flowers everywhere

First it sleeps, then it creeps, then it leaps. That's what the old wives say about planting something you hope will take off, even though you know it'll take three years for it to really take hold and start spreading. 

These purple-spired ajuga plants love shade. These are super-happy, sending out long shoots along the ground under the pine-needles, then popping up another cluster of glossy, deep-green leaves to colonize another shady spot. 

Beauty berries grow in clusters along the stem of the plant. The clusters appear in summer, and are bright green. In fall, the berries turn a magenta pink that is so bright it seems to glow in the dark. 

 Beauty Berries are edible, and high in antioxidants. Many people make a tea of the berries, but we leave them for the squirrels and wild rabbits. 

The plant can be trimmed as a shrub or left to grow into a small tree. 

I'm not gonna lie; this dogwood tree beside the front porch is frail and high-maintenance. But when dogwood trees everywhere were dying, this one held on. 

Even with occasional watering, random fertilizing, and daily whispers of encouragement, this little dogwood-that-could is far from being a show-stopper. 

But hey, it's a fighter. I still have hope that one day, this little tree is going to come into its own. 

Gardenias are so easy to propagate; just stick a trimmed-off piece in the ground and keep it watered. It'll sprout roots and continue to grow until you have a thick stand of hardy shrubs with glossy green leaves and divine-smelling flowers.

You can also stick cuttings in a glass of water with some root-grow powder and propagate them that way, but I'm too impatient for that, and besides, it's not necessary. Just look at the ones I stuck in the ground. They're everywhere.

An African Wisteria drapes over the arbor entrance that leads to the front porch.  Unlike wild wisteria, this plant is non-invasive--it stays where it's planted and doesn't send out runners.

The flowers are a deep pink-purple, and smell incredible. The plant grows long seed-pods, so someone who's good at growing plants from seed might be able to propagate it.

Or, you could buy one. But they're hard to find.

There seem to be several varieties of hydrangea in this little corner of the world, and I honestly can't remember what they are, because I planted them so many years ago. 

To propagate hydrangeas, I put a big rock on top of any branches that droop onto the ground, then wait. The part that's pinned to the ground will sprout roots,  and then voila, you have another plant to spread, share, or keep right where it is.

Butterfly Weed dies back to the root in the winter but comes back every spring. There are several of these plants scattered through the flowerbeds around the house. Bees and butterflies love them! Monarch butterflies lay their eggs on these milkweed plants, and then the larvae eat the plants down to the stem. Don't worry though, just let them do it. The denuded plants will survive, and so will the butterflies!

I don't know what this plant is, but isn't it pretty? It dies back every winter and comes back every spring, just a little bit bigger than it was the year before. 

It lives in a corner of the flowerbed, right where the sidewalk curves toward the front door, and a row of paving stones leads to the chicken coops. It's pretty enough to cause a person to pause on the way to scatter chicken feed in the morning.

Plumbago is a trailing plant with powder blue blossoms. They are happy as can be in the raised planter that's tucked up next to the pool slide. 

The thing is, we wanted a pool slide, but IMO, it was a big ugly plastic thing that hurt my heart to look at. So, we installed a circular planter to house enough flowering plants to hide the slide. It worked, too! A  Bridal Wreath Spirea spews a fountain of white blossoms up and over the edge of the planter, and the Plumbago trails down the side. 

These precious purple flowering plants live in the flowerbed between the pool and the entrance gate. Planted with Butterfly Weed, Mexican Sunflowers, and some yellow-blossomed plant I can't recall, the colors of all the plants in bloom look like a party in the summer. 

The plants in that flowerbed die back in the winter, and all but the Mexican  Sunflower come back from the root, stronger and bigger than ever each spring. (The Sunflower leaves plenty of seeds though.) 

Four O'Clock flowers open up every afternoon in the summer and early fall. 

They're magnets for hummingbird moths. 

It's hard to catch a photo of these elusive creatures. They move so fast that the only way to capture an image is to use video mode, then select a still shot from the video stream. And because they only come out at dusk, the lack of lighting makes it even more difficult. 

But if you live here, you can sit on the front porch steps on summer evenings and commune with them for hours.

Connecting with the natural world that surrounds Dragonfly Pond Farm is as easy as looking out the window or walking out the door. Bees, butterflies, dragonflies,  bugs, lizards, birds, and critters of all shapes and sizes, they're all here, waiting to make your acquaintance. 

Deer visit the woodland swamp to find water and browse the edible plants and berries.  There's a dog-proofe, sheep-proof fence around the entire property, but that fence is just a suggestion to the deer, and they are happy to hop over to a place that feels safe and welcoming. 

Bluebird and Martin houses put out a welcome mat, but many other animals make Dragonfly Pond Farm their home. 

Gray squirrels and flying squirrels live in the trees near the house. Bats control mosquitoes,  and armadillos eat snails, slugs, and grubs.

Red-tailed hawks nest in the woods behind the house, and woodpeckers live in the dead tree in the horse field. A Great Horned Owl calls to its mate from one side of the property to another. 

Raccoons and possums live between the house and the railroad tracks. We've seen red foxes and bobcats, and we've heard coyotes sing at night, but they're not close anymore, and that's our loss.

But still, the tree frogs sing and the bullfrogs croak and the crickets chirp, and they are our lullaby at night. 

I don't know what kind of ginger this is, but its flowers are so pretty! They look almost like a succulent or bromeliad. 

The ginger is very happy where it is, and it pairs well with the Four O'Clocks and Butterfly Weed that share its flowerbed.  The Monarch butterflies agree. 

Attracted by the Butterfly Weed, the Monarchs lay their eggs on the plant, and the caterpillars that hatch feed on the Butterfly Weed, then move to build their cocoons on the underside of the ginger leaves. 

This cool plant reseeds itself every year, and it is happy growing along the stepping-stone path to the pool. It'll spread, so you  can take the babies to another location until they're everywhere you want them to be. 

This plant is doing fine in the flowerbed outside the basement, which is a sweet spot for solitude, especially for the artistic soul who likes to be close to nature. 

The courtyard area outside the basement door has its own little greenhouse, a water-catchment barrel for watering plants, an arbor entrance to the other side of the backyard, and a towering Magnolia tree.

This beautiful flowering plant with its huge glossy green leaves looks a lot like a gardenia, until it blooms with these bright red flowering spires.

But the plant is not a shrub. It grows more in the habit of a hydrangea, with the root ball growing wider each season, as the plant dies back in winter and comes back each spring. The bushy plant grows to be about three feet high, and just keeps getting wider every year. 

I propagate this plant the same way I propagate  hydrangeas, by  putting a rock on top of a drooping stem to weigh it down so it grows roots over the winter. 

I'd like to say that the firesticks are growing everywhere around here, but in truth, I can't stop giving the new plants out to friends.

 People often don't notice the pool at first. It's surrounded by flowering and fruiting shrubs and trees, so the pool beyond the rose arbor can come as a surprise. Thoughtful planting ensures that there's a profusion of color in every season. The camellias bloom during the fall and winter, but there's some overlap in spring, when the camellias are still going strong and the Bridal Wreath Spirea is just beginning to bloom.