July 2006

July 1st, Canada Day, a beautiful sunny day spent with friends, food and wine.

Several lilies opened up that day, this 'White Tiger' is making quite the show this year. Where last year it had perhaps 3 or 4 flowers, this year there is a nice rosette of 10, really nice.

July of course is lily month in our yard, with the vast majority being Orientals, Trumpets and OT's, all of which are highly fragrant and for that reason it makes July one of our favorite months in the garden. Now, having said all that, we start off with a picture of another 'Tiger type' which is likely only called a 'Tiger Lily' because it happens to be speckled and has a down facing recurved appearance, something it gets from one of its parents, probably lancifolia.

Well, here we are then with the first of the orientals for this year: 'Mona Lisa' and it had that distiction last year as well. I thought I saw some basel offsets developing last year and was hoping for more then just the one stem in 2006, but alas, it wasn't to be.

This variety is certainly one of the shorter fragrant ones we have and lends itself very well for use in planters and pots.

One of the Asiatics we have, 'Suncrest', actually starts its flowering late June, but it carries on well into the second week of July.