Category: Plants
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Clematis flammula
What was ordered and planted as “Clematis flammula rubromarginata” in November 2023, turned out to be “Clematis flammula Sweet Summer Love” in July of 2024. Which is a good thing because it’s actually a lot prettier than the variety I had ordered. “Clematis flammula Sweet Summer Love” grows to about 250 cm high and 100…
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Myrtus communis
Myrtles are one of the most ancient Mediterranean plants. They grow very old, but they also grow veeerrrry slowly. And they’re not quite as robust – at least in my experience – as one would think. Over the past three years I lost two of them and managed to keep two others alive only with…
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Spilling the Beans…
It took three summers to determine which kind of beans or peas will really work for us in this mediterranean garden. What works for me: Asparagus Beans / Vigna unguiculata sesquipedalis A definite keeper! From early July through late September I can harvest handfuls of long green, tasty and tender beans. They are also popular…
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Ipomoea
No garden without the large luminous flowers of Ipomoea purpurea “Heavenly Blue” or “Grandpa Ott” – my favorite color varieties in my previous gardens. But it turns out to be just too hot and dry for them here. I did try sowing them but if they come up at all they need to be watered daily…
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Trees for a Dry Mediterranean Garden
When we re-did our garden layout in the winter of 2023/2024, the goal was to turn the wide open vegetable and flower garden, where everything burned up in the summer, into a “park garden” with lots of shade trees. I researched a lot and made up a nice little shortlist of more or less drought-tolerant…
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Vitex agnus-castus latifolia
Vitex agnus-castus is a native of the Mediterranean region, known since antiquity and always believed to be an anaphrodisiac (“chaste tree”), although this has never been scientifically proven. It is widely cultivated in warm, temperate regions, loves full sun, a well-draining, loamy, neutral to alcaline soil, and is hardy to −15 °C as well as pretty…