Garden medley

[fivemack]

I bought, a few months ago, a bag of Miscellaneous Seeds.

They grew no beanstalks to heaven (fortunate, since I had returned the axe), but flowers in undeniable miscellany; I planted them densely enough that the snails couldn't get them all.

I wonder if snails that have feasted on broccoli plants are a delicacy? I have had a total of seven beans from the bean plants, the carrots have not thrived, and all but one of the broccoli plants are snail-plagued skeletons. The potato plants are copious, but their leaves an unhealthy yellow; should they have flowered yet?



My brother James (to whom many happy returns of the day) pointed out that, by discussing FORTRAN, email out-sourcing and the state of the Polish wheat harvest, I might well have driven off every single visitor to this blog. However, any remaining visitors will know more about flowers than I do; can you identify any of these plants? I'd particularly like a name for the shy blue flower with a white inner and a yellow centre, that produces a flower most mornings which has dropped off and been replaced elsewhere the next evening - you can see it more clearly in the huge picture that you get by clicking on the top picture of the bed.

Comments

[redbird]

I'm sorry I can't help with the flower identifications; my references are North American, and not in easy reach at the instant. The "shy blue flower" at first made me think of day flowers (that's a non-Linnaean name, of course, but googling on "Virginia dayflower" should get you a representative of the kind), but I can't find what you describe in the huge version of the top picture.

[fivemack.livejournal.com]

The blue flower is at [1778, 794] in the huge version; I took some closer-up photos this morning which I'll upload tonight.

[ellarien]

Those are certainly miscellaneous, and nothing is very recognizable from my mostly north-midlands experience. I think the flat pink stuff (top left of the small pics) might be milkweed, and the bottom left some kind of toadflax. There's something on the right of the panorama that looks like a rather anaemic snapdragon.

[helenbr.livejournal.com]

The orange one in the top right of the top picture is very familiar to me. I had thought it was called a nasturtium but neither Google nor Wikepedia seems to agree with me so either I'm remembering wrongly or I have been misinformed at some point. Neither of which helps you very much but if I remember differently, I'll let you know.

[aendr.livejournal.com]

marigold, but that's the only one mother and I can name - recognise, but not name.

[helenbr.livejournal.com]

Actually, we have much the same problem. Our new house has a garden with well-established plants in which we have a duty (and indeed a desire) to keep nice and tended. Only I have no idea what any of them are either or what we should be doing to them.

What I think I want is a book/website which has decision flowcharts like the examples they used in schools where it says "Is it a tree or a flower" -> "How many leaves does it have" -> "What colour are the flowers" until you end up with "Congratulations, it's a buttercup". Except I want it for the whole of the British garden plant range, which means it probably doesn't exist.