Can anyone identify this plant?

I purchased the plant pictured here several years ago, in two four inch pots.  I have it planted in a partially sunny border that gets regular water.  As you can see it has spread beautifully.  In about 4 weeks, it will be completely covered in those small snap dragon-like flowers.  The flowers have a little "mouth" you can pull open and closed, like a snap dragon.  The foliage is small, delicate, lush and is shaped similarly to oregano - no serrations on the leaves.  Again, the pictures really do not portray how great this looks when in full bloom.  In winter, it really dies back, but every spring comes back strong.  Next to the nasturtium and the pencil, you can get an idea of the scale.  (not a bad looking border either, I must say, huh?) 

It really is one of my favorites, and I'd buy lots more for many other areas, but it was not labeled when I bought it, and I have never noticed it at the nurseries I usually shop.  Any ideas?

Austin Flowers

Being a bit of an anglophile, I like The Cotswolds, Elgar, Britten, Benny Hill and E.M. Forster, and I also tend to a number of David Austin Roses, and they're blooming now:

From top to bottom ~

The Pilgrim, a great climber

Abraham Darby

Graham Thomas

The Dark Lady - unbelievable fragrance

Dichroa febrifuga

I have no luck growing basic Hydrangea macrophylla, however I have had nice success with a hydrangea relative that is native to Nepal!  Here is Dichroa febrifuga, also called Blue Evergreen Hydrangea.  I found this plant several years ago at The Orangery, a short-lived nursery that occupied the outdoor space adjacent to the sorely-missed Denman's in Old Town Orange.  I can't say I've seen it anywhere else.  The specimen is not even listed in my 40th anniversary, 1995 version of Sunset Garden Book.

I'm wondering, has it been added into recent editions?

Indeed, it is native to Nepal and southeast China, and the plant is evidently used as a natural remedy for reducing fever.  The plant has many of the characteristics of common hydrangea, and mine could actually use a little shaping up as you can see,  but as is, it has a very pleasing, California native look to me.  I can imagine this plant looking right at home growing wild in some shady redwood grove somewhere in Big Sur.

My specimen is planted in a shady, naturally mulched area underneath the spreading boughs of a good-sized Juniper tree.  The area stays pretty moist.  Evidently the blueness of the blooms can be manipulated by adjusting soil PH, but I do nothing of the sort.  According to San Marcos Growers, this plant can reach 4-6 feet in height, but mine is no taller than 3 feet.

I'm going to assume this plant will thrive in any garden up and down the California coast.  Highly recommended.

Apple Thinning

As discussed in a previous post, its shaping up to be a banner year for my dwarf apple trees Anna and Dorsett Golden.  The bottom photo shows a typical bough completely over-laden with fruit.  It does not seem reasonable to me that these trees, both barely five feet tall, can possibly support so many apples to ripeness.  So, I just thinned the fruit pretty drastically on both trees to a level as seen in the first two photos.  The thinning amounted to dozens of discards, but there are dozens that remain.  My plan this season is to provide a bit more water than previous years, probably something like an additional single deep watering once a week, to see how large I can get these select fruit to mature.  

The Alstroemeria Meadow

Although Sunset recommends they be grown in full sun, I have a "meadow" of alstroemeria planted in a very shady area that has been quite successful over the years.  The meadow is a riotous mish-mash of five different varieties of alstroemeria, with some errant blackberry vines, nasturtium and Japanese artemisia all forming this cool, wild looking meadow.  I don't do much of anything to tend to this area, other than pull the spent flower stalks.  It does get regular surface watering from the sprinklers as soon as the weather warms up.  I try to never let the top soil get dry during warm/hot weather.  This plot looks pretty sad during the winter, as the alstroemeria and artemisia both die off more or less to the roots.  However, come spring everything sprouts up and looks great.

Although I never noted which varieties I planted, I believe two of them are Peruvian Lily - or alstroemeria aurea, which I purchased at Green Scene a few years back.  These two varieties will have flower stalks well over three feet tall as we move closer to summer. 

  

Lavender Care

Lavender is of course a common favorite here in Zone 23.  I grow a pretty fair amount of it, mostly varieties of English and French and some Spanish.  For those who grow Lavender, you know that English varieties it seems in particular can get overgrown, leggy and downright ugly after a few years, even with trimming.  My typical response to this has been to remove these overgrown specimens, roots and all, and replace them with a fresh 1 gallon plant.  

I have a border garden of lavender, rosemary and iceberg roses along our front split rail fence (cited recently by a famous local entomologist as an area of high spittlebug incidence) that was getting unruly this fall.  I cut back several English Lavender all the way to the ground.  Too tired to try to remove the roots, I just left them in the ground. Well, look at them now.  This photo shows one of several new plants that have sprung from those roots, forming shapely, good-sized shrubs much quicker than would have been the case if I had replaced them.  Now I know.