High Summer Royalty

It's the end of July and it's hot and humid and hot! High summer holds the earth firmly in its grasp and, while plump red tomatoes dangle off their vines like chandeliers and frilly Annabelle hydrangeas show off their curly tresses to the begonias languishing in the shade,  high summer also extends far beyond the vibrant borders of the well-tended garden.  Queen Anne's Lace (Daucus carota) holds court in the hillsides, meadows and along the dusty roads.  Her footman, chicory, (Cichorium intybus) seems to be always at her side, helping to lead the parade of hot weather wild flowers and sublime weeds.

Her lacey majesty, "the queen" also graces hedgerows and fenceposts and  stands delicately tall and elegantly fragile among her tangled court of long grass and bowing branches ladened down with attending leaves.  Queen Anne seems just as at home in low wet areas as she is in very dry surroundings--well, of course--she's the queen! 

Chicory supplies the sky-blue buttons to her majesty's airy gown, providing just the right amount of warm weather drama capable of capturing the eye of even the most casual of passersby, These two wildings wait with supreme confidence to be plucked and gathered into a bouquet of colorful blossoms and greenery, artfully arranged in a beautiful vase with those of the more gentile sort, like dahlias and zinnias.

Surprising as it seems, neither of these wild beauties are native to North America, travelling here with the Europeans and taking up residency in the late 1600's and early 1700's. Both are edible, while Queen Anne's Lace has often been regarded as a medicinal herb, helping in the aid of digestive disorders, we all know that chicory can be an alternative to coffee. Now, well established into the American countryside, they both seem quite at home, as though they have been here since the beginning of time.

It has been said that Queen Anne's Lace was so named after Anne, the mother of the Virgin Mary while another legend holds that she was named for one or the other of the two Queen Annes in the Stuart line of ancient Great Britain as both loved to tat lace.  In either case, this royal wilding was and is also referred to as wild carrot. (Although there really is a wild carrot plant out there and is easily confused  with Q.A.L.) Just pull some Queen Anne's Lace flowers and stems and then notice the smell of fresh carrots and yes, the roots are edible, just like carrots.

On the other hand chicory, sometimes known as the coffee plant, is a member of the sunflower family and each flower on its stiff stem is only open for a day. Yes, it is an edible weedy wildflower and can be roasted and ground as an additive to coffee or used as a coffee substitute for a slightly different taste. Among other things, Thomas Jefferson used this as a cover crop in his fields to feed his livestock, as many a farmer has done over the last couple of hundred of years here in the United States, too.

Both of these regally royal darlings, while beautiful and proud, during high summer until frost, are now considered by many to be terribly invasive so, do be careful should you want to sprinkle a little seed in your own garden beds, for one day you may find yourself having to overthrow this floral monarchy or conduct your own war with the roses!



     

Six More Should Do it.

Looking in on the bees, far out in the field.

It started innocently enough.  Of course, it always does when it comes to Peter pondering the addition of another garden bed out somewhere in the yard. Sometimes he gets a bee under his bonnet and he just can't let it go! One evening while we sat out on the back porch watching the rain fall--as it does almost every evening, lately--looking out on the gentle slope where six recently planted strips of new lavender plants looked, well, a little lonely.  They needed balancing out against the backdrop of evergreen needles and deciduous leaves that reach up into the Virginia sky, It was then when heard Peter mumble to himself, "Six more should do it." "Six more of what?" I asked. "Six more strips of lavender." He was still mumbling but I heard it loud and clear.

I think he just needed an excuse to borrow our neighbor's tractor, one last time.

Standing and planting in and around the newly filled-in sand trap.

So, gone is the ol' sandtrap and neatly clipped golf green, (think the Harry Hechinger commercial from years ago when there was a Hechinger's) that was meticulously kept at just one-half inch, while other parts of the yard would be kept at two inches and other parts of the yard were clipped to three and a half inches.  Still other parts of the yard were kept at 5 inches!--Dont' ask! Really, I gave up mowing long ago as it took a schematic of the entire yard to figure out what grass should be at what length.  Besides, I'm a much better weed wacker than he is.  However, I think that was engineered as well.  But, I digress...

It's getting curiouser and curiouser.

Now, instead of green grass and sand, there are two rows of Lavandula x intermedia 'Seal', two rows of Lavandula x intermedia 'Phenomenal', and two rows of Lavandula x intermedia 'Provence'to mirror the other side of Lavandula angustifolia 'Elizabeth', Lavandula angustifolia 'Buena Vista' and Lavandula angustifolia 'Mitcham Gray.'  Next year the hillside will be splendidly, dressed in the color purple and ribboned up in grassy green.  The mowing plan should be verrrrry iiiinteresting, I'm sure.

You can just see him sitting there thinking, "REALLY?"

Trying to figure out what all of the fuss is about.

The bees didn't seem surprised at all about yet even more lavender taking up residency here at Blooming Hill.  to them, it's the more the merrier.  
However, they wasted no time flitting from flower to leaf to bush to tree spreading the news that the Rinek's seem to have an addiction problem, of sorts. However, we prefer to think of it as a lavender collection.  The devil deer just sighed and flicked their ears at us but that wiley ol' fox who torments poor Tucker seemed slightly off balance himself, since we removed his beloved sand box far out in the field.

Twelve new rows of lavender plants added this year.  On the right, six added in May and on the left, six added just two weeks ago.  They will provide a very nice view, farther afield.

In any case, the slope looks great and you must come and see it for yourself. Going forward, we will be replacing much of the mowing with much more weeding and on the upside, much more harvesting of lovely lavender in the years to come.  As my mother used to say, "Six of one, half a dozen of the other."  Yep, six more should do it, just fine--for now.