We are out in the garden every day, maintaining the flower beds, borders, vegetable beds, shrubs, fruit trees, containers (weeding, harvesting, deadheading, cutting back, watering, fertilizing, recycling, and cleaning up).    When it is hot, we look for shaded areas and we reduce the total time, especially since we are out hiking, paddling, or playing tennis every day too.       With each new phase there are different tasks to be done, but there are new flowering plants with each successive month too.

I was out in the gardens taking photos this month and the light was not always right, wind blew the subjects around, and it was sometimes hard to find the right angle.    It takes several tries for some of the flowers and there are some which are not included since I haven’t yet taken the photo I would want to share.

Shared here are photos flowers including zinnias, gazanias, hydrangea, climbing rose, wild bleeding hearts, Delphinium, yellow foxgloves, Coleus, Echinacea, Monarda, Catananche, Cosmos, and Veronica.    Click any image to go to the Google Photos Gallery and click any the image for a caption.

The end-of-summer vegetable gardens are active with cucumbers, tomatoes, beans, zucchini, and potatoes being harvested.    Pears and plums are ripening.    Fall plantings have been started too.  Seed collection for some plants has started and for anything that can be invasive, the seedheads are collected and added to the green bins.   The compost bin is being filled and it will be turned over in the late fall.

The home gardens were started in 1977 and expanded every year.    We have some bigger projects to undertake in the spring of 2026 so we are enjoying the garden each day for now.