IN THE FIELD: Purple Proliferates
My Mom has a small garden just off her patio filled with flowers of many varieties. Some of the flowers are her favorite perennials that return every year. To fill in the spaces and nooks and crannies, she will plant annuals in and among the plants waiting to bloom so there is always a flush of color.
Last spring a year ago, she planted several annual ageratum plants in the front corner of the flower bed. She felt it would add a nice splash of color next to her collection of small rocks. The plants flourished in the tiny rock garden. Later that year as part of the autumn cleanup, she pulled the plants along with all the other annuals that were finished blooming since they are not cold hardy. Apparently the seeds of ageratum plants are.
This spring, long before my Mom had planted any other annuals, little mounds of green leaves and purple flowers began to pop up everywhere. Yes, everywhere. Somehow they have spread throughout the whole flower garden creating a carpet of purple and green. It really is quite lovely, but it isn’t exactly what she had planned. They even hopped over the gravel path and took up residence in the raised bed vegetable garden I built for her.
I don’t think I’m going to tease her anymore with having two green thumbs and somehow always managing to create bionic growing conditions.
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David Heilman 
I love purple… these are so beautiful… Thank you dear David, have a nice weekend, love, nia
Aren’t they cute little flowers! I love purple also…have a great weekend Nia!
Pretty purple fuzzies! I love my lavender in the micro farm.
I love that “micro farm”…purple is one of my favorites! They really spread everywhere…never had this occur before!
Gorgeous Flowers…………
Yes, and Mom has an exceptional crop this year! Thanks for stopping by and commenting!
I am so jealous. I live on a first floor flat, & have a cat. I bought a whole lot of pot plants to put on the balcony so my cat would have an oasis to sit amongst. One by one they died. Your mother is special with her skills. Just beautiful.
She has been doing the garden thing for as long as I can remember. Her mother and father were the same way. She taught myself and my sisters when we were kids by letting us plant a small plot in her garden. I suppose it’s in the gene pool now!
Wonderful image and subject David love the color in these, I found some of these in the wild I did a macro shot on very cool flowers !!
Thanks Bernie, apparently this was an exceptional year for these plants…just the right amount of rain, sun, cool temps and warm temps.
lovely purple and green, had a grin on my face while reading this one as I pictured your mother pulling out the ‘”voluntaries.”.
She phoned me this spring and said “David, you’re not going to believe this…” I went over before she pulled some of the “voluntaries”. She didn’t have the heart to pull all of them so now there is a carpet of purple and green under the monarda, black eyed susans, vinca, small shrubs, morning glories, snap dragons….
sounds gorgeous! Enjoying every minute as the nights get cooler.
Nice to hear your Mom has a collection of rocks too! I love the colour of these plants. It’s always hard to pull up plants that are happily growing in places you don’t want them!
Rocks are another trait that runs in the family LOL. I once worked in a plant nursery and would bring home orphans and nurse them back to health…until they started to take over the house. I was politely asked to transfer them from the apartment back to the nursery so we would have room to walk…
What a beautiful display of color!
I was over there last Friday…it’s purple and green everywhere…and she said she pulled about half of it!
I wish I had your mom’s bionic thumbs / growing conditions! Then again, if I put more time into the garden as opposed to the camera and the blog and the motorcycle, who knows what I might accomplish! Good on your Mom (and lovely photo!)
Her thumbs have always been on the greener side…don’t know how she does it LOL. I have to say that tour by bike like you are sounds like so much fun…gardening/touring…that’s a tough toss up!
Your mother’s garden sounds lovely. I’m planting argeratun next year – I’ve never planted them before as I don’t do annuals. This year I had several plants come up again that were supposed to be annuals last year (originally planted from a wildflower seed mix) and they were more spectacular than last year. Exquisite photo.
Thanks Sheri, maybe some of the plants from the seed mix were biennials…a nice surprise indeed! Our new home will be finished this fall, so next year we can have a garden again. YIPPEE! Thanks for stopping by and the follow…as I have done the same with your blog. I have read several of your entries and couldn’t agree more with what you write about. Now we just have to get more folks thinking along the same lines!
That’s how nature works 🙂 Sometimes you don’t even need to try hard to create something lovely 🙂
How true, I was over last week and couldn’t believe what I saw. Mom had pulled at least half of them and they keep coming back! It’s remarkable!
This reminded me of my mum, who loves gardening (even though she doesn’t have much of a garden).
Beautiful flowers, David! i am sure my mother will definitely take the whole bunch. 😀
Glad this reminded you of your Mum…they seem to have a special way with gardens don’t they.
Beautiful! I love the purple blossoms!
Pretty…I was talking with Mom on Sunday and she said she had to cut more back! I really couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw the carpet of purple!