Well, the season is getting pretty late now, but there are a few late bloomers hanging on, hoping for warm Indian summer days! Here are some of the things we’re still enjoying in our yard:

The ‘Pink Simplicity’ roses have done better this year, with more regular watering and fertilizer. I finally trimmed them back on August 11th, and they grew back with lots of buds. Maybe I won’t replace them after all. We’ll see how their spring bloom is next year. On the right is Anemone x hybrida ‘Honorine Jobert’ — always a great flower in the early fall.

These are shots of Caryopteris clandonensis, or Blue Mist Spirea. It’s not really a spirea, but that’s a common name for it. It is EXTREMELY attractive to bees, so I had to move these away from our deck a few years ago. My wife and kids definitely didn’t like being near all those bees!

I learned this summer that — yes, indeed — Shasta Daisies will rebloom if you cut back the dead heads in July. I didn’t do that to all of them; I tried an experiment (either that or I was too busy to do them all!) and cut some back to see if they behaved differently than the others. Yes, they did, so now I’ll shear back the tips to just cut off all the spent blooms every July. Nice to know it works! The other shot is an annual African daisy — Dimorphotheca. They didn’t do very well, because I think they didn’t get enough hours of sunlight in the places I planted them in the front flowerbed.

And last, but definitely not least, I have been very impressed with these new Delosperma cooperi iceplants that I grew from seed this year. They flowered very quickly and have continued to flower all summer and now into the fall. This is a wonderful plant!