a brief spin of a tour of the garden center: part 4.

a web-spun tour of the garden center hasn't graced a scene in this place lately.

i believe this might be a pia hydrangea. so many kinds of hydrangea exist nowadays.

the more blue-split-purple blooms with a hint of brown at their tips are a lacecap hydrangea, possibly bluebird, but i'm not sure.

a sly tip about hydrangea care-- never prune them until they're almost fully grown for a season in may. let the old tall sticks from the previous year poke upward, even if ugly, till you can tell for certain what's dead and what's not. often, people prune them back while they're dormant after winter, and since in many cases, new growth can grow on old wood, leaves will plop forth, but blooms may be stunted for that year. so even if it's hideous, give the shrub some space for tidying until late may, at least. then it's easier to decide where blooms and new growth are making themselves known for the season.

some newer cultivars of hydrangea can be cut back early without the blooms being stunted, but it's safer to just leave the shrub alone until late spring, so as not to jeopardize any potential bounty of flowers.

black knight butterfly bush is one of the darkest purple of any kind, and the scent of it, like others, is pleasantly akin to grape bubblegum, ever-lovely nose-wise in my book.

an assortment of columbine are out in the garden and nursery worlds. i've only seen a few beyond the common purple and one similar to this but with a blood maroon type of hue to it. 

a lot of the tags on the daylily broke off last season or during winter, but i think this one was an indy inca gold daylily.

sometimes mums are confused about when to bloom. this is the case here, as these puffy topped ones don't realize that it's not fall.

lantana. they remind me of the quirky butterfly bush called honeycomb.

cleome, or spiderflower, is one of my favorite leggy annuals. i have a market pack of cleome  sitting with many other unhoused plants along my sidewalk next to the backyard. i know they'd like a home soon in the soil of my garden. now for time time time.

this perker of petals is tequila sunrise coreopsis. so many kinds of it are just want-ready, at least in my plant addicted mind. a newer kind i would like to try out sometime is the route 66 coreopsis.

this pink popping sweetheart is a magic carpet spirea. magic fits well here in my opinion, as a mood elevator of sorts via the tiniest heavily blushing blooms.

the almighty, beyond durable and hardy daylily here known well from roadsides is what some call the tiger lily. if you kill one, be concerned. these plants love to spread and seem nearly indestructible. i found them titled also as ditch lily, and that name should speak for itself. although i think there is another more spotted orange, downward-facing lily, perhaps asiatic, called, tiger lily, so i'm not sure if they share names or if there's a more appropriate one somewhere for this flower.

the yucca's cupped-like bell flowers have pushed out in full sweeps in the past week or two. yucca survive on barely any water and are semi-evergreen, a relative to cactus.

verbena are often mistaken as a perennial in our region, but they mostly behave as an annual in zone 6b. these appear reddish pink but are more of a medium pink. my camera just battled a bit with the bright of daylight.

red hot poker speak for themselves fairly well also. if only their blooms lasted longer, they'd probably be more popular of a perennial than they already are for their distinguished shape and look.

until next time !