Dying Is the Downside of Landscaping

The tremendous amount of landscaping I've done so far this spring and summer has made the yard look much, much better. The constant maintenance is not a drudgery to me, but I also know that my travels this summer have left my new shrubs and flowers more at the mercy of the terrible heat and dryness we've been experiencing in Winston-Salem.

The signs of some plants' struggles are obvious. I've just about completely lost one of the Soft Touch Compact holly bushes, and a second is now about one-third brown.

Three of my four rhododendron are showing distress, with the Anna Rose Whitley now manifesting quite a few half-brown leaves:

Finally, as previously noted, the wiregrass on the north portion of the front yard is just a nightmare, which I did not help since I tilled it all up without first removing as much of it as I could when I was preparing planting areas. You'd never know I had a well-tilled place for these plants, and the mulch is long since overcome by this fast-spreading and horrendous weed:

My Archangel Angelonia are growing beautifully, at least for now, in the midst of this terrible invasion.