Alex's Asteroid Astrology

Well, we’ve passed Labor Day in the US, the unofficial end to summer, so perhaps a review of the season of bloom and fruitfulness is in order.  After a very wet spring, July and August have more or less reverted to form in these climate-change times, coming in considerably drier than was the norm in my youth.  With a few notable exceptions, however, the summer enjoyed average to somewhat-below-average temperatures, which made the drought seem less … droughty?

That early moisture made a huge difference in the garden, with lush vegetation and lots of bloom.  Granted, it supercharged the weeds as well, and I haven’t been able to keep up with it.  But in their own way, they were also helpful, keeping the sun from penetrating to dry out the soil in their shade, allowing ‘wanted’ plants to thrive better under drought stress.  So my watering regimen in 2025, while tedious, hasn’t been as onerous as other years.

I found that my father’s old electric-powered hedge clipper is a valuable ally in clearing weeds from spaces which have been given over to native plants (about 50-60% of the garden), and I’ll happily employ that to clearcut everything in a trice, once winter comes.  And then we’ll just have to try to do better at weed management next year (promises, promises!).

Something else I learned from my weeding laxity – I see now what the garden truly wants to be:  a native meadow with touches of English cottage garden.   I’ve commented before on the glory of the waves of native plants as they each come into their own, throughout the year – dandelion and violet in early spring, ground ivy and clover to follow; thistle, Queen Anne’s lace and evening primrose in high summer; and now goldenrod reaching peak, with asters and white snakeroot still to come.  I’ve enjoyed these throughout my time here, but in a more restricted manner.  This year, with the weeds (read, “natives”) run riot, I began to see the outlines of a managed meadow, with certain plants given free range over certain areas at certain times, and edited in others.

The free range part I’ve got down pat!  Now I just need to work on my editing.

But all that lies in the future, and the point of this post is to linger over the recent past, the blooms and blossoms that have made the summer of 2025 a record-making one for florals. 

The daylilies were, as always, the standout performers of the season, but this year, even more so.  Some varieties of course underperformed, plants that are not truly happy where they are, but in the main, it was a bumper crop of bloom, with a record number of scapes and buds on many.  The glory of the daylily is its transience – as the name implies, each individual blossom lasts only a day. 

One of the great joys of my daily life in the summer is my early dawn rotation through the East and West beds, where most of the daylilies congregate, to gently snap off the prior day’s shrunken blooms so they don’t mar the beauty of those that are just opening.  Each day is a new adventure – which will flower today?  How many will appear on each plant?  What kaleidoscope of colors awaits?

A burst of heat in mid-July, just as the daylilies were reaching peak, produced a phenomenal display, with multitudes of blossoms open simultaneously on each plant.  Many of my lilies sported more than a dozen scapes, and in this period, they often boasted one or more opened flowers per stem, creating an instant bouquet.  Unfortunately, this exuberance also foreshortened the season, and the daylilies bloomed out a week or two earlier than usual, but the show, while it lasted, was truly stunning.

I had one new variety which bloomed for the first time this year.  Ruby Spider, purchased on clearance late last year, didn’t bud in its first truncated season here, but repaid me in 2025 with a good offering for a plant so young – two sturdy scapes clustered with up to two dozen buds on each.  Ruby Spider is noted for the huge size of its flowers, and she didn’t disappoint!  I measured several in excess of 9” in diameter, much larger than the average daylily blossom, which typically runs to 5-6”.  Her gorgeous coloring of ruby red petals (as you might expect from the name) yields to a brilliant golden throat tinged with the barest suggestion of lime at the center.  Simply marvelous!

The daylily collection, which numbers more than 40 unique varieties, has really come into its own now, in its fifth year.  Colors range from pale yellow and butterscotch through bright gold, vivid orange, pastel pink, fire engine red, deep burgundy and vibrant purple.  Truly something for everyone!

As the daylilies are opening, bee balm is not far behind.  Again, the early moisture resulted in hugely expanded tracts of my electric magenta variety, islands of vibrant color in the garden, which grew almost to my height in spots.  Mildew hasn’t been as much of an issue this year, either, though I’m not certain why.  And reaching peak before the sweltering heat of later July, their blooms lasted for weeks, with some random rebloom bonus occurring through August.

Right on their heels is echinacea, the ubiquitous coneflower.  Most of mine are pink (though termed “purple”), some of them natives that self-sowed in my father’s time and have expanded their range since.  But I’ve also purchased several in the newer hybrid shades over the years, with mixed success.  Many of the amazing colors found in garden centers, though labeled perennial, need to be treated as annuals, for their return is uncertain at best.

But I find that white does very well for me, and has now gotten to the stage of self-propagation, with spots of white echinacea popping up all across the garden, nowhere near the original plantings.  A new variety in butterscotch has done well, too, perhaps prompted by the May deluge.

I was particularly pleased with one of the natives, evening primrose, which began to flower in late July and lingered for a full month of color.  Bright, buttercup yellow, these massive plants, up to six feet tall, have gradually formed an impressive colony screening my view of the neighbors from the south side of the sandmound.  Starting just three years ago with a single self-sown ambassador, they are now a defining feature of the summer landscape.  As the name implies, evening primrose opens in the late afternoon, so is a valuable source of sustenance for nocturnal pollinators like moths.   Speckled with small yellow blossoms that glow in both the setting and rising sun, by late morning the following day their blooms have wilted, to be replaced by a fresh crop come eventide.

The water surplus also coaxed enhanced bloom from my Lucifer crocosmia, with its scarlet lilylike flowers blooming sequentially, base to tip, on large stems of up to five feet in height.  Most years they offer a desultory showing, seeming like their hearts aren’t really in it, but this year, both the plants themselves and their flowers were markedly increased.  I originally planted four, but only three have thrived – imagine my surprise, then, when the fourth suddenly reappeared!  Apparently he’d been laying low, hiding himself in the tall grass without blooms to show he was still there, until May’s hydration excess brought him out again.

As the daylilies are fading in late July, rudbeckia begins to fill in the gaps.  Commonly known as Brown-eyed Susan, rudbeckia’s rich amber-gold, daisy-like flowers are festive and long-lasting.  This is another avid self-propagator, and small stands across the yard are now developing into mature clumps.

Heliopsis vies with rudbeckia for “best in show” when it comes to summer yellows.  Brighter than rudbeckia, she is pure sunshine in bloom.  Some of my several stands of this have mutated over the years into double-flowered varieties, more like zinnias in appearance than the typical one-ringed heliopsis.  These also tend to dry well, and retain much of their brilliant golden color for years.

I have a second type of these, called “Bleeding Hearts” heliopsis, with a deeper, brick-red, almost burnt umber center fringed with bright yellow.  This variety has never done all that well for me – I had two originally, and lost one early on.  Or so I thought – as with that shy crocosmia, I was shocked to find the apparently deceased Bleeding Heart heliopsis back at the old stand this July.  Diminished, surely – but there!

Undoubtedly the largest dieback perennial in my collection is Joe Pye Weed, a Pennsylvania native which can put on as much as 9 feet in a single season. Moisture-fueled JPW outdid itself this year, towering over the fence with waves of fuzzy pale purple blooms on sturdy erect stems. The smaller blooms also dry well, if cut at peak and allowed to dry in water.

It’s not all dieback perennials in the summertime garden, however.  My oakleaf hydrangeas continue to put on a good show, as they blush from purest white to pink and magenta, with minty green and dusty rose tossed into the mix for good measure.  Once again, the early hydration produced magnificent blooms and more vibrant colors than usual.

Pee Wee, my “diminutive” oakleaf, at just three feet high, was covered in small-scale blossoms in late spring.  Heretofore, these remained white throughout, until drying a dull grey-brown towards late summer into autumn.  There may have been a suggestion of pink, but it was just the merest inkling of a notion of color.  This year, however, Pee Wee is bustin’ out all over with genuine rosy hues!

Queen of Hearts, too, has been loathe to live up to her name with late-season pink replacing her pristine white blossoms, tight as shields.  But in 2025 she put on a magnificent show, really bright pink edged with minty green, a glory to behold.

Alice has always been a good performer in this regard, but even she outdid herself, with pinky colors that inclined almost to magenta.  Snowflake sports the most unusual color combinations of all my hydrangeas, and seemed to add extra stages of coloration as she turned from greenish white to layered blossoms of mint green and dusty rose, simply stunning en masse.

Summer 2025 has been one for the books, no doubt.  But it’s a bittersweet beauty, knowing that the climactic conditions which produced this bonanza are becoming more and more rare.  Oh, for the rain-soaked summers of my youth!