The bee balm are blooming!

I love these flowers! They usually bloom at the end of June and into the beginning of July. I used to have just red and light purple ones and a few years ago a friend gave me a little clump of the magenta bee balm and that little clump has done so well. You’ll see how big that clump has gotten in the gallery below as well as the cover photo.

I do love perennials but most of them only last a couple of weeks and so it is with bee balm. I noticed as I was choosing the photos for this post that I didn’t take many photos of the red ones. They, along with many other plants this year, are not as nice as in years past. We’ve been in drought this summer and that has affected plant growth, or lack thereof. So, I think I will start with the one red bee balm photo that I liked and let it stand out from the pack of magenta bee balm photos.

There are also a light purple type of bee balm that used to be in my garden, alas, I guess they’ve moved on. They are blooming in the park and Willow Pond. Love this color too!

And just for fun, I’ll close with this photo of wild raspberries that are ripe right now. Or are they blackberries? On my walk at Willow Pond yesterday most of these berries were black and I’m including another, updated photo from yesterday. I think I have had this query in the past so I googled and what did I find? They are actually wild black raspberries! Okay, let’s see if I remember that next year. I didn’t know there was such a thing but I love the color.