This week’s column is going to be a bit different than most. My husband, Ike, and I ran away from home a few weeks ago to celebrate our wedding anniversary. We ran north to Quebec City and thoroughly enjoyed the wonders of it, as we always do. This trip, however, we took the time to visit some public gardens.

It was obvious, to someone who gardens, that their public works department faced the same winterkill this past spring that many of us did. Their lamb’s ear was all newly replanted, and there were large, large areas of annuals hiding newly planted perennials. Of course, it has been my experience that public gardens use a lot of annuals all the time so there is constant color in their displays. You can’t very well have people visiting and not have flowers blooming, I guess.

I also saw some wonderful perennials that I couldn’t name. Now, in two cases anyway, I am quite sure of their family roots. I just don’t know the specific cultivar. Therefore, photos with this column are included as a kind of “Name that Flower” contest. I am hoping those of you who know the cultivars will let me know, so I can hunt them down. Unfortunately, Quebec City’s public works doesn’t believe in plant tags.

A family resemblance

We visited two large gardens, one by the armory on the Grand Allee and the Joan of Arc Garden on the Plains of Abraham. The large, pale yellow brown-eyed Susan shaped flower was in both gardens in profusion. It stands, on average, about 14 to 18 inches tall on very sturdy stems that grow from clumps. The center of the 4- to 6-inch wide flowers ranged from a light chartreuse green to golden. For about 2 inches out, the petals were a light butter yellow color and then they paled to a very light lemon. These flowers grow and bloom like a brown-eyed Susan, which makes me think that is the family.

The second flower is from the gaillardia family, I believe. It may be called “Indian Summer” or something close to that. It’s a marvelous fall flower because of its striking array of oranges, both bright and burnt. It also bloomed 4 to 6 inches across on sturdy stems, but was about 1 foot tall on average.

All I can say about the third flower is that your guess is as good as mine, but probably better. It was a large, lushly green bush growing about 5 feet by 5 feet and had these lovely white trumpet kind of flowers blooming.

One of the more interesting aspects of the Quebec gardens was the use of many different kinds of ornamental grasses and – are you ready? – ornamental corn plants. Honest. They grew like corn, with the same leaves etc., except they were a deep burgundy color and only about 4 feet tall. They were interesting set between tall sedums, grasses and tall asters.

Maybe they don’t have that much trouble with raccoons in downtown Quebec or maybe the little furry buggers don’t like this kind of corn. Who knows? In Turner though, I don’t even want to imagine what kind of damage the raccoons would do to the flowers while running in and out of the garden to check the corn plants.

I will look forward to hearing from you about the flowers and until next time, enjoy the bright blue skies of autumn and the good sleeping weather. Say goodbye to the hummers and don’t feel bad about leaving some goldenrod and milkweed, the butterfly babies will thank you for it.

September gardening reminders

• If you want to dry hydrangea blooms for the house, it is time to start. If you cut two or three blooms at a time about three or four days apart, they will dry with different colors and give you a lovely bouquet.

• Stop fertilizing shrubs and roses so they can put their energy into getting ready for winter.

• If you have outside plants you want to bring in for the winter, you need to get them potted up. Then you can start acclimating them to the inside a few hours each day and at night when frost might sneak up on you. If you have sunny spots, geraniums winter well as do gerbera daisies and sweet potato vines, if you keep them trimmed.

• Clean and sterilize the bird feeders with Clorox and water.

Happy gardening!

Jody Goodwin has been gardening for more than 20 years. She lives in Turner with her husband, Ike, her two dogs and two cats.