Hummingbird Bush, Summersweet

Last summer I put pictures on this blog of a bush my friend gave me.  She called it a hummingbird bush, but the hummingbird bushes in my plant reference did not resemble it--especially since most were red.

It has pretty white blossoms that appear fairly late in the summer.  It has shiny green leaves that sometimes stay through the winter.  This year they didn't appear till May, and I was beginning to think it had died.

To get to the point of this blog, I was reading my new Birds and Blooms magazine today and found a bush called summersweet, or Clethra alnifolia,  The description and picture match my flowering shrub.

The bush was fully covered with these seeds in the  winter.   I didn't get a  picture of the full display of the seeds since the green was beginning to come  out.  They are brown, not purple as it appears in the picture.

Cucumbers

These early cucumbers needed a little shelter.

 A discarded squirrel  "discourager" provides a bit of protection for the first week or so.

Cucumbers did  great last year in this hanging basket.

Maple Trees

I looked in my tree reference to try to learn what kind of maple tree this is.

A friend gave me the little tree 15-20 years ago. It is a small, with leaves tending to a pale, yellowish green in the summer.

It has multiple small trunks.

Hen and Chickens II

My yard has hen and chicks all around.

Some are in pots meant for the purpose and others are in whatever is lying around.

This plant requires little attention and will grow and multiply most anywhere.

It is a little inclined to disintegrate if watered too much in a pot.

It does well and multiplies in the corner of a flower bed.







Each year about this time I have a large plant sale.  One of my most popular potted plants is the hen and chicks.  I recycle household items as containers and use left-over pots.

Hen and Chickens

Hen and Chickens is a hardy passalong succulent that can be persuaded to grow in all sorts of odd places.   Mine are just the old-fashioned passalong ones, but they come in different colors and shapes.

The good thing about them is that they can be put in all sorts of containers or in a corner of a flower bed, be it sun or shade.  They stay outside all winter with no attention.


My efforts to plant them in tall strawberry jars from the garden center have not been very successful.

 Actually one of the jars broke in two. I used the bottom for a shallow hen and chicken holder.

 The bottomless top I buried and filled with hens and chicks.  They prosper more when buried a bit.   They will soon be totally full.

This is a good example of my lack of success with hens and chicks in a strawberry jar.

This ajuga just dropped in and I let it grow. There is a small fern growing on the other side.