Nursery visit: Hughes Water Gardens

Each year I pay at least one visit to Hughes Water Gardens in Tualatin, OR—about 20 miles south of my home. This is where I first saw Euphorbia griffithii ‘fireglow’...
As you would expect, their display garden is basically a huge pond. This is the entrance...
Things aren't looking so good for that ram...
This! Ha. If I had all afternoon I would have stood right here and recorded it all playing out. I first encountered the slug as he was motoring along minding his own business. I had to run back to the car to grab my mask (it should be second nature by now, right?) and saw that he'd reversed his course in order to take a closer look at that, what ever it is. Another slug? A dried fish out of water? I'm not sure.
Moving along I admired the pond...

And then headed over to the greenhouses, which have huge ponds inside for water plants.
My focus on this visit was the tropical house...
Because exciting things were happening in there.
But first we pause to pay our respects to the orange bougainvillea just inside the door...
And gosh, seeing those body-less legs out of the corner of my eye was a little disturbing!
But we're here to ogle the tropical water-lily pads and the other blooming lilies, so let's get to it...




Equal time to the lotus...







Just a few more lilies before we step back outside.


That was pretty fabulous, right? Okay...let's go see what else they have for sale...
You'd think a fountain like this wouldn't fit my style, but I love them and would be happy to incorporate one into the garden if it showed up.
Cannas!

One of these variegated umbrella palms came home with me, Cyperus albostriatus 'Variegatus'.
Normally I'm not a fan of muddy variegation, but something about this one really called out to me.

The colors in this planting were pretty darn fabulous too.
And finally, if you're in the Portland area and you've been looking for a Ensete ventricosum 'Maurelii', this is where they are!
Weather Diary, July 30: Hi 95, Low 65/ Precip 0