After incinerating us in late June, Portland weather has settled down to pleasant 70-80 degree highs for a few weeks. It makes for nice gardening, but there are multiple plants in my garden that would like more than cloudy mornings and gently warming days. Some like it hot - me among them! But since we're already halfway through summer (nooooo!) I do have some summer flowers, and a few of their pollinator friends, to share today.
Here's Echinacea 'Sombrero Salsa Red'.
Another pollinator attractor is Helenium puberulum, with its odd little button flowers. To the left of it are the fading flowers of Salvia desoleana.
Once the individual florets on Echinops ritro open, they'll be covered with bees.
Eryngium agavifolium seems to attract flies. I can't detect any kind of foul odor but there must be something there... The flower heads are cool, regardless.
The flowers in the top image, a newer Hesperaloe parviflora plant, are a softer pink and paler on the inside than the ones on my five-year-old plant. This one came from our spring bloggers swap, and I'm delighted it settled in happily enough to bloom this summer. The older plant is below, with a happy bee explorer.
Cypella herbertii keeps pumping out blooms.
While looking out for pollinators today, I noticed the tiny blooms of Origanum vulgarum.
Catananche caerulea is a nice hit of blue to lead into all my orange flowers coming up.
Agastache 'Acapulco Orange' finally doing it's thing. It wants more sun, but I love it right here near the patio.
Agastache rupestris.
Agastache aurantiaca 'Tango', I believe.
A late-blooming milkweed, Asclepias tuberosa. The earlier blooming plants had their flowers cooked, so there were no milkweed pods. I hope this one will make seed after it opens.
Lastly, Crocosmia 'Corona'. I grow just a few crocosmia these days, due to their thuggish ways. This one may not last much longer in the garden (I say that every year) but until I evict it, I'll enjoy its pretty, bi-colored flowers.
I'm joining Carol, of May Dreams Gardens, to celebrate the flowers blooming in our gardens on the 15th of each month.
Happy Bloom Day, all!
