Desperate for a Flower Container

My uncle was getting rid of an old cement watering sink.  Of course, I immediately think of  a place for it in my yard that wouldn't look too tacky.  It has been settled for a couple of years as a home for the huge perennial zebra grass.  Its neighbor is a pipe section of a culvert that holds an angel trumpet in the summer.

Some large hostas reside in an old enamel sink in the front yard.  By planting hostas around its base, I made it not too overwhelming and really a very nice container.  By the way, I disagree with those who try to convince me the sink was once a urinal.  Another enamel sink hides behind the aforementioned cement sink.

At this time of year the only word for my flower containers is ugly.  They have no flower clothes to cover what they really started life as....

UGLY!

This cement sink will be filled with

six-foot tall zebra grass this summer.

 

This ugly sink (I think) will be covered with hostas
when June gets here.

 



This discarded section of culvert will hold an angel trumpet come summer.



Quick Ground Cover

An effective way to cover a section with ground cover is shown here. First find a discarded pan. The one here is a medium-sized frying pan. A lighter weight pan might work as well since you need to punch a hole in it. Fill the pan with whatever ground cover you want to use. The dig a hole in the section you want to cover. Place the pan even with the soil. Keep watered for a while and then ignore it.

 

 

This pot was planted fairly late last year. I am removing it to go to another place and filling the hole. I am using creeping Jenny, but any ground cover with a tendency to send out runners would work. Ajuga or lamiium would be good.

  



Hummingbird Vines

Different outlooks--the same flower. 

This pretty vine evidently grows in different climates.

Some Florida visitors commented on our cypress vine.  Some one called it a cardinal vine.To us in the mountains, it is a hummingbird vine.  It does attract hummingbirds.  My friend Sheila got it from her mother who got it from a friend in Charlotte.  It is truly a passalong plant.

I really like the vine.  It dies back at frost, but when early summer comes, it returns full force, coming from the hundreds of little seeds that dropped in the fall.  Later in the summer it grows vigorously but has a rather dainty appearance. 

My husband has a different outlook.  He thinks it is a pest.  It may be dainty, but it climbs up his tomato vines, the azaleas, the rosebush.  It doesn't matter if he kills a few.  There are plenty more in the yard during late summer until frost.  Incidentally, you might be careful in the late spring.  Those little emerging vines look a lot like weeds.

What plant should never be allowed in your house when it is blooming?

 It smells almost as bad as a skunk.  The carrion cactus is aptly named.  The beautiful starfish-like blossom has the distinctive aroma of the dead meat which gives it its name.The smell is so convincing that blow flies seem to appear from nowhere to settle on its petals. 

This plant can't stand our cold winters.  It has to retire to the basement and sometimes parts of the cactus seem to rot, but usually enough remains for a fresh effort in the spring.  It tends to wait fairly late in the summer to bloom.

Take one of the stems, stick it in a pot, and it will root rather easily.  You can share it with your friends, but be sure to warn them how unpresentable it can be.  My friend JoAnn  shared the plant with my mother and me.  I think her neighbor gave it to her.

Ornamental Plow

While cleaning out my parents' old smoke house,

I found this old plow that had been there at least
fifty years.  Chub Wilhide had given it to them
and labeled it Pete and Repete.

Not being prone to using a hand plow, I found
a use for it.  I put it in the middle of a flower
 bed to use as a frame for my clematis.  It has
just been put in place and is waiting for
 a new clematis to be planted. 

I wil post a picture later in the summer to
see how well it does.

Church Bazaar Purchases

Every summer our church has a large bazaar with all  proceeds going to missions.
We usually raise close to $30,000 in the two days of the sale. I bought these
 two items for a total of $5.00.Why so cheap?  It took my husband all afternoon
 to put the welcome sign back together.

Are these tacky?  Perhaps.  But I think they are appealing and  it doesn't matter
if they are a little too much.


This little girl is my favorite.  She hangs in a bush in our front yard and appeals to
visiting children.  We had to tie her to the bush because she kept turning her rear to the street.





Woodpecker and Lamp Post

This wood pecker searches for bugs at the top of a tall lamp post.  Obviously he has a tough beak.

Pileated Woodpecker

I wonder how long it will take me to finish off this tree!

Another Aptly Named Plant

There can be no doubt where the elephant ear got its name.  The example here is only a medium size plant.  The bulb was planted in the spring and really had a somewhat slow start.  I will have to dig it at frost and winter the bulbs in the basement.  I live in the mountains of western North Carolina, and I won't take a chance we have an extra hard freeze.

 I also have some elephant ears in pots that I just cut back and move to the basement.  Actually, my friend Linda, who inherited a large old house near us from her parents, has a clump of these plants probably twenty feet in diameter that have wintered at least 25 years without freezing and rotting.  They probably are so close together the bulbs protect each other, and the dead foliage provides mulch.  You can imagine how impressive her elephant ear patch is.

Mamie Keith's Rose

About fifty years ago a friend of my mother gave her a rooted cutting from the beautiful pink strong-stemmed rose in her yard. It prospered and became a large bush.  I got some of the children of this bush and they are still growing in my yard.  I have shared this rose with others.  Mamie Keith has been dead for many years, but everyone still calls the rose the Mamie Keith rose.  Incidentally her name also lives on in the Mamie Keith Children's Wing of our local library, which received a large bequest in her will.



Christmas Gifts

My grown children have trouble thinking of
something to give me for Christmas.  You can only use so many sets of garden tools. 

I got this neat fellow a couple of years ago.  Each feature is separate and occasionally a piece falls off. He may be missing an ear right now.

Below is a bird refuge I got this year.  The bird is supposed to seek shelter in cold weather but none have visited yet.  Perhaps the motion of the wind causes motion sickness.  I got a set of three.

Potting Soil and Pots

Since I sometimes sell  plants, I need inexpensive potting soil.  We have a bagging mower and dump clippings in the edge of our back woods.  After a couple of years this blends with the soil and can be plowed or just mixed into useful soil.  Mix just plain old dirt with the clippings for a more solid soil.

Another source is rotten dead pine trees from our small wooded area (about half an acre) behind our house.  Several years ago the power company cut about 15 trees from under the lines.  Not knowing what to do with them, we just stacked them in the woods.  It took six or seven years for them to rot into usefulness.   I use discarded pots from the dumpster and just plain old discarded cooking pots, which sometimes can be really interesting.  People just leave empty pots at my house, even if I am not there.  I think the pot that I burned soup beans in has been reinvented as a flower pot three times, since people tend to return the pots from the flowers they bought at my sale.