All the little flowers

My garden has big, showy peonies, bright pink bleeding hearts, roses and hydrangeas; the dahlias are coming right along, so are the clematis. But I love best, I think, the littles, the quiet, humble, persistent ground-huggers. Like these.

An old favourite, the Johnny-Junp-Ups. They come back every year on their own.

Alyssums, just getting started. They'll bloom until the first snow, then come back next year.

This one's a leftover from last year that somehow managed to sprout in a hole on a concrete wall.

Bacopa. I planted these last year and didn't expect them to survive the winter. But here they are.

Thyme. There were bees until I arrived with the camera. Sorry I couldn't get a photo of the delicious scent!

Weeds? Lemon balm; good for teas, good just for the scent. And the ubiquitous buttercups; beautiful, but stubbornly invasive.

A neighbour left this on the table by my door, in a cup of water. I don't know for sure what it is. Pretty, isn't it?

Peonies tomorrow.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

En mi jardín hay peonías, grandes y llamativas, corazones sangrantes color de rosa intenso, rosas y hortensias; las dalias ya están por abrirse, y también las clemátides. Pero las que más me gustan, creo, son las florecitas pequeñas, las flores humildes, sin pretensiones, pero duraderas. Como estas.

1. Pensamientos salvajes, Viola tricolor. Regresan cada año sin necesitar cultivo.
2. Los alisos producirán sus flores hasta las primeras nevadas del invierno.
3. Uno, de alguna semilla que cayó en un hoyo en una pared de cemento. ¡Valiente!
4. Bacopas, Chaenostoma cordata. Esta planta la sembré el año pasado. No esperaba que aguantaría el frio del invierno, pero aquí está.
5. El tomillo. Casi siempre hay abejas buscando polen en las flores. Se fueron cuando llegué con la cámara. ¡Lástima que no se puede fotografiar el aroma!
6. ¿Hierba mala? No. Limoncillo, Melissa officinalis. Hace un thé muy bueno, y huele a limón. Con una flor de botón de oro, Ranunculus repens. Las flores son hermosas, pero la planta es invasiva y persistente; las arranco a diario, pero siempre hay flores nuevas.
7. Un vecino dejó esta plantita en la mesa al lado de mi puerta, en una taza de agua. No sé que planta es. ¿Bonita, no?

Mañana, habrá peonías.

Balm on a rainy night

 So it rains. And blows. And rains. And storms. And rains some more. And I've caught a cold and don't dare go out and get myself wet and chilled. Last night, in desperation, I went out in the rain and ripped up a couple of plants of lemon balm, which grows wild beside my carport. I filled a vase with wet lemon balm; it even still had a few flowers.

Lemon balm flowers, Melissa oficinalis. From base to tip, 8 mm.

I was hoping to find something alive on the plant, maybe even a spider for Arachtober. And yes, there was a slug.

Tiny slug, 1cm long.

And a bunch of green aphids. This one fell off, but I coaxed her back onto a leaf.

There were no spiders, but a miniature harvestman was hiding behind a leaf.

5mm long, with a stripe down her back.

Heading for a better hiding spot.

Bye!

I got up this morning and checked the vase. Neither the slug nor the harvestman is anywhere to be found. The aphids were still there.

(And now, do I have a tiny slug wandering around my kitchen? Or eating my house plants? When he shows up, he's going out into the rain again.)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Pues llueve. Y sopla un viento fuerte. Y llueve. Y hay tempestad. Y llueve aun más. Y a mí me ha pegado una gripa y no me atrevo a salir a empaparme con agua fria. Anoche, ya harta de mis cuatro paredes, salí en la lluvia y arranqué unas plantas del toronjil (hoja de limón) que siempre crece cerca de la puerta.

Llené un frasco con ramas del toronjil. Todavía tenía unas cuantas flores.

Fotos:

1. La flor de toronjil. De la base al punto de los pétalos mide 8 mm.
2. Una babosa chiquitita, de un cm. de largo.
3. Un áfido verde; había varios. Este se había caído; luego le acerqué una hoja y volvió a subir.
4. Esperaba alguna araña para el grupo de Arachtober, pero en su lugar, hallé este opilón escondido tras una hoja. Mide 5 mm de cola a cabeza. No medí las patas.
5. Aquí se trata de esconder de nuevo.
6. —¡Adiós! — me dice.

Me levanté esta mañana y examiné el toronjil de nuevo. Ni la babosa ni el opilón se pueden ver. Pero siguen allí los áfidos.

(Y ahora, ¿tengo una babosa dando vueltas en mi cocina? ¿O se está comiendo mis plantas caseras? Cuando la encuentro, se irá afuera a la lluvia otra vez.)

To cause the heart to become merry

My garden always has at least one lemon balm plant. I never plant it, and I often rip out large armfuls when it gets too enthusiastic, but it always comes back. Now, as the rest of the garden lies sad and frozen, the lemon balm is fresh and strong. I just picked a couple of leaves, highly scented, enough to make a good cup of lemony tea.

A few stems, brought inside, produced flowers at the end of October.

Lemon balm, Melissa officinalis.

The flowers are tiny, less than 1 cm. long, growing in the axils of the upper leaves.

Pink flowers, reddish corollas.

Nicholas Culpeper (1814)... suggested it to be used for weak stomachs, to cause the heart to become merry, to help digestion, to open obstructions of the brain, and to expel melancholy vapors from the heart and arteries. (Wikipedia)

Cold-weather aphid

In all the cold weather, most of my garden has shrivelled and shrunk. The nasturtiums are a smear in the mud, the hydrangea rattles pale brown heads in the wind. Only the alyssum still blooms, draped over the wall, scorning the rain that tries to grind it into the cement.

And the invasive (but still tolerated for its scented leaves) lemon balm, cut down to the ground a month ago, has sprouted new leafy stalks. I cut them down again and brought a handful in to make tea. But they turned out to be a home for aphids, and the whole kit and kaboodle ended up in a glass of water, growing under my window.*

Lemon balm leaves and aphid, on my kitchen counter

The plant is used to attract bees to make honey. It is also grown and sold as an ornamental plant. The essential oil is used as a perfume ingredient, but the plant has other culinary and medicinal uses. Lemon balm is used in some toothpastes. ... as a flavouring in ice cream and herbal teas, both hot and iced, often in combination with other herbs such as spearmint. It is ... also paired with fruit dishes or candies. Additionally, it can be used in fish dishes and is the main ingredient in lemon balm pesto. (From Wikipedia)

*I am too soft-hearted for my own good, sometimes.

And tonight, the evergreens are all glittering with new frost. Proper winter weather, finally!