Keep Those Projects Rollin

Aug19

It sounded like a plan, kick all that midsummer apathy to the curb and really focus on getting some of those garden-changing projects done… but then I realized life is short and vacations are more memorable than a new bog garden, so vacation it was 🙂

One of Maine’s most photographed lighthouses, Portland Head Light. After WWII, my uncle was stationed at neighboring Fort Williams so we’ve been visiting this site for a good 40 years now. It’s always picture-perfect.

We did a pitstop in lower Maine and then headed to the Canadian border and Campobello Island. Five days of being outside, wearing sweatshirts, cooking on a campstove, and enjoying the scenery. The kids and I enjoyed it… the wife again chose to stay home, close to electricity, wifi and central air 🙂

Looking across the channel to Lubec, Maine.

These trips of course pass too quickly, so now it’s back to contemplating the maturing season and the back to school fliers. I dislike both so lets instead look at how the latest projects have progressed. You could probably guess that no one picked up a shovel to finish things off while I was gone.

The new hellebore garden. Mid August is not a good time to transplant hellebores, I believe after blooming is recommended, but after years of saying they needed to be moved if the mood strikes better to act on it.

The new shade garden is already filled with hellebores. I nearly died of heat stroke and probably lost about three pounds of water weight digging them out of the full sun spot in the potager and moving them, but the plants seem just fine in spite of the heat. I wish I could say the same for the shovel I used to dig them. Hellebore roots are strong, and apparently that strength is more than what was left in the shovel’s handle, so a new one was the first post-vacation gardening purchase. Fortunately the bog garden construction required no tool-sacrifices.

Ok so the new bog garden is far, far, less impressive than a handful of transplanted hellebores, but I’m quite pleased with it. Of course the most interesting pitcher plant is already half dead but the rest look promising and I’d still like to find some moss to add. The pitcher plants were left potted so they’d be above the highest water level, but there’s absolutely no reason for the log. I just thought it was a nice thing to add.

So maybe the projects aren’t rolling along as much as the calendar says they should. Maybe it will happen this week… although the weather says otherwise… or maybe not. You can’t follow a relaxing vacation filled with cool, foggy ocean breezes with a jump right back into the hot dog days of August. You have to ease your way back, and for me I was happy enough to get the lawn mowed again and edged, especially since to do so involved first replacing the lawnmower blade due to a violent run-in with a hidden rock.

Looking past the tropical garden into the backyard. The green of the lawn is misleading considering nearly all of it is weeds and annual crabgrass.

Of course I took all these pictures prior to any work being done. Even a single day away from the garden needs to be followed up with a thorough garden tour 🙂

It’s only been a week but with plenty of rain and some serious heat things have grown quite a bit. To my surprise no one has questioned the milkweed sprouts growing in the lawn or the gourds creeping in from the sides. Even when I mowed, I mowed around them. I like lawn, but a few interesting weeds are always an improvement!

All over things are exploding with color. Again the sunflowers have taken over, and again I love it. I’m always surprised by how well they elbow their way in, even with all the bird snacking and weed smothering mulch. I tried ripping a bunch from the tropical border and the potager but as you can see I’m about as good at that as I am at finishing projects 😉

The front border at its peak. Even after skimping on this spring’s annual plantings it’s still managed to come together.

I’m thinking about ordering topsoil and more mulch in order to finish the bed expansion which happened when the bog was planted. It just makes sense to shovel and move tons of stuff when the humidity shoots up to one billion percent and the forecast calls for a nice little spell of heat. If worse comes to worse I’ll just let it block the garage for a few weeks until the guilt overcomes me, and if I’m really lucky the sweaty mess of it all will make me almost relieved to see summer winding down. Maybe. I doubt it though.

Have a great week!

Rollin with Summer

Jul31

August approaches, and with it come some of the best outdoor moments of the year. I love how the garden comes together now, and how everything is just full of humming and buzzing and color. It’s a treat each day, and my only complaint is how fast the days fly by.

The front border on the last days of July. Less annual color this year but still a few interesting things to check out each day.

We were away last week on vacation and missed some of the hottest days of the year, but that’s fine with me since it was plenty hot on the island we visited. The heat here in Pennsylvania was tempered by a few downpours though, and even after a week of neglect the garden still looked fine.

I’m starting to wonder if I should try and tame the inner reaches of the front border. This time of year it starts to look a little messy with self-sown rudbeckia, sunflowers, and phlox.

The fact that the garden carried on fine without me is a little insulting but when it’s messy to begin with I suppose a little more messy doesn’t show. I’ll take that as one of the perks of having a far from perfect garden, but I did devote a Friday evening to mowing, and a Saturday morning to deadheading and weeding the front borders and I think it did make a difference.

Neatness would be much improved if I would only stand up to the interesting little things that show up on their own, but I can’t, and although good design never called for a squash patch on the front lawn, it looks like that’s what we’re going to have.

Everything out front is about the same as it always is but I did notice one change. There seem to be fewer wasps and bees this year, and more flies. That of course could change in a week, but as I was staking the steely blue eryngium I didn’t have that usual fear-of-sting like I normally do, and I was surprised.

Hydrangea ‘Limelight’ with rudbeckia triloba, eryngium planum, and a few branches of willow ‘Golden Sunshine’. Yes. It’s messy here as well.

Hopefully the missing bees and wasps are just an annual blip in bug populations, but I halfway think it’s got something to do with all the bulldozing and construction that went on behind our house. When they finished off the industrial park, a big chunk of rocky, scrubby, weedy, woodsy habitat was leveled off, and is now either mulched or turf and not at all interesting to anything other than woodchucks.

Sedum ‘Bon Bon’ is looking exceptionally nice between the blues and the yellows of the front foundation plantings. Yes it’s messy here as well and I really need to edge and divide the blue fescue, but that’s not something I’m willing to give up pool time for.

Not to look forward to messiness, but I did go back there this weekend with a sprayer of roundup and an eye for anything particularly invasive. The weeds and brush will return on their own, but I just want to make sure things like Japanese knotweed, crownvetch, bindweed, and poison ivy don’t gain the upper hand. I guess you could say I’m a weed connoisseur.

But don’t let all this talk of weeds become too distracting. I gave the front yard a once over and then did the backyard on Sunday. Neither looks too bad now and I’ll post more photos shortly, but in the meantime I’m particularly happy with the hardy agapanthus ‘Blue Yonder’ which is slowly clumping up for me at the far end of the front border. I think this is year three for it, and each spring when it comes back I’m always excited to see a few more shoots, and each summer when it blooms I’m wowed by the saturated color.

Agapanthus ‘Blue Yonder’ handled -5F last winter without a problem or any kind of protection.

So that’s it for now. The heat of summer has things slowing down a bit, and as long as I don’t slow down as well there might be a chance of catching up on projects. We’ll see. There are two more trips planned and that’s always a lot more fun 🙂

Three Things

Jul17

Summer is flying by way too fast and fewer and fewer things are getting done. I wonder where the time goes but then remember that afternoon nap which got away from me and then the hour spent just sitting on the porch ‘looking’, and things kind of all come together. Summer is the lazy person’s nirvana.

Still a few things get done here and there. Mulching is one thing which happened, and although it was a half load with more planned for later, it made a world of difference even if most of it is just a foot wide strip edging the beds.

Even with a ruthless hand the purple coneflowers (Echinacea) still seed all over. I’m fine with that of course, although I did yank a few in the way of my mulching and edging.

Mulching would have gone much faster but even a lazy gardener can be a greedy gardener. Beds were expanded, some enough so that the expansion was remarked upon by the housemates. I just explained that the re-edging of the beds was necessary and left it at that. New mulch is always appreciated, so the latest land grab was quickly forgotten.

Grandma’s pool path has been cleaned up, and kniphofia ‘Alcazar’ is still sending up fresh pokers. I’ve shovel-pruned a few varieties which just don’t flower long enough, but ‘Alcazar’ has been a winner.

A second thing of note is lily season. They’re doing great this year and although I’d prefer them towering over the other plants I guess they’re not bad at all considering how thin the soil is that they’re growing in.

‘Silk Road’ gets better every year. Very fragrant, love the color, and she’s no trouble at all.

A few shovel-fulls of compost might be in order for these ladies since they really get no attention otherwise. The only time they caused me any concern was in April when a late freeze damaged a few of the earliest ones. Most of my favorites survived but a few froze back enough to call it a year. Hopefully they’ll be back next spring.

Lily ‘Leslie Woodriff’ is just off to the left. I may have to find a new home for this one since she just doesn’t seem to show off well with her companions. That’s part of it, but truth be told I just wanted to show off the rusty foxgloves and dill 🙂

Just a few more…

Lily ‘Conca d’Or’ is absolutely wow this week. I snapped a potful up on clearance last summer, and this just shows how well the local nursery cares for their stock, even when past prime.

And one more. Lilium lancifolium, the old fashioned tiger lily. I think I read somewhere the garden version is a sterile triploid version and that sounds believable since it never sets seed, but this is the one most likely to be found in old gardens and around abandoned homesteads so it seems to be doing just fine as is. Notice the round little dark bulbils which this lily produces where leaf meets stem. They’re super easy to pluck off and pot up, and in just two or three years you’ll have a brand new tiger lily colony. Be careful though. They have a reputation as a Typhoid Mary of the lily world and are said to carry all kinds of viruses which aphids can spread to their more refined cousins. Of course I rarely listen to good advice and grow them anyway. They always remind me of summers in Maine and my aunt’s old farmhouse garden and I guess I’ll risk the others for that.

Lilium lancifolium the tiger lily.

I also got a hold of the double tiger lily last summer. Beautiful or atrocious is in the eye of the beholder, but it’s just a few days behind the single so you’ll have to wait.

Off to a third thing. The phlox are in bloom and as usual they don’t compare to the very first year I prepped a bed and planted them out, but also as usual I’m willing to forgive many of the flaws in one of my favorite flowers. The fragrance of phlox is another summer farmhouse memory so when they’re in bloom out back even I can be convinced to grab a trowel and pruner and do a little weeding and straightening up just to be around them.

The potager nearly always looks a mess but to me I’m quite happy puttering around looking for surprises… and vegetables… every now and then it produces an onion or something, just enough to retain the ‘potager’ name 🙂

And maybe a fourth thing. The Russian hollyhock (Alcea rugosa) has captured my imagination as easily as their homeland captured the last election. The color is a soft yellow which goes with everything, the plants top out at a decent 6-7 feet, and best of all there’s still no rust to be seen on the leaves. In the front yard the current crop of regular hollyhock seedlings are peppered with orange spots and yellowing leaves, but back here it’s still a clean slate. I hope it stays that way.

Alcea rugosa, the Russian hollyhock. My fingers are crossed for plenty of seeds since I want to plant this thing all over. Please ignore the Japanes beetle nibblings which have ruined some of the show…

So that’s it from here. Hope your summer is rolling along just as nicely as mine (although maybe at a slower pace) and you’re enjoying the sunny bliss of the season. It may all seem carefree wonder but don’t forget to give some consideration to the cooler parts of the year and by that I mean snowdrop season of course. Edgewood Gardens should be putting out a snowdrop list soon and I have no other choice but to wait patiently until it comes to my inbox. There’s already been a species list for the real fanatics (which I won’t answer yes or no to on ordering from) but the named drops list should be in the works as well. When it comes out I like to think of it as Christmas in July, and as it stands right now I’m sure I’ve been very good this year 😉

Ready For My Closeup

Jun18

I’m finally back in the garden after missing three of the last four weeks due to work commitments, and it feels good. All the guilt and regret is washed away (both trips were sort-of voluntary) and I’m pleased to see the plants have mostly fared fine without me. That’s a good thing of course, even if it does cut my ego down a bit to see how well things did without me there giving them a daily once-over but sometimes if you love something you have to set it free… Good enough in theory, but here the weeds really took advantage of the freedom and over the next few ~~days~~ (ok, weeks) I hope to address that. In the meantime closeups work, and they’re so much nicer than the other set of photos which were going to show all the challenges and struggles ahead in this weedy garden.

Iris ‘Roy’s Repeater’, one of the interspecies cross iris which I’ve been mildly obsessing over for a couple years now. Maybe I still have room for another three or four…. I do like the pale yellow ones 🙂

I got in Friday night so it wasn’t until Saturday morning that the tour happened. Then it was coffee on the porch and a lot of thinking. Needless to say I was in no rush to get working and even less of a rush to do the important things first. That is unless you think staking the delphiniums is the most important thing which needs doing, because that’s were I started. It was light work, just right for getting into the swing of things and getting the nails dirty again. Funny how the most noticeable thing about being away for two weeks is that your nails get normal-person clean.

The first of the delphiniums, staked just in the nick of time.

After staking I weeded along the front porch. That’s kind of cheating as well since the bed is so full few weeds stand a chance, but it was a start, and now at least I can sit out there without a heavy conscience.

The spring foliage of Rosa rubrifolia is nice enough that the flowers don’t even matter… which is a good thing since they’re so tiny.

With a little weeding under my belt I gave a little more thought to what needed to be done next. I decided the best thing for me to do was go to the nursery. It’s been a while and I didn’t want them to worry. Plus if I do get around to weeding it’s a terrible idea to leave all those empty spots, they’ll only grow more unwanted weeds. Better to fill the gaps with new plants.

Hydrangea ‘Strawberry Sundae’ is coming on very well this year and I like how the red stems look against the ‘William Baffin’ rose… which is a blooming beast this year!

I spent way too long at the nursery and if you’re counting I may have spent way too much money as well. It wasn’t easy but I’m trying to stick with my new self-improvement plan which includes me being a force of social change. I wasn’t buying all those plants for myself, I was buying them to support my local nursery. I was buying them to build up the little guy, to keep dreams alive, to encourage someone to have a nursery yard full of obscure interesting plants ready for me to buy whenever I need a plant fix! I could have been weeding my own garden but instead I chose to go out and help make the world a better place. You’re welcome.

I may have said I don’t need any more plants with yellow foliage. That was foolish. I still needed a yellow fountain grass, ‘Lumen Gold’ to be precise.

The plants were crammed in right after lunch. Well actually there was a pool visit first and a lot of child throwing as well, but fortunately there was still enough energy left to scrape a shallow hole and bury a few root balls. I’ve decided that plants need to realize quickly that it won’t be an easy ride around here, so tough-love planting is the new rule. I do take care to break up the root balls as much as possible though. The sooner those roots get out of their potting soil, and into their new soil the better.

The blueberries look promising.

So that was Saturday. Sunday was father’s day and weeding was again pushed on to the back burner, but because someone also has a new ‘all purchased plants must be planted within three days’ policy it wasn’t a complete day of rest. I spent a good two hours setting up the deck containers. That sounds busy, but if you’ve ever watched it’s more moving plants and considering than it is planting. I’m never really happy when it’s done, but once things grow in it always ends up looking good enough.

The honeysuckle (Lonicera sempervirens) has been entertaining the hummingbirds for a few weeks now. Aphids can be a problem but I just ignore them and the distorted growth (lower right) they produce.

I spent the rest of Sunday puttering. I was happy to see plenty of bugs but little plant damage, and I like to pretend there’s some kind of good and bad balance thing going on but experience shows it’s not likely to stay that way all summer.

Stinging nettle has been tolerated and even encouraged in the back reaches of the yard. The stinging thing is relatively harmless and cool, but even better is when the leaves start folding up around the red admiral caterpillars which this plant supports.

One animal which always surprises me are the garter snakes which have moved into the arborvitae next to the porch. There are two, and surprisingly enough they enjoy draping themselves across the branches and catching the morning sun when things are cool. Not everyone agrees they’re good company but I like them.

I was hoping to get a photo of one of the snakes but found this praying mantis instead. I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a tiny one before.

The rabbits and an on again off again woodchuck are other wildlife which are making themselves known, but there’s one native wildflower which is really announcing itself this year. Jewelweed (Impatients capensis) loves the regular rain and its juicy little stems are showing up everywhere.

Clematis ‘Ruutel’ rising up from a sea of jewelweed. Easy enough to remove, but there are other plants anxious to get out from under their shadow.

I think that’s enough from me. The on again, off again drizzle suggested I call it quits for garden work and I was fine with that. Taking pictures is much easier than weeding anyway.

Quaking aspen out in the meadow.

Golden hops looking for some support to scramble on up… someone should probably address that.

Hypericum ‘Albury Purple’ living up to the name.

I know the lavender colored flower is a Dracocephalum but the cactus has grown over the label and I’m just not curious enough about the exact species to brave the spines.

I love Thalictrum rochebrunianum. The foliage is cool enough, but with the dark stems and their waxy coating it’s just a work of art.

So much for weeding out these sunflower seedlings…

Verbascum atroviolaceum is a small floppy verbascum which only flowers in the morning and isn’t all that showy, but of course I think it’s cool.

The border along the street is just doing its own thing this year. We may run a purge but if it ain’t broke don’t fix it…. says the gardener who will end up trying to fix it.

One of my favorite weeds is the Oxeye daisy, this one complete with a colorful inchworm.

Growing native plants is a noble cause, but once you start planting cultivars things get iffy. I pull out plenty of the regular pokeweed, but apparently ‘Sunnyside Up’ has now entered the local gene pool… and is too pretty to pull 🙂

The foundation planting has exploded into June color, and I’m wondering if these might not be the perfect meadow flowers to plant across the berm. Penstemon digitalis ‘Dark Towers’ with Nepeta ‘Walker’s Low’ and Oxeye daisy again.

Allium narcissiflorum with a red carpet rose in the background. I like this little onion!

Anthemis tinctoria with rose campion and more daisies.

Common milkweed (Asclepias syriaca) trying to take over the world (or at least the front foundation bed).

So that’s it from here. Maybe it’s messy, maybe I’m not getting much done, maybe the weather is a little cool, but as long as you remind yourself it’s not January it’s all good 🙂

Have a great week!

Hola Spring

Apr20

Spring arrived last week, and from the looks of it she’s in a rush. A couple warm days, a gentle rain, and we’re off!

‘Just a bit’ of pruning on the seven sons tree (Heptacodium) turned into a few trunks being removed, but the real point of this is the finished berm and trees which now shield us from the Industrial park.

I had to quickly finish up the last of the cleanup -which turned into more of a leave in situ/ call it natural mulch/ kind of thing- but I did try to get in a few projects. One of them was an attempt at addressing the cankers which always seem to show up on the Seven Sons tree (Heptacodium miconioides). From what I’ve read this plant seems to be prone to them, and my options are (1)ignore them and hope they don’t completely girdle the branch (2)cut them out whenever they show up, or (3)get rid of the whole thing. For those keeping track, I’ve moved on to option 2.

Eventually these canker infections will grow enough to encircle the entire branch, cutting off the flow of nutrients and the trunk will die off. Hopefully cutting them out will help control them…

Fortunately my pruning activities are nothing compared to the curly willow my friend has to deal with. The almost-bomb cyclone weather system which pummeled the midwest earlier in the week also brought fierce winds, rain, and hail to our little valley.

I feel somewhat responsible. About a dozen years ago I offered a potful of rooted cuttings which were graciously accepted. Curly willow grows fast though.

The weather forecast for this Easter weekend.

Not to dwell on the weather but any gardener worth his or her salt tends to dwell on the weather and I of course am no exception. At the risk of appearing to complain I just want to point out that my holiday break perfectly matches the multi-day rain event which will be April-showering the Northeast this weekend. Also if you are curious as to what part of the Northeast plays host to my garden, it’s just about dead center to the red outline which highlights this weekend’s heaviest rain forecasts.

Still, too much rain always beats drought, so I’ll just hope for the best and just enjoy the flowers which are coming up all over!

A week ago it was corydalis, now the daffodils and hyacinth are taking center stage. btw, Hyacinths don’t appreciate high winds so fortunately the ones here were only just coming up when the wind hit.

I can complain about a lot of things, but the spring bulbs along the street are not one of them. All I do is cover up last year’s debris with a mulch of chopped leaves and then wait for things to come up. It’s been a couple years since I last added new daffodils or hyacinths but I think this year a few can use some dividing. Of course I’ll spread them out some more!

I think this is ‘Woodstock’. I love those dark stems and saturated color. Beetroot red is often used in descriptions, and I think that’s right on the mark.

‘Red Devon’ (which is looking less washed out this year) with ‘Tweety Bird’ in back and a few pale ‘Pistachio’ here and there. ‘Pistachio’ is an absolute favorite in case you’re wondering.

‘Barret Browning’ (pre-1945) is an oldie but goodie.

I have a few grape hyacinths out there as well. I avoid letting them go to seed, but of course when I saw seeds offered I had to try them. Go figure. I think they’re extra special of course, since I spent three years growing them on to blooming size, but I won’t be offended if you think they look just like any other muscari which you can buy for pennies a bulb.

Muscari seedlings along the front walk. I believe these were planted as ‘Mt Hood’ but of course don’t show anything close to the icy blue color and pale tip of the parent.

I see that the rain outside has stopped for a bit, so let me find my boots and take a slog around the garden.

A view down along the street border. From the side and angled just perfectly it looks packed with spring color, and that’s the view I’d like to leave you with.

Enjoy your weekend and have a blessed Easter and Passover.

Corydalis and then Some

Apr14

Warmer weather has finally reached NE Pennsylvania and within days buds are swelling, sprouts are showing, and the earliest spring bloomers are putting large swathes of color into beds which have spent the last few months exploring black and white themes. Finally I can take those nice leisurely garden tours and not have to harass the same old snowdrop shoots every few hours, looking to see if they’ve changed at all. New things are coming on faster than I can keep up with and all I can say is it’s great 🙂

Sitting on the front porch step is my favorite way to take in the front garden. Right next to the step is where I plant many of my smaller treasures, but in the past couple years the pinks and mauves of Corydalis solida seedlings have started to crowd out just about everything else.

Depending on what the thermometer does we’re just a few days away from bunches of hyacinths and the earliest masses of daffodils, but for the moment Corydalis solida dominates the front garden.

Corydalis solida ‘Beth Evans’ spreading out along the street border. It’s a lot more pink than I prefer but after months of brown and snow who cares.

I’d have to look, but it’s only been a few years since I planted about 15 tubers each of pink ‘Beth Evans’ and redder ‘George Baker’, and from there on they’ve exploded across the garden. They seem to enjoy the better-drained garden beds, in particular spots where other perennials will come up and cover them after they go dormant in a few weeks. Restraint is not something I think of when these come up, and if you’re of the type who prefer a more ordered garden I would highly recommend avoiding them. Corydalis solida does its own thing and if they’re happy in your soil you’ll have them showing up everywhere.

A weak attempt at adding named varieties has left me with just one survivor… and possibly a bunch of just-as-good seedlings. Keeping named plantings “pure” requires much more diligence than I chose to pursue so of course I just let them go.

In a few days all this color will fade away and the plants will quickly ripen seed and shrivel away to disappear underground for another 11 months. If I’m on top of things (which has NOT been the case so far this year) I’ll dig a few of the more crowded clumps and tuck them in to all kinds of new territory… or just do it accidentally in August when I dig up a shovel full of the little round yellowish tubers. In the meantime here are two other surprises from the earliest of spring garden.

Drumstick primrose (Primula denticulata) were a steal off the late fall clearance rack. I have no idea if they’ll last more than a year, but right now I’m thrilled by how early they are and lucky I was to find such well-grown plants. -Thanks Perennial Point!

Near the shelter of the house the hyacinth have started. This wimpy, washed out pink is my most exciting hyacinth ever since it’s the first to flower of a bunch of seedlings off the clump to the left. Six or seven years is all it took which sounds terrible but since I never did a thing for them other than leave them alone it hasn’t been bad at all.

Pink. My favorite color. Still it’s my firstborn hyacinth and I love it, and look forward to seeing how it develops over the next few years.

So that’s it. Spring is exploding so that’s really not even close to what’s going on, but like you I’d also rather be in the garden versus on the computer so off I go! Hopefully after missing most of yesterday for all kinds of events, and today for more events (and plenty of rain in the afternoon), something valid gets done in the garden before the work week returns, but you never know. I’m fine with just sitting around taking it all in. Plus, as I discovered yesterday, parts of the compost pile are still frozen so I guess we’re still just starting.

I love the start. Have a great week!

Like the Little Train That Could

Mar4

I have faith in March this year. I think he’s a changed month and there will be none of the shenanigans he usually throws our way in terms of weather extremes and spring crushing snow loads. I think.

Up by the shelter of the front porch, this clump of snowdrops and winter aconite are always first in bloom… even if for only a few hours between snow melts…

It’s only just the first week of course, and this optimism is based entirely on the few hours between Saturday’s snowfall melting off, the sun coming out, above freezing temperatures for just three or so hours, and then the next snowstorm rolling in Sunday afternoon. I was quick to run out though and take a few pictures while the flowers were also feeling optimistic.

I went ahead (perhaps foolishly) and planted out the new witch hazels in whatever decent, unfrozen, spots I could find. This is ‘Diane’ crammed into a spot close to the street.

Most of the garden is still fully winter, but if I crop out the patches of snow and focus on the few patches of early snowdrops, winter aconite (Eranthis hyemalis), and witch hazels, well I guess you can have a little hope for spring.

Hamamelis ‘Barmstedt Gold’ a little further down the border with the earliest snowdrops to appear in the open garden. ‘Gerard Parker’ is the name of the snowdrop in case you’re wondering, and yes, I still need to do a little cleanup here…

This is the time of year which consists of me shuffling back and forth between the same few spots and poking and prodding every last shoot in an attempt to get them to sprout faster. I doubt it helps, but on a “warmer” day I’m out there way more than the weather deserves and I’m sure it rolls some eyes. My neighbor refers to it as ‘you’re out taking pictures of dirt again, aren’t you’ season, and that always reminds me that I should really find a more private spot in the backyard to raise these plants.

Also in front amongst the shelter of the foundation plantings, galanthus ‘Diggory’ is just coming in to bloom with ‘Wendy’s Gold’ behind.

The thrill was short-lived. We ended up with about six inches and although it’s pretty and not all that cold I won’t be sharing any of those pictures. Im huddling indoors and for my plant-fix it’s back to the snow-free, yet underwhelming winter garden in the rear of the garage.

The last of the woodshop nonsense is finally out of this area and I’m making it 100% plants. Nothing too exciting going on, but new seeds and cuttings are exciting enough for me, and I’ll show more of that in time.

So just a couple more days and I’m sure March will be showing his more personable side. I don’t think I’m asking for too much, just no hailstorms or blizzards this year please.

On a side note, this upcoming weekend (Saturday, March 9th) marks the third annual Galanthus Gala, hosted by David Culp of Downingtown Pennsylvania. This event is sure to thrill snowdrop lovers and plant lovers in general, and is normally one of the highlights of my late winter snowdrop-a-thon. Alas this year I cannot attend, and the thoughts of missing out on seeing friends and browsing sales tables and talking gardens would have me depressed if I happened to dwell on it too long, so I won’t. I will just recommend that you should go if you can, stop by, rub elbows with the garden obsessed from the US and beyond, sit in for a few talks, and maybe leave with a few new goodies. I hear that besides a healthy supply of snowdrops and such, there will be even more hellebores and also a nice haul of witch hazels this year. Perhaps my wallet will appreciate missing out on more witch hazels but I’m going to be a little crabby about that for a while.

In any case, all the best for March and have a great week!

sorta like suburbia

more than you ever wanted to know about my garden

Category Archives: front border