Q & A, part 3...

All the flowers of all the tomorrows are in the seeds of today.
(Author Unknown)
The orange butterfly weed is blooming and waiting for the monarchs to lay eggs, soon it will be covered in caterpillars and they will strip the leaves. There were 2 questions in the comments yesterday so since I hadn't done a Q & A in a few weeks, I looked back for more and only found one other that hadn't been answered. On June 20th, Lynne asked "Have you ever offered garden tours?". The answer is that I have lots of summer visitors asking for tours and I get several calls a summer from groups asking if they can come and do a tour. So no, I don't offer but I almost always (if my time allows) graciously accomodate those who ask :-) Yesterday, Kayceebeebee commented and asked "I've never seen a vanilla spoon before. Do they grow in MN?". Vanilla spoon is an annual from Proven Winners. It is what I call a "speciality annual" as they are sold single and not in 4 or 6 packs. I especially like the Proven Winners as I have the best luck with them. So yes, it grows in MN but freezes out so you have to replace it every year. If you remember my Mother's day post we went and purchased my speciality annuals that day, I buy those for all the containers and a few unusual ones to put in the ground. Another one purchased that day is the Hot Lips salvia pictured below.
Yesterday, Lynne asked "How do you keep the bunnies out?". The answer is Gabi & Ruger, our dog & granddog who also lives with us. They are outside farm dogs with free roam of the property and frequent rabbit hunters. When I go outside in the morning the first thing they do is patrol the garden. In the winter, they get quite lazy and spend most of their day sleeping in the warm garage so we were able to enjoy feeding Joseph & the girls. As soon as it was warm out, I discontinued feeding them the corn in order to protect them from our mighty hunters. I took a few shots this morning of the whole backyard garden because the beautiful close up bloom shots I have been showing are a little misleading. The garden is still mostly green and doesn't hit it's prime until mid to late July. That is why I get such joy of seeing each new set of blooms each day and my morning ritual is to walk around (ignore the weeds) and see what has opened. In this shot, you can see Gabi returning from her morning run through. As always you can click on any of my shots for the large view.
I also enjoy doing an occasional "Where's Ruger" as sometimes he is a little harder to spot, plus it is a send out to Nathan our son (it is his dog). So in this opposite view of the mostly green garden, Where's Ruger?
With all the outside house remodeling being done, I am redoing the whole front landscape. The first to be worked on is a small rose garden and I have added the first two roses. Easy Elegance Sunrise, Sunset...
and Morden Sunrise.
The gardens are always a work in progress for me and I hope to show you the angel garden as soon as I weed it!