The day started out with dark clouds moving in and we knew rain was likely. It ended up raining solidly from about 7:45 am this morning until just before lunch time
. I am very thankful for the moisture and over the four hours of drizzle, we had a good 1" or so soaking rain with the chance of some more later this afternoon. It's nice to take a day or two off from our laborious watering schedule of sprinklers and irrigation zones. Mother Nature is the best way to go for natural irrigation (obviously!). The shot at the top shows Pat and John potting up some elephant ears (Colocasia sp.) that never really grew much in their pots and we'll nurture them thru the winter for spring planting next year. The bloom cluster (umbel) directly above is from the garlic chives (Allium tuberosum) which has long culinary usage and is a stalwart perennial. Be wary of the "seedy" nature of this plant as it will "move" around your garden and you'll have a colony in short order.
To t
he right is the 'Candy Roaster' squash (Cucurbita) in our collection starting to turn orange. Our squash collection is doing well and the soaking rain today will give everything a boost. I'm sure Janice will be picking many of these to display at the 6th Annual Garden Festival ("Take it to the Grill!") which is occuring this Saturday, August 27th at the east end of the gardens (11 am - 4 pm, FREE admission). Organized by the Rock Prairie Master Gardener Association (RPMGA) and UW-Extension, this event will feature all sorts of tasting, activities, vendors, food, pie baking competition, music, etc. Mercy Health System has sponsored this event and allowed for a free admission day to the gardens for everyone. I've always been impressed with how well this event is run and how much fun the participants (and volunteers) are having out there! Speaking of veggies, to the upper left is the haul that Janice picked out of our Ornamental Edible and Compact Vegetable display this morning before the rains. 
She took these directly to one of the local food banks. To the lower right is Jackie R.'s cool butterfly. If you haven't seen the 34 neat butterfly "works-of-art" out in the gardens, get to RBG and check them out. We'll be auctioning these butterflies off on Sunday, September 11th (details on the website soon).
he right is the 'Candy Roaster' squash (Cucurbita) in our collection starting to turn orange. Our squash collection is doing well and the soaking rain today will give everything a boost. I'm sure Janice will be picking many of these to display at the 6th Annual Garden Festival ("Take it to the Grill!") which is occuring this Saturday, August 27th at the east end of the gardens (11 am - 4 pm, FREE admission). Organized by the Rock Prairie Master Gardener Association (RPMGA) and UW-Extension, this event will feature all sorts of tasting, activities, vendors, food, pie baking competition, music, etc. Mercy Health System has sponsored this event and allowed for a free admission day to the gardens for everyone. I've always been impressed with how well this event is run and how much fun the participants (and volunteers) are having out there! Speaking of veggies, to the upper left is the haul that Janice picked out of our Ornamental Edible and Compact Vegetable display this morning before the rains. 
She took these directly to one of the local food banks. To the lower right is Jackie R.'s cool butterfly. If you haven't seen the 34 neat butterfly "works-of-art" out in the gardens, get to RBG and check them out. We'll be auctioning these butterflies off on Sunday, September 11th (details on the website soon).Big John and Pat went out to immediately do their pushmowing and were dodging rain drops as they finished and sought shelter. The guys then shifted to indoor projects and did a nice job cleaning up vehicles and tidying up around the hort center. Larry was finishing his weedwhipping and also got a nice soaking this morning. He commented that he couldn't even see because it was so dark with the storm clouds! After the sun emerged this afternoon, he finished up that weedwhipping task. His indoor project involved cleaning up and servicing one of our riding mowers. Janice was out in the gardens briefly then moved in for myriad indoor projects including preparing for our reference library expansion. I finished getting together one of our big orders for next year and am done with my presentation for tomorrow night (for the Wisconsin Hardy Plant Society). We also saw Dr. Gredler and Little Jerry briefly and Bill O. was in to mow later and help tidy up after the rain. Directly below is the fine detail on a crested male fern (Dryopteris filix-mas 'Grandiceps') in our fern & moss garden. At the bottom is the exquisitely shaped, and brightly colored, 'Prestige Scarlet' cockscomb celosia (Celosia argentea var. cristata 'Prestige Scarlet'). As an All-American Selections winner, this showy annual is tough and has a long bloom period. We used lots of these in our red/maroon theme last year. Visitors like touching this one too and how could you resist! 
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