(First!) Foliage Follow Up - June 2012

Following my first ever Bloom Day, it's my first ever Foliage Follow up!

To see more amazing foliage, go see Pam at Digging and all the other amazing gardens in the comments.

Just like with bloom day, I have no theme, I just want to show off some of the interesting foliage in my baby-garden:

In the front garden:
Three different types of foliage growing together:

Ice plant, sedum x rubrotinctum and blue fescue

The sedum loves growing all over the base of the rocks in front garden - I think that's why it has survived for these past 3 years, even though it's not supposed to do well here.
Mexican feather grass (Stipa tenuissima) that's grown back from its hair cut this winter:

There are two clumps of this in the front garden, and I love how they dance in the wind.

Closer to the house, there's more different leaf textures:

Agave schidigra, blue fescue, A. desmettiana

 And on the other side of the driveway, there's the Muhlenbergia capillaris, with last year's blooms still on it. I love this grass, especially in late summer when it's pink!

These also wave in the wind, but less than the feather grass.

 Behind the stone pillar, the hosta is hiding in the shade. I never thought I could grow these here in the desert, but so far they're doing ok.

They haven't turned into a big clump yet though...

 Moving to the back garden, there's the other Agaves, including A. parryi:

This one was just planted this year.

 All the plants in the back garden are still very spaced out, since the garden is still growing up. Another agave that I added was A. ovatifolia (Whale's Tongue agave):

Its still very small

 I can only hope that it grows up to be as wonderful-looking as some of the other ones I've seen, or like Pam at Digging's "Moby".
These next couple of plants were too small when I bought them (at the Huntington Plant sale! sqee!) to put in the ground yet. So they're in container and pipes, and will get moved in a year or two. In this pipe there is: A. tequilana 'Sunrise', A. angustifolia (variegated) and Aloe dorotheae:

The Aloe is the red one... I love the color on it.

 The next pipe is also a work in progress / opportunity for plants to grow, and see if they'll survive the winter. These are an Echeveria subrigida and a Kalanchoe luciae. It may be a bit of denial that I live in the desert to believe that the Kalanchoe can make it through the winter...

But if it does, it might get the pipe all to itself....

 This container on the patio holds three more "I wish these would make it through the winter":
Aloe camperi 'Cornuta', another Echeveria subrigida, and Echeveria hybrid 'Blue Wave':

From the Huntington Garden plant sale.

 I don't know what that stalk is in the middle - maybe a bloom stalk? But it seems to late for that. I guess I'll find out later... The sunflowers are getting ready to bloom also, and are creating wonderful leaves for now:

Sun flower bud - I'm not sure anymore which cultivar this is..

 The plants are rather huge... Here are the three I planted from seed this year:

I think one of these is a red sunflower?

I love the look of the large leaves and plants - I think next year I'd like to grow Castor Beans in the garden, to amp that look up even more!
There's also some edibles that I'm growing more for looks - although if the rhubarb makes it through the summer, I'd like to eat the stalks in a few years:

This is it's first year - waiting to see if it will survive the summer heat

I've learned that rhubarb is grown as an annual here - but I want to see if I can get a big clump in a few years, so I'm not going to harvest anything this year. We'll see what happens! This first year in the back garden is a lot of experimenting with what does and doesn't work.
Like I found out lettuce grows here, as well as what happens when you don't pay attention to your lettuce for a few months:

Pipe full of lettuce!

Maybe next time I'll try harder to take care of them so they can be eaten... but who knew lettuce plants could look so cool?

There still so much more growing in the back garden, but I'll include those in a future post! I'm looking forward to seeing what the rest of the summer brings... and already making plans for next year!