Moon Garden

By: Museumlover

Ever wish you could enjoy your beautiful garden and patio at night, by the light of the moon? You can if you plant a moon garden. There are a number of flowers which only bloom at night and there are also flowers that really "shine" in moonlight.

It can be so peaceful to sit outside on a nice evening. Why not enjoy the sweet smells and beauty of your garden after the sun sets? Some of plants are meant to attract the night pollinating moths and they open only at night and send out lovely fragences. The flowers that show the best in the moonlight are white or silvery.

These plants are also beautiful during the day hours. There is a plant called moon flower, Ipomoea alba, whose spiraled flower buds show during the day and start unfurling about dusk. These are large, 6 inch wide white flowers. They smell wonderful. A relative of the morning glory, t is a vigorous vine and kind of looks like plumped up morning glory. It does well in full sun to partial shade and is great for an arbor or large trellis. They can also be started from seed.

Angel's Trumpet, Datura spp, is a large, upward or outward facing, trumpet shaped flower. I've grown these many times and they are lovely, some are double flowered. They have prickly seed pods after blooming. They thrive in the heat. On a hot summer hight, their flowers are particularly fragrant.

Brugmansias have large trumpet flowers and a shrubby body. They can be shaped like small trees and are tropical in nature. They can be taken in and saved in the house in the winter. Other summer bloomers are the white bellflower, baby's breath, astilbe and falsespires. Bugbane, monkshood and boltonia (snowbank) will bloom from late summer to fall. Shasta daisy and chrysanthemum will bloom into frost.

Another with a sweet heavy scent is flowering tobacco (Nicotiana alata). Night blooming jasmine is another sweet smeller.

Use foliage that glows in the moonlight, too. Artemisia has silver gray leaves and look very pretty at night. I have learned the hard way the artemisia is invasive! Every year I have to pull some of it out so it doesn't take over, but it is pretty. The simple lambs ear is another that will look silvery under the moon. Some hostas, caladium and ornamental grasses can be very light, feathery and shiny in the moonlight.

To add more ambience to your moon garden, consider a fountain or some other water feature in your garden or patio. The soft tinkling of the water, sweet smell and lovely glow of the flowers in the moonlight can really soothe away the day's anxieties and tribulations. Fountains are very easy to build and there are plenty of books at the library about making things yourself for your garden.

Next time...for the younger members of the family....a pizza garden. Growing your own pizza is just great and so tasty!!!