A Week of Fall Flowers 1

Since today looks like this:

and this (Look! They're using their mittens!):















I thought I'd better get my last bit of fall garden posts done for the season (more or less; after all, it will be plus 8 Celsius later this week).  I wanted to feature a few of my fall favourites, both annuals and perennials that do well late in the season despite our short growing season here.

Today's feature:

The Snapdragon is an incredible frost-tolerant flower, and I can hardly believe now that I didn't plant any this year.  This one, photographed October 16th (after several frosts) above, and today below, was a bonus self-sown flower from last time I planted them, and it seems perfectly happy even today:

Or, at the very least, reasonably content.  One year I grew a whole bunch of tall white snapdragons for my sister's wedding, and they were just gorgeous and ready just in time for the early September event.  They were still going strong when it snowed, and made a lovely addition to the garden.  I'm thinking I should do that again next season, as they fill in the gaps among the dormant plants so that something is still happening in the garden.  These are quite easy to get going from seed, with the only challenge I've found is that my window is not as sunny as I'd like, and they get a bit gangly and tangly.  However, once they've been potted or planted, they're vigorous enough to recover and get sturdy quickly.  Of course, the kids love them, especially when you pluck one off and make it talk to them by squeezing the sides.