Inferno

It's hot as hell, to borrow a phrase. At 2:30pm in Kirkland, it is 110 degrees and still climbing. All-time heat records shattered. We won't discuss the state of my hydrangeas, but there are plants in the devil garden that are happy in the heat, given enough water.

Devil Garden Exhibitionists

This has been an unusually warm January, and several site-appropriate plants are showing off in the devil garden.

Although these flowers are at ground level and only an inch across, they steal the show for me, both for their intricate strangeness and their name: Scoliopus bigelovii, aka Bigelow's foetid adder tongue.

Next up, Hamamelis 'Carmine Red,' aka carmine witch hazel. Couldn't have an evil garden without a witch. The flowers are so odd, looks as if the branches are covered with fiery red spiders.

Speaking of spiders, this is Ophiopogon japonicus, aka black mondo grass, which is scattered around the devil garden to give the feeling of large black spiders crawling underfoot. The black shiny berries are gorgeous.

This is Iris foetidissima, aka scarlet-seeded iris. This is its first year with seeds, though it was one of the first-planted devil garden plants, back in 2013. "Foetid" commonly appears in the names of my devil garden plants; luckily for me, I haven't noticed any truly bad scents.