Buds and offsets-1

The watering had a fantastic effect, a lot of beautiful buds appeared. And hopefully more and more will come from now on, so I start a topic with this subject. It's a real joy to photograph them.
Here are a few:

Crocuses

I have shown the flowers of this Colchicum in autumn. Now the leaves are coming:

Colchicum arenarium

Eranthis hyemalis

The same, two days later:

Eranthis with Cyclamen coum

The same, two days later:

Hepatica nobilis

The same, from the back:

Hepatica nobilis

and from close (yes, it fascinates me):

Hepatica nobilis from close

Saxifraga x elisabethae '(had no label)'

and from close:

Daphne sericea

And finally a not hardy Cyclamen:

Cyclamen pseudibericum

Harbingers of Spring

Yes I know this is a nonsense, because the pictures show some overwintering buds, not an oddity at all.
But after all  the spring explosion is somewhere packed in them, and so they contain the promises.

Two herbaceous perennials, whose buds are overwintering near the soil surface:

Cortusa matthioli Alba

Dodecatheon sp.

An early flowering evergreen perennial with buds overwintering in the leaf rosette:

Draba lasiocarpa

And finally a shrublet:

Daphne sericea

And then the camera's accumulators went dead... Maybe I will continue this topic later if I can find another promising buds around.

The End of Summer

I hate the end of summer with the inevitably shortening days.

Yesterday afternoon I made a little collection of what is still enjoyable in our little 'garden' .

Looking through the balustrade of the balcony one can see only a green cavalcade:

but there are some colorful things also.

The blue Campanula portenschlagiana is still in bloom and looks pretty good in the neighborhood of the Habranthus robustus:

Cyclamen purpurascens is also flowering even if not so abundantly as a few weeks ago. This one lives in a pot separately, in the shadow of the lime tree showed yesterday. Maybe I should plant it directly in the big pot of the lime.

The Daphne sericea is a very good plant. After the big spring show it had had all summer some sweet little bouquets for us.  And it also grew a lot, I think it will overgrow its pot more rapidly than I expected for...

The Solenostemons I've got as cuttings this Spring in our  Plants Society give also much color but with their leaves.

And those which are not hardy but bloom all summer. Although not all behaved satisfying at me. Here I want to show only the Brachycome, it only fits in this collection with its little daisy-like flowers. It is perennial and I think it would also fit in a rock garden though not hardy here. I grow it in a separate pot, behind it can be seen my miniature garden with Primulas (not in flower at the moment).

OUR MINIATURE ROCK GARDENS

The 'Palástál' made in spring looks like this now:

The plants have grown not too much during the Summer but this is not unusual, important is that they look healthy except of Leucanthemopsis alpina, who died. If everything goes well they will do better next year, like the others in the 'Ortlerpot' did in their second year:

I've made this 'Ortlerpot' a year ago and it looks very nice. I hope for flowerpower next spring.

This is a smaller, but deeper pot with another Daphne sericea, Potentilla nitida, Saxifraga x andrewsii and Saxifraga 'Leonardo da Vinci'.

And some other developments:

The white Campanula portenschlagiana cuttings are growing well in a semi-shaded place:

The Campanula raddeana made no seeds. This is only chaff:

Draba parnassica

The seedlings in pots died during Summer. But this one put in a 'crevice' is thriving, it has already a nice cushion:

Home Again

After two weeks of alpine wanderings, home again. We've seen lovely South-Tirolean houses full of flowers, "tüchtig" kitchen gardens, and naturally a lot of well known and also some new alpine plants on the brink of snowfields and glaciers. But foregoing this, we visited the Rosarium of Baden bei Wien which was also an unforgettable experience. Although this blog refers to our "garden", I think I will tell and show more about these places when I will be ready with picture selection.

During these weeks our plants were watered by a kind relative of us, who was keeping to my instructions put on every single plant!

It's funny that the alpines seemed to tolerate better the absence of the "baas" then the others.

The Petunia has become leggy and with very few flowers. After a lot of cosmetics is still does not look too well. Well, I tried Petunia the first time this year :)

Neither the Nemesia did fulfill my expectations. Yes, it lives and blooms, but I hoped for a larger clump filled with flowers by midsummer...

Regarding the perennials, the sempervivums are now on the top:

Looking from close, the flowers are really like some jewels:

Habranthus robustus is also flowering, but not too intensive...

Cyclamen purpurascens is just beginning. The florist's Cyclamen persicum, instead of summer dormancy, is in full bloom. Maybe because of the cold at early summer. I must repot it in full flower...

Campanula portenschlagiana and C. raddeana still have some flowers and buds, though not too much.
And Daphne sericea, shown already in April, has all the time some flowers:

Some Troughs

The one with Primulas and Gentiana, showed already many times:

Another trough with a new plant purchased this spring:

Arabis blepharophylla

This one is with Lewisia pygmaea, Lewisia tweedyi and Sempervivum montanum:

And the newest and fondest at present (also for the smell)

Trough with Daphne sericea

This one is named Rosimtál, recollecting a nice place in the Ortler mountain region. That place is the Rosim Tal (Rosim Valley), and tál (pronounced tal) in Hungarian means plate or even trough. In Rosim Tal are growing many Daphne striata and in June the air is filled with its beautiful smell.

And finally, not an alpine but I hope it will flower all summer on the balcony. The faded flowers drop off, so I will have to collect them all summer :)

Nemesia sp.