"If ant hills are high in July, the coming winter will be hard" American Folklore

“Seeing death as the end of life is like seeing the horizon as the end of the ocean.”

― David Searls

I got out on the ocean a few weeks ago and that felt really good, caught a few salmon, lingcod and cabezon. I love all the quotes  you can read about seeing beyond the horizon. I'm reading a pretty in depth book about Magellens circumnavigation and it is something to think that ancient humans really did sometimes see the horizon as the end. The book literally spends the first 300 pages or so just getting to the point where they are sailing down the Guadalquivir.  I'm trying to see beyond so many things right now, to envision a better place for humanity and I have to be honest It's not that easy. We need more folks to put the boat in gear and place the compass needle at 270 degrees, or whatever compass point gives you a horizon and head for better times. 

Lilium davidii 'Berry Red'
I wish I could go back and talk to Jack Poff, Mrs. Berry's long time gardener and one of my early mentors about this one, I'm sure he would have a story about it, and if he didn't I bet he would make one up. A huge thanks to the wonderful growers at Wild Ginger Farms for getting this one out on the market! Now if they would only get that Scoliopus bigelovii that grew up on the hillside propagated! wink, wink. I bought a bulb of from Wild Ginger last year at the Bush Pasture Park sale and it's now occupying a prominent place next to the treasured Rocks Peony and an Edgeworthia in the slight shade of a purple leaved flowering plum, towering to 6' tall with it's deep red flowers back set on the purple, it's like the dying embers of a fire  when you see it backlit by a summer sunset. 

The rock garden is a splash of color and a few things that will be moved, I have a fondness for these native Checkermallows from my years spent restoring the Willamette Valley Wetland ecosystems around Salem. They do get a bit rangy as they go to seed and often fall over. They really do need to be out in the wet meadow part of the property but they seed around and I can't get myself to pull them out until they are 6' tall and it's too late!

I've been swamped with folks asking about the summer bulb catalog, and I will say that it's coming soon! I have a busy couple of weeks coming up though and so I'm tentatively going to say it should be out around the first or second week of August.

Cheers,

Mark