Mums' Back Yard Garden Spring has sprung and summer too, where are the flowers? This year we dug out pretty much everything but the Minature Rose Bush and a couple of Day Lilies. We needed a fresh start. Everything had become over grown and boring. The first year we built this garden we experimented with lots of different flowers and herbs. That's the best way to find out what you should't do. We didn't research, we just found heat tolerating plants and went at it. By the second year we knew what we didn't want. We kept 4 Rosemary bushes, Day Lilies and the Minature Rose bush. We planted several tubers and bulbs for a wonderful show of Tiger Lilies, Daffodils, Hyasinths, and Bearded Irises. Unfortunately, I didn't get any photos. I also didn't get photos of this years (2003) "Before", however, I do have this years first picks of the overgrown mess that popped up since March. This is the garden that my husband, daughter, son-in-law and grandson built me in 2000. Here is round one of weeding out the summer grasses that got ahead of us. You can see the Lily of The Nile (Agapanthus) that I finally found the courage to put in the ground in March. It hadn't bloomed for 2 years in the pot. As soon as I put it in the ground it produced two beautiful displays. They are almost finished with this year's bloom. I'll get close ups later, after my darling Husband finishes weeding, edging and mowing. I tried to weed, I really did, I had three huge piles of grasses before he began. Another shot of the garden. There is a new Minature Rose bush in there somewhere. You can see some of the garden decorations including the solar lights. These give off just enough light to see the night shadows of the flowers. Here you can see the corner of the garden. It is still full of grasses....we ran into some fire ants...decided to let them be...we will get our revenge. HA HA HA. This is the last section of the garden. My Minature Rose looks good today with all the overgrowth gone. This is the back side of the yard, outside our bedroom window. We let these Cannas grow from the neighbor's fence line into ours. After a couple of years we dug them up, split them and lined the back fence with them. The orange Cannas came from behind the wooden fence. The tree is supposed to be a Mullberry tree. We have yet to see any berries. It has started to become a little more resistant to the fungi and the insects. We still have yet to contact a tree specialist to come out and trim it and treat the problems. By mid July it usually has lost half of it's leaves. It is bare by the beginning of September. No berries, no shade...but I haven't the heart to take it down. We dug it up from a neighbor's yard when it was a wee little twig and nursed it until it could stand on its own. Under the tree is my herb garden. There is Lemon Basil, Lemon Balm, Lavender, St. John's Wart and a little patch of Thyme in there somewhere. Peppermint popped up in here last year. We had peppermint in the big garden, but some of the seeds from the flowers must have made there way over to here. That's it for now. Come back again to see the "After" photos. We won't be doing anymore planting this year. Barb's Quiet Spot Flower Photos 2000 Home Back to The Menagerie Garden