July and August are peak months for flowering
in the ornamental onion garden. While it may appear
shady in my garden from these views, it is indeed situated in full hot
sun. I prefer taking photographs
under low light conditions (cloudy periods, in morning or late afternoon
sun), often the best lighting
to capture nuances of pastel colored blooms. The photo below was
taken the 3rd week of August.
Below,
is a bed of hybrid seedlings, the open-pollinated parentage mostly
derived from species such as
senescens, nutans, and angulosum. There's great variety of inflorescence
shape, aspect and density,
flower color and bloom time. Over a period of several years,
superior seedlings are plucked out while in
flower, and moved to beds for further evaluation over a few more years. 
While
most of the Allium nutans-senescens types of hybrids bloom in August, many
bloom even later
into September. The view below was taken on September 8, 2007, the blooms looking fresh in
the
94 degree F heat. 
Back
to the 3rd week of August below, the image is largely dominated by Allium
'Sugar Melt'
covered with pink blooms, one of my first named selections that
originated from hybridized
Allium senescens glaucum offspring. 
Back
to the early to mid-July onion garden, Allium flavum ssp.tauricum
color forms take center stage with all
sorts of colors. The display is shared with varieties of Allium
cernuum (nodding onion) in shades of rose to white.
|
