More Roses and Dr Jekyll & Mr Po

A Few More Roses

Here's 'New Dawn,' a climber that will eventually be trellised to enclose the Croquet Lawn. I don't have a lot of experience with the cultivar, but so far, it seems most impressive as a bush rather than as an individual flower. The flowers are kind of sloppy looking up close, but from a little distance you just see dark green foliage and copious, good-sized pale pink flowers.

Meanwhile, I've got a tentative ID on our mystery stripy rose: ''Ferdinand Pichard.' If the internet is at all a reliable gauge (and I'm not sure that it is) there are actually relatively few striped roses. Bicolors, yes. Stripes, not so much. And of all the stripes only FP looked at all close. In most pictures, it's a bit pinker than ours (most people describe it as red on pink rather than red on white), but I've noticed that the younger our flowers are, the pinker they are. (See below--older flower left, younger flower right) And I found this picture by this French photographer on pbase that's really a dead ringer for our rose.

And here's our rose bed--much remains to be done, especially in terms of adding small trees and trellises, but I'm pleased with the progress the bushes have made thus far. I'm on the fence about whether or not to risk a bay laurel and/or a 'Forest Pansy' redbud this late in the season. Probably best to wait till September, but it'd be nice to get a little screening in place now that baseball season has started and our neighbors are coaching again. Sometimes I step out the kitchen door and feel like I'm on stage. If I'm in my PJs and bare feet, this is especially disconcerting. I need the enrobing action of a nice, stout evergreen like bay laurel.

I've got a better picture of our unknown crinum, more fully in bloom than before. I think the flowers are a bit too small and pale to be 'Ellen Bosanquet,' but based on the pictures I was able to find, I couldn't really say for sure. Other possible candidates include 'Elizabeth Traub' and 'Eagle Rock.' It has an pretty large umbel of flowers--I count 14 buds in a single inflorescence.


Cry Havoc and Let Slip the Cats of War
And finally, the kitty. Yikes. We sleep with our bedroom door locked.


Actually, although he looks like a vampire fiend from Hell in this picture, he was just yawning. He was bored by me taking pictures, but not especially annoyed or inclined to lunge for my throat. A second later, he looked like this. Good kitty.



A Meteorological Note
The sky is really flinging the rain down on us by the bucketfuls. They threatened hail--I hope it skirts our (newish) magnolia. But our recently re-transplanted ginkgo and 'Reine des Violettes' rose will appreciate the moisture.