Tuesday Bouquet: The "Present"

 

It's supposed to be a boxed gift wrapped with a ribbon.  The roses are supposed to be the bow on the box. This is a different angle:

It's actually better than the photos indicate.  No, really!  The roses will open more (theoretically) and look more prominent and bow-like. 

An interesting exercise because of the Chrysanthemums ("buttons" in floristspeak).  We were given two bunches each.  My first bunch had extremely thin, soft, weak stems.  I struggled getting those thin, soft, weak stems into the foam to create the floral "wrapping paper" of the foam "box".  I spent nearly the whole class on that.  When I ran out of the first bunch and started on the second bunch of Chrysanthemums--a surprise!  They had thin, very strong, very hard stems, easy to stick into the foam.  A good lesson:  sometimes it's not me--sometimes its Chrysanthemums with weak stems.  I felt like not an idiot for a change.   I'll take another photo in a day or two, in case it looks more present-like.  

Presently in the garden--a trip up the west side slope to check on the fifty narcissus bulbs planted late last year.  

The 'Snow Glow' Agaves on the slope look gorgeous.  They are close to flowering.  One of my most stupid gardening decisions ever, one of many, was planting them up on the slope.  Their beauty is such that they should be in very prominent spots where they can be constantly admired close up rather than from afar.  Well, now I know.

A few of the native Lupines appeared.  We must be low on rabbits at the moment--yay!--they usually eat the seedlings:

The Ceanothus 'Ray Hartman' planted a year or two ago looks...okay.  Better than it did last summer, certainly.  Still not thriving, but it eventually might.  The Rhus ovatifolia I planted six or seven years ago looked awful for the first three years, okay for the next two.  Now, it's thriving. 

Will you eventually thrive, 'Ray'? 

 A poignant note on 'Ray'--the last purchase I made at Tree Of Life nursery, a well known native plant grower in south Orange County.  The land is being developed for either housing or retail for all the housing going in around there.   Sigh.  Habitat for deer and pumas and butterflies and birds and Oaks lost.

As for the Narcissus...

Hmm.  Not anywhere near fifty have appeared.  More like five or six.

Hmm...looks like a critter investigated that one (blooming!) and decided it wasn't edible:

I accidentally chose a bad (super super dry) winter in which to plant the bulbs.  Oh, well.  The existing clump on the slope, which was a single bulb many years ago, has at least increased over the years.  Now flowering:

Perhaps the few new planted Narcissus bulbs will eventually do that, too.  

The highlight of the slope at present is a massive old plant of Rhodanthemum hosmariense, inexplicably glorious in such a dry winter:

It's over four feet long, about three feet wide, and eight inches high, in terribly hot, terribly dry conditions.  

Didn't do a damn thing for it, and this is how it rewards me:

Love that plant!!!  Call it 'Morocco Daisy' if you must, though Rhodanthemum is relatively pronounceable and recallable, until this fine plant's previous genus classification, Pyrethropsis.  Thankfully, Rhodanthemum won. 

Besides the one on the west slope,   multiple R. hosmariense in the garden are joyfully feeding bees at the moment, while most of the rest of the non-succulent garden is either cut back or nearly asleep.

I like the triangle they're making here:

Also off the slope, the potted freebie not-Tuberoses are producing more blooms:

And there are the first "Dutch" Iris of the year!

Bluest right before they open:

We're expecting a good rain here for the next two or three days, as much as an inch.  We're at 1.69" for the rain year that began in October.  Any rain is a gift.