July ’26: The accidental white garden
... and the oddness of normalcy.
What a strange month July has been. After all the activity and rapid, dramatic, thrilling change of the previous few months, I feel like I’ve had a sort of post-partum depression in July as things slowed to, well, the normal pace of a garden. With all (ok not all, see below) the plants in the ground, and it being peak summer, there’s sort of nothing to do but wait for things to grow. And we all (or those of us in temperate climates, at least) know how truly slow that can feel.
Last year (year before?), I started a spreadsheet where I was mapping out the leaf and bloom times and durations of the things I had planted, trying to get my head around which plants would be in leaf or bloom or fall color at the same time as each other, and what it would add up to. Working with so many plants that are new to me, and with things not necessarily blooming their mature durations (or even at all, in their infancy) it felt helpful, if somewhat tedious, to be able to see it like that. But I haven’t kept it up with all the plants I added this spring. So instead I’m looking around the actual garden this month and all I see is green and white. Like I accidentally planted a white garden, which I’ve been trying hard not to do.
Currently obsessed with these two grey-green-white beauties — mountain mint (Pycnanthemum muticum) and upland boneset (Eupatorium sessilifolium). Eager to pair them up somewhere, and you’ll definitely be hearing more about both.
As it happens, many or most of my favorite Northeastern native plants just happen to bloom white, and I’ve tried to be cognizant of that and to provide some balance. (Nothing at all against a white garden, so lovely, just not my intention.) So I have to remind myself that there are other colors in the ground — they’re just not blooming at the moment.
In the case of the ironweed that I have planted literally everywhere the past three years, it’s just now starting to form is bright red-purple bloom heads, so it’s coming. (And so huge this year! The older plants, at least.) Whereas with the wild bergamot I planted as plugs just last month, there is only tender young greenness where there would (and will in future years) be big stands of pale pinkish-purple blooms. Same goes for the goldenrod: maybe it will still bloom this year, not sure. And the asters are coming! Those that haven’t been repeatedly beheaded by the deer, that is. Out front I have the hot pink coneflowers doing their cheerful thing, but otherwise July has been the month of only white-blooming things.
This little 8" baby on the left is tall white aster (Doellingeria umbellata), a future giant. On the right, even the strawberry blooms are white.
Actually, now that I think about it, if I had a white garden for just a month or two in high summer, following the pinks of late spring, that would be perfectly fine by me. I like the anticipation it creates for the blue/purple phase that’s on the horizon, before the fall foliage colors follow. I’ll keep that in mind this time next year when I can see how it’s playing out.
All the baby meadow rue (Thalictrum thalictroides) is blooming and I know I should pinch them, but it is too cute. And check out the subtle pink halo on the switchgrass (Panicum virgatum). You can see its teeny rose-colored blooms to the left of the rue.
WEATHER
I’ve been thinking what a lovely month, filled mostly with normal July temps: pleasant mornings and evenings, rare humidity, afternoons reaching only into the upper ’70s or low ’80s. Which is true enough, but then I recall also the heatwave it began on, the wildfire smoke that trapped us inside, the tornado warning, the flood watches and warnings, and the 5+ inches of rain we got over the course of two days this week. So not entirely normal, in any historical sense. (Climate change is real, y’all.) But a welcome reprieve, at least, from the rolling heat waves of the past few months, plus finally some very welcome rain — and then some.
Highest high temp: 101º on July 2 (one of 6 days above 90°, all in the first half of the month — hence my amnesia)
Lowest high temp: 71º on July 6
Average high temp: 84°
Lowest low temp: 52º on July 20
Highest low temp: 72º on July 3/4
Rain days: 8, plus some drizzle
GARDEN NOTES
The moderate weather — and an idea I couldn’t stand not to act on — did lead me to plant a few things in July, one blissfully cool morning before a projected mild week. But mostly it’s just been a matter of tending the driveway potager. (I’ll have a separate kitchen-garden update for you next week.)
Planted this month:
• A second little common juniper ‘Gnom’ at the corner of the carporch — a dark, evergreen backdrop for the tiny birch grove I haven’t written about yet
• Joined by some switchgrass and rattlesnake master (long-time dream plant of mine) and one of the struggling smooth aster babies (chomped down yesterday)
• A pair of fringed sedges (Carex crinita) from an “ugly plants sale” by the oakleaf hydrangea in the back hedgerow
• And another small switchgrass and a pint-sized upland boneset (Eupatorium sessifolium) in the future mini-meadow peninsula, because I’m obsessed with the trio (now a lovely young clump) I got at last year’s ugly plant sale and want lots more
TO-DO’s
Speaking of which, I’ve definitely blown my very special plant budget for this year (and then some) but clearance season is coming. So I’ll be reviewing my plant wish list and making a shortlist of things to be on the lookout for in August’s markdowns, just in case! That’s also to come.
How was July in your garden? As always, I would love to hear—
