Coneflower Garden

Coneflower Garden, a photo by linfrye .. on Flickr.

7" x 10" Splash and Splatter
WN Artist Quality Paints
Canson WC Journal Paper

The sun has finally come out and we can see blue skies once again. I don't remember such a rain-filled spring and summer!

Despite all the grey skies, my coneflowers are as happy as ever - bopping about in the breezes, being visited by butterflies and other pollinators, and lending the morning such an intoxicatingly sweet scent ...

These biennials seem to find a comfy home throughout my property. They once were contained in a small 'herb-sized' hexagonal bed and now have 'moved' to the front beds, side beds, and here and there, even the back beds! Not that I mind at all, as I find them eminently cheerful.

Each fall, I take their dried brown seeds and scatter them about, helping the flowers in their movement across my property. In our warm fall weather, the seeds sprout and leaves form a basal rosette which later dies back in the winter. In the spring, the biennial plant grows another set of leaves and flowers. By planting these seeds in the fall, they are tricked into flower production in one year instead of waiting the two years to flower.

With the blue skies and sun, our temps are rising again -- mid 90s for the rest of the week. But I'll gladly take a bit more heat to see that sun again!

Hope your week is going well!