We have almost reached the middle of September. I am looking for those cooler early mornings and late evenings, but so far they have not arrived. Maybe with climate change it will be October before we start having any fresh cool mornings.

When I go outside and walk around and look at all of the weeds and try to find the plants in amongst them I am very discouraged. We have had adequate rain this summer and all the plants have grown well, but the weeds have grown like monsters on steroids. 

There are weeds much taller than my head and now of course they are putting out seed. I’m hoping we will get a few days of relief from these near 100 degree temperatures and I can get outside and attack the weeds. I have been sharpening my machete to try to hack the weeds down as they are unable to be pulled up. 

Moon flowers are one of my favorites and I planted some this year on a beautiful trellis given to me by a friend. They came up quickly and were growing nicely. I have been looking for their big, white flowers, but about a week ago lots of little red trumpet flowers started blooming all across the top of the trellis. Now I have to go out and decide which are weeds and which are moon flower vines and cull out the unwanted weed vines.

Spider lilies, Lycoris radiata, are starting to bloom. I should have a lot of them, but the evil amaryllis weevil has eaten many of my hymenocallis bulbs and some amaryllis bulbs this summer even though I use systemic Imidacloprid on them. In past years, they have also destroyed spider lilies.

Spider lilies bloom on a thin scape before any foliage ever makes an appearance. Many people who have them, accidentally mow them down or break the scapes while weeding, before the flowers open. The scapes are very easy to overlook, just a pencil-sized pale green wand that blends in with everything green.

The bulbs are very hardy and will live for years if they are not mowed down before the foliage dies down in the spring. They multiply very quickly and two bulbs will become four to six bulbs in a couple of years. They produce new bulbs so efficiently that the newer bulbs are pushed to the surface because they have no room to grow underground. 

At maximum size, the parent bulbs reach about the size of a small lime. Off sets are much smaller, but they grow fast when given enough space to expand. The flowers are long lasting when cut and very lovely in a clear glass vase.

Pinecone gingers have beautiful red cones now. The cones are bracts that hold the true flowers, the small white or yellow, tubular-shaped flowers that come out of the scales of the pinecone.

The clear liquid that comes out of the pine cones, if they are turned upside down, is a skin protectant. It is added to many beauty products, shampoos and soaps, but you get the pure stuff out of the pine cones. I rub it on my arms when I’m working outside and they get itchy from being brushed against greenery. 

About this time of year, I cut the foliage to the ground leaving the red pine cones standing up on their scapes a foot or more tall. The foliage is lemon-scented, I put that down to be walked on and the scent will be released for the next few days, even longer if you spray them down or we receive rain.

Pine cones make a beautiful arrangement with only a trimmed palmetto leaf behind them to accent the colors. They are long-lasting in arrangements and hold their color very well.

Beauty berry shrubs are displaying their beautiful neon purple berries; they can be seen along many dirt roads and also sunny areas along the edges of woods. To use them in an arrangement, cut long branches of the berries, snip off the leaves which will give you branches filled with clusters of bright purple berries at intervals surrounding the branches.

The branches of berries can be used for the background height in an autumn arrangement, filling in the front with mums and the rim of the container with attractive foliage.

I am not a designer. I had much rather grow flowers than arrange them but in fall there are so many natives that produce beautiful flowers, berries and foliage that I do enjoy playing around with them for my own pleasure.

As a master flower show judge, I do have to study design and stay current, but I always enjoy the horticulture classes much more than design classes. If you enjoy arranging flowers, spring and fall brings an abundance of materials to play with.

There is a great difference between an arrangement and a design. Designs must follow artistic principles and the elements are used to express the artist’s impression or ideas. Elements are line, shape, texture, contrast, color, form and value. The principles are like a recipe and the elements are the ingredients.

With each passing week, more fall flowering plants and shrubs will be producing blooms.

Crotalaria, a.k.a. cow killer, is flowering now with two-feet-tall spikes of bright yellow flowers above the foliage. Do not let your children or pets put the plant material in their mouth or handle it and put their fingers in their mouth. Plants grow wild in sunny spots such as old fields, ditches and vacant lots.

I am out of space, see you next week. 

Susan Grooms lives and gardens in Lowndes County.