for the first time this summer.  Apparently pinks don't love the mulch so much. Some looked bushy and happy at the end of the fall while some plants didn't look so happy.  If they come back, I will have to pull that hardwood mulch away from the base of the plants to avoid the browning issue.

Oak Leaf Hydrangea  or Hydrangea quercifolia "Alice" in bloom for the first time in 2013

What a magnificent flowering shrub this is! The foliage is the largest I've seen in all the hydrangeas. The flowers last for a long time and the foliage turns various shades of browns, burgundy and reds which makes it a very interesting and bold plant in the fall. But wait..it is not all, the bark on the woody stems peels and flakes in the winter which gives it some winter interest as well.

Oriental Lily "Casa Blanca"

Coreopsis "Mercury Rising" - acquired in the fall

Yellow tree Peony

I fell in love with the large flower so I had to have it. I later found another yellow peony that was an Itoh intersectional variety so I am curios which of the two will like to live in our garden the most.

Poppy "Lauren's Grape" or Papaver somniferum
This poppy I first found on Pinterest in a gorgeous garden image with no label or source.  I tracked down the source of that image to Annie's Annuals website.  This poppy is so pretty and also popular so of course I also had to have it right away. I ordered two plants from an online catalog at Select Seeds. One made it to bloom and seed. The other died during the long rainy season.  Hopefully we will get lots more again this coming spring from seed.

Blackberry Lily or Belamcanda chinensis.  The foliage makes it look like an iris but the flower is not an iris at all. It is another plant from the garden club exchange. It makes a cool seed pod in the fall!

Fall Anemone "Serenade"

Purchased and planted in 2012 but very slow to establish. We only saw the bloom in the fall of 2013. A very pretty pink.
There are many other new plants that we loved in 2013 but I will have to end this blog post here.