The Garden of Bogturtle- June 1-10, 2026

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Growing on the Red Cedar Tree that is where we park, Lonicera 'Mandarin' looks better and better each year.

Geranium sanguinium 'Alba' is shown again below. 


I found out this Streptocarpus is named, for some strange reason, 'Siberia'. But the flowers do look just like the dark violet velvet.


Here for many years, with no real increase, the unusual blue-green clone of the Southern native, Zenobia pulverulenta, is showing its little urn shaped flowers. Showing they are part of the Heath family.



Oenothera tetragona, I think. And Evening Primrose that shows 4 parts in the middle of the flower. You are likely to always have this fine plant, if you plant it. I have to thin it, to control it. 


Geranium sanguineum 'Alba', shown again.



Looking wonderful. Red Knockout Roses were cut to about a foot from the ground, and are coming back wonderfully. 

Not problem free, apparently, the one to the far end is beset with thrips, that hide under the leaves and eat, leaving only the top layer of a leaf behind. Which turns brown. I am using insecticide and it may help.

Pratia peduncularis, the Blue Star Creeper, again


Happy I have Lychnis calcedonica, The Maltese Cross, with me. Some say it is one of the few truly red perennials.  Pathetically small flower heads on the only plant I see, this year. The tops can be a bunch of flowers the size of a saucer. Should act like a dependable cottage garden plant. It is not likely to take over, here, as the yellow Evening Primrose is. But I am happy to have that fine perennial,

 

A great clump of what I think is called the Circle Flower, or Lysmachia punctata. The flowers circle the stem, and many, I have seen, have blackish marks on the five petals. Mine don't.


Very happy to have Asclepias incarnata, in its white flowered form. The name implies a flesh colored flower, and that is what you do usually see at sunny swamp edges. There is a cultivated form called A. i. 'Ice Ballet', and I don't know if this is the seed of that.  But the plant is easily 3 feet tall, with small flower clusters. The sort of wild appearance that shows, by selection over generations, a worthwhile cottage garden perennial could be developed. In the same planter two colors of the tough perennial called 'Butterfly Weed' or A. tuberosa. Nor yet blooming. The two would not, naturally, grow together. A. tuberosa endures drought. A. incarnata needs ample water. 

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