Greetings and salutations, everyone; yes, once again it is I, your popular host, Mani the purebred border collie, here today, after a longish absence, to bring you up to date on all the happenings here. You may remember me from such similar-themed posts as “Frightful Times”, among so many, many others.
Here I am in a characteristically sun-drenched pose.
If it looks like things here are becoming greener, well, they are.
Even the buffalo grass is turning green.
You may have to look closely to see the green.
Some people around here don’t like native dryland grasses because it takes so long for them to turn green in the spring, and this year the grass (this is my Private Lawn) took longer than usual to turn green, but the buffalo grass needs hardly any water during the summer, which makes it excellent for a dry climate like ours.
The guy I live with said he might plant some bulbs in the grass this fall, because for some mysterious reason bulbs really like growing in buffalo grass. By the time the bulb foliage has died down, the lawn is ready to be mowed.
You only mow buffalo grass once or twice a summer, and after it’s mowed, it does need to be watered, a little, especially in hot weather.
Since I mentioned the weather, I should tell you about our scary weekend. In fact it was absolutely terrifying.
It started to get windy Friday before last. I mean super windy.
Then on Saturday it got extra super windy. The wind was gusting to about 70 mph (112 kph). The guy I live with attached a leash on me so I could go out and tinkle and know that he was close by me.
The wind blew and blew all night long, and then on Sunday, too.
This was all accompanied by “fire danger” warnings, though the guy I live with explained to me that the “forecast area” included most of eastern Colorado, which is a very big place; the Kansas border is about 180 miles (289 km) east of us, and most of that part of Colorado has had very little precipitation in the last couple of months.
Still, he made sure our bags were packed, which of course added to the stress.
I got to go see a huge blue spruce (Picea pungens) that was blown over by the wind, a block from my house. It looked scary; it had fallen on a garage.
This month has been pretty dry, which the guy I live with said was disappointing, but the forecast for next week calls for rain, which hopefully we’ll get. There might be some scary thunder but I can deal with that, since I have three forts in my house now. The guy I live with said that most dogs only have one fort. And some have none at all.
So that’s the scariness.
Meanwhile, Viburnum farreri is flowering.
The guy I live with and his wife would make pilgrimages to Denver Botanic Gardens to see this in flower in December, January, or February, but this has been a very long, strange winter, and times have changed since they made those pilgrimages, so he’s happy to see it in flower, even this late in the year.
The flowers are strongly scented of heliotrope.
He said that when he went to Toronto, one year, the viburnum was in flower in April, which he thought was strange, since he considers this a winter-flowering shrub, but it’s doing this here, this year, because of how our winters have been, lately.
I’m also going to show pictures of some color forms of Corydalis solida, which are seedlings from the tubers he planted which he ordered from nurseries in the Baltic states some years ago. He posted these on Facebook but I might as well post them here, too.
The plants are crossing and seeding like crazy.
Oh, one other thing. See this?
I think you know what this looks like, and you would be right.
It’s a fake hornet’s nest. The guy I live with bought some of these after seeing some hanging around his neighbors’ house.
Apparently hornets and yellowjackets see these, and go elsewhere to build nests. The guy I live with talked to his neighbor and his neighbor said he was pretty certain that they worked.
Two have been hung under the eaves on the front of our house. One blew away during all the wind but he was able to find it and reattach it.
That’s all I have for today. Kind of a lot, I guess.
I’ll leave you with a picture of me, sitting next to the decrepit dog ramp, with a hope for some rain next week.
Until next time, then.
the miserable gardener 
Viburnum farreri looks very similar to an unidentified Viburnum that I saw in Washington. I suppose that it was not totally unidentified, since someone must know what it is; but I had no idea what it was. It was unexpectedly fragrant, which is likely why it was where it was in a neighbor’s garden. Now you got me wondering.
I remember the fake hornet’s nest. Hornets must not be too bright.
The guy I live with said that Viburnum x bodnantense ‘Dawn’ is a lot more common in gardens. It doesn’t have quite the scent of one of its parents, V. farreri.
Yes, but, if I remember correctly, ‘Dawn’ is light pink. (I just looked it up, and it looks light pink.) Now that you mention it, I do not remember seeing it while in Washington. Perhaps it blooms later, like now. There were a few Viburnum that I did not recognize. While I was there, my Pa inquired about Viburnum plicatum f. tomentosum ‘Mariesii’. Californians tend to notice that one because there is nothing like it here.
The guy I live with is only interested in Viburnum farreri because he likes Farrer’s books. And it’s very different from all the other viburnums.
Viburnums are very diverse.
They are.
“Viburnum x bodnantense ‘Dawn’”. Had it here for 10+ years, and then, pfft.
The guy I live with said that every time he and his wife would visit DBG, any time from early December until February, they would go look to see if Viburnum farreri was in flower, and it usually was. It’s in kind of a protected place, tucked away behind lots of other shrubs, and pretty close to a dead-end street with very large houses on either side of the street.
There was a ‘Dawn’ close to it, and it very often got killed almost to the ground in a bad winter. It must the be other, less hardy parent, V. grandiflorum that’s the culprit.
Mani, I must confess, at first glance (and without a whole cup of coffee in my system while reading this early this morning), I thought you had scored not a fake hornet’s nest, but rather a spiral-cut ham.
The viburnum looks lovely. Our Korean Spice is about to flower at our house.
I am glad you have three forts for thunder and other scary weather.
That’s funny. It wasn’t a spiral-cut ham, though. That would be a lot of ham for the guy I live with to eat.
Multiple forts are pretty excellent.
The guy I live with has tried to grow Korean spice viburnums but they never survived. There’s a Burkwood in the shade garden, but no other viburnums.
Love the idea of hanging a fake wasp nest. That’s so brilliant!
They seem to work, though they make strange noises when blown back and forth by the wind.
Mee-yow!!! You went thru sum seereusslee scary stuff Mani an Guy!! Wee gotted a wild Storm Fursday an Furiday an part of Caturday! Inn fact 11 Pee Em Furiday nite wee were plunged innto darkenss when a Transformer blew up! THE rain was vishuss an THE wind was howlin an whippin efurrything around! Mee iss scared of THE dark so BellaSita sat up with mee to 2 A Em with flashlite. Then wee went to bed an shee reeded. Hydro came on 3 A Em!!! WHAT A RELIEF! Today has been sorta sunny an a bit of wind butt much calmer!
Yore Corydalis solida flowerss are so beeuteefull. Wee got nothin yet! An THE foney Hornet’ss nest iss purrty kewl 😉 Wishin you an Guy a peecefull an wind free week with just THE rite amount of rain!
***purrss*** BellaDharma an {{{hugss}}} BellaSita Mum
Thanks; we’re hoping for some rain because all that wind dried out everything.
Our power went out about ten days ago; it rarely goes out because it’s buried underground. It was kind of scary. The guy I live with said there were lots of power outages after the windstorm.
The guy I live with got the corydalis from overseas, back when it was easier to do that. Then they all started crossing and the pictures are the result.
THE flowersss are beeuteefull Mani! Wee hope you gotted yore needed rain there. Man THE weather has been wild hasn’t it??
We got about a millimeter of rain early this morning. Maybe we’ll get some snow later this week; it won’t be below freezing though.
Mee-yow that iss not alot of rain Mani! An wee hope you do not get snow….then again any precip iss guud where you live rite?
Rain would be good, and so would snow.
Pawss crossed fore ypuss’ Mani & Guy….
Thanks; we hope so.
Wee due two Mani an Guy!!! Pleese Sky Cat let it rain!
It would be nice.
You wish for rain and we wish for dry weather. Same old story with gardeners!
Rain would be nice, for sure. Eight percent humidity here today.
Those wind storms can indeed by scary especially with the threat of fire. Always good to be prepared. We are used to wind here too. This week 70kph winds accompanied by wet snow. Yeah! There were some beautiful reticulated iris and many other small bulbs blooming that will now be squashed. Your corydalis are gorgeous. We visited a garden on the weekend that was full of self sown hepaticas and corydalis. Absolutely beautiful. I hope the rain arrives soon.
Well, we did get a tiny bit of rain very early this morning. They say maybe more later this week, including some snow, which would be fine with us.
The guy I live with said the iris might be okay, or might send up more flowers.