Digitalis purpurea

Or more simply put - Foxglove. (You can see that I’m gearing up to start teaching my plant ID class this week!) This plant started growing in my courtyard last year - it’s a biennial so it grows the first year from seed, flowers the second year, disperses seeds and the process starts over. I think that some seeds must have found their way to this garden from my former garden. Surely there will be many more next year!

The plant has been absolutely enormous from the get go! Much bigger than any Foxglove I’ve ever seen. And then it bloomed this spring. It’s taller than I am (at 5’6”) by at least a foot. The very last blossoms were silhouetted against the sky today and I thought, as fond as I am of this plant, that it might make a good blip.

I spent the day tidying up the last bits for my class, which starts Wednesday. All of a sudden I have 18 students instead of the cap of 15 that I asked for. It’s not a problem necessarily, but it can be difficult to gather that many students around one perennial or annual plant and have any sort of meaningful discussion :-(


And we’re going camping on Friday for the weekend! I haven’t been camping since my now-very-adult son was 6 years old and I am so excited! Dick and I split up the list of stuff we need to bring - fortunately he has all of the gear, so I’m focusing on food and other essentials. The weather is going to be perfect and of course the company divine :-)