{"id":484,"date":"2009-04-13T10:54:58","date_gmt":"2009-04-13T18:54:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/2009\/04\/13\/spring-garden\/"},"modified":"2009-12-23T09:09:23","modified_gmt":"2009-12-23T17:09:23","slug":"spring-garden","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/2009\/04\/13\/spring-garden\/","title":{"rendered":"Spring Garden"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A few faithful readers have reminded me that I&#8217;m overdue for a garden update. Since the backyard has burst into bloom with spring, I have to agree that it&#8217;s definitely past time. I&#8217;ll start with some orchids that are right on their spring schedules: a great purple <a href=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/identify\/orchids\/epidendrum.html\">Epidendrum<\/a> and a pink &amp; purple <a href=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/2008\/05\/07\/orchid-of-the-day-bletilla-striata\/\">Bletilla<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Epidendrum flowers\" href=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/04\/epidendrum_640px.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/04\/epidendrum_640px.thumbnail.jpg\" alt=\"Epidendrum flowers\" \/><\/a><a title=\"Bletilla flowers\" href=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/04\/bletilla_striata_640px.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/04\/bletilla_striata_640px.thumbnail.jpg\" alt=\"Bletilla flowers\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>As for non-orchid blooms, this Sage offers a multi-sensory experience &#8212; soft, furry, pineapple-scented leaves and fuzzy, hot-pink flowers. It grows more than 5 ft tall (1.5 m) and puts on a big spring show with dozens of blooms. Little blue Forget-me-not&#8217;s return every year to the garden. The tiny flowers are great, but the seeds that follow are encased in small burrs that stubbornly attach to clothing. The small, dark red flowers belong to Pittosporum trees that line our back fence.<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Salvia flowers and leaves\" href=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/04\/salvia_dorisiana_640px.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/04\/salvia_dorisiana_640px.thumbnail.jpg\" alt=\"Salvia flowers and leaves\" \/><\/a><a title=\"Forget-me-not flowers\" href=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/04\/myosotis_640px.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/04\/myosotis_640px.thumbnail.jpg\" alt=\"Forget-me-not flowers\" \/><\/a><a title=\"Pittosporum flowers\" href=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/04\/pittosporum_flowers_640px.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/04\/pittosporum_flowers_640px.thumbnail.jpg\" alt=\"Pittosporum flowers\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>In the final set of photos, the eye-catching yellow flowers are strongly scented Freesias, and the pink tubular flowers are Veltheimias. They don&#8217;t have a scent, but are definitely charming in their own right. Both Freesias and Veltheimias are corms (similar to bulbs) that are native to South Africa. They grow with winter rains, bloom in the spring, and then go dormant during the dry summer. This schedule makes them perfect for San Francisco&#8217;s Mediterranean-type climate, since the showers we had this past week will probably be the last until next winter&#8217;s rainy season. Meanwhile, it&#8217;s time for me to water the other parts of the garden that can&#8217;t wait 8 months for rain.<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Freesia flowers\" href=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/04\/freesia_640px.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/04\/freesia_640px.thumbnail.jpg\" alt=\"Freesia flowers\" \/><\/a><a title=\"Veltheimia flowers\" href=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/04\/veltheimia_-bracteata_640px.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/04\/veltheimia_-bracteata_640px.thumbnail.jpg\" alt=\"Veltheimia flowers\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A few faithful readers have reminded me that I&#8217;m overdue for a garden update. Since the backyard has burst into bloom with spring, I have to agree that it&#8217;s definitely past time. I&#8217;ll start with some orchids that are right on their spring schedules: a great purple Epidendrum and a pink &amp; purple Bletilla. As [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-484","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general-gardening","category-photos"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/484","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=484"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/484\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1719,"href":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/484\/revisions\/1719"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=484"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=484"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.aboutorchids.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=484"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}