Late June Mallow Mania

Fernymoss took a bunch more photos today while he was out weeding and presented me with a lovely batch of blooms I'll be posting as I can during this busy time at work. So, I thought it would be fun to stay in the Mallow mode after yesterday's blast from 'Sun Showers.' The Malvaceae is a huge family of plants, comprising over 200 genera and over 2,300 species (see Wiki link above for details). It even includes such agricultural crops as Okra and Cotton! (That was something I just learned tonight.) Regulars here already know about our passion for Mallows, and we have an ever-increasing number of species, to which we are always adding new ones when we find one we like (or one finds us, as is the case with the 'Prairie Mallow.') So here are a few for your delectation, some of which may be familiar or others you might consider adding to your garden ... all the species represented here are quite easy to grow from seed, and have a long, proliferous bloom season!
This first example is the lovely "French Hollyhock" or Zebrina Mallow (Malva sylvestris), one of our favorites. We planted a pack of seeds quite a few years ago and it has now made itself quite at home in the sunnier end of the front Boulder Bed (in fact, this year it achieved 'weed status') and some who are in the way are going to have to move to a bed behind the house or (gasp!) get pulled to make room for other plants. In normal times these blooms should be just covered in bees, but this year, well, our bees have disappeared. (See this previous post for details.)

Hollyhocks (Alcea biennis) are often cited by gardeners as one of their favorite old-fashioned flowers from childhood, and we're no exceptions ... when I didn't have a space to garden (the old apartment days) I always longed to have them in my garden. Well, we're just happy that this one survived to bloom this year! Last year we had several really large plants gearing up to bloom this year, but alas, they served as a tasty dinner for the rabbits in early winter, and aside from some very small seedlings coming up now, it's the only one we'll see bloom this year. I sure wish Pepa could have been around for the Great Mallow Massacre, because she would have at least given those wascally wabbits a run for their life, or even better, a quick escort to the Great Rabbit Reaper. Oh well, we can replace them, but it sure doesn't endear the rabbits to me any more than in the past (when one year they ate and entire bed of Larkspur!).

Enjoy, but please don't eat the Hollyhocks ...

Editorial note:

I had planned to include some photos and comments on our 'Prairie Mallows' (Sidalcea malviflora), but Blogger is acting up tonight and freezing up and losing photos and text, so if I can successfully publish this post, I'll consider myself lucky. I guess I've been "Bloggered" as I've seen other bloggers call it. No matter what, it's been a frustrating night in Bloggerlandia. I'm hoping things are back to normal next time, because we've got a lot more going on right now to show off!