I’ve said it before… the garden is a strange and mysterious world, with magic known only to itself.

Like… Where the heck did these Balloon Flowers come from????

So here’s the thing. I did plant Balloon Flowers in the garden. But I planted ONE plant, in the sidewalk garden (about 20 feet away from this spot). And that was in 2023. And it never came back. And I had no Balloon Flowers in 2024. Also… that 2023 Balloon Flower looked like this:

So what the heck??? I know Balloon Flowers do spread by seed – but I’d love to know how far that seed travelled, because none of my neighbours in the general vincinty have any!

Another mystery over in the veg garden…I touched on last week. And I actually think I solved the mystery. Or at least part of it.

It’s doubled in size since I showed you last week. It’s on a vine that SHOULD be a Celebration squash. But that clearly is not a celebration squash. But I remembered… I had several squash plants come up in the old squash bed (seeds from rotted squash from last year). So instead of planting fresh seeds… I just dug up the seedlings and replanted them where I wanted the squash this year. And I’ve learned that the squash/pumpkin/cucumber family is very… promiscuous. That means they can cross pollinate with pretty much anything in that family And when that happens… you get a mix of whatever it pollinated with. In this case… I’m guessing it was one of my little star gourds. What does that mean for harvesting…. well… although it’s big… it could be inedible… from just downright bitter, to potentially mildly toxic. Or… it could have the look of a gourd… but be as tasty as a squash. It really is a gamble.

It’s also possibly mixed with a yellow zucchini. Though that would have had to come from a neighbours garden as I didn’t grown any last year. So it’ still a bit of a mystery… even if I mostly figured out what happened. The other mystery is… will all the other plants be like this?

Either way… I’ll be planting from bought seed when it comes to the cucurbit family from now on!

And here’s another somewhat mystery solved.

My double decker coneflowers did not mysteriously dissapear….

Apparently I forgot that they just take some time to develop that upper deck. And until they do, they just look like a regular pink coneflower.

This next one isn’t a mystery… but just Mother Nature showing that she does what she wants. I think I mentioned that I lost my big white Butterfly bush this year. I had it planted more or less where the downspout from the kitchen roof came down. And we had a very wet, cold winter… and it turns out Butterfly bushes just can’t take that much wet. Lesson learned.

I bought a new one, and planted it in a different spot. (It’s going to bloom soon). But looked what popped up in the catio…

Now… it didn’t just “pop up” really. I do weed the catio (which I’ll be doing again today), and I when I first noticed it as little seedling, I thought it might be a Helenium I planted there, that had struggled. But as it grew, it became increasingly obvious it was not.

In truth – it might not be a white one – as I have several colours. But the white one was only about six feet away from where this one popped up, so white it most likely. Sadly, I can’t leave it in the catio. It will get too big. I’ll have to dig it up and find another spot for it. Or maybe donate it to a neighbour.

Either way… it just goes to show… the gardener plans… Mother Nature laughs.

Any good mysteries in your garden?