Tuesday, October 2, 2007

Wild morning glory


I had a pleasant surprise when I came upon this wild morning glory while filling the bird feeders. I was completely unaware of the vine so was astonished to see such a beautiful flower in a weedy patch.

7 comments:

Ruth Welter said...

Hi Ki, your wild morning glory is just beautiful. I discovered some pink, wild morning glory in my perennail garden. It grows at such a crazy rate. Now that my perennials have stopped for the season, I'm letting the morning glory do what it wants for awhile, it really adds some color. Yours is so pretty.

Ki said...

Hi Ruth,
I usually pull out all the wild morning glory vines because they climb over everything and can be quite unsightly. Some that we've not pulled because they grew unnoticed or in a weedy wild place in the garden produce such inconspicuous flowers that it usually isn't worth keeping anyway. This one took us by surprise. I wish they all were like this one. In the early summer I took photos of wild white morning glories with a pink blush on the edges of the flower. That was also quite stunning. I'll look for your mg flowers if you have photos of them on your site. Thanks for the comment.

Iowa Gardening Woman said...

What a beautiful sky blue morning glory. I have an over abundance of Grandpa Ott's morning glory, I pull lots of them up but I do let some grow. We let them grow by the compost bin.

Ki said...

Hi Iowa Gardening woman,
I looked up 'Grandpa Ott's' morning glory and it's a beaut. I would definitely keep some around. The reason I don't plant morning glories is that the seed seems to sprout everywhere in the yard. It was fortunate that the blue morning glory vine was hidden until the flower bloomed or I would definitely have pulled it out to my detriment. I would have missed the beautiful flower. Thanks for the comment and mentioning 'Grandpa Ott'.

Tira said...

Ah, these are the surprises that makes gardening so rewarding.

Rusty in Miami said...

Thanks for stopping by my Blog and the information on the bitter lemon. Morning Glory is a very hardy plant they grow very well in our tropical Florida climate, if I had the space it would be in my inventory of vines.

Ki said...

Hi Nicole,
Yes, rewarding indeed but even better because it grew as a volunteer. BTW your posts of food recipes look and sound terrific. We are always looking for something not so ho hum and your recipes are just the ticket for some adventurous eating. Thanks for posting them.

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Rusty in Miami,
I only knew what they were because I saw some growing, wondered what they were and did some research. They did resemble a small version of the cultivated bitter melon so I found out what they were pretty quickly. I didn't know about the medicinal properties of the plants though. I think some cultures even eat the leaves of the bitter melon plant.

I love the beautiful flowers of the morning glories but as you mentioned it spread and climbs over everything so I just enjoy them as wildflowers in the weedy areas around our neighborhood.