What's Blooming?

I can't find a single thing blooming outdoors after our deep freeze last week, so I'm posting pictures of my kitchen windowsill, which keeps my spirits up during the drearier days of winter.
 

This is the sight that greats me each day when I step into the kitchen.



I got this orchid from my beloved brother who raises them and has greenhouses full of these exotic beauties. He lets me take home blooming plants as long as I bring them back before I kill them. The Gardenia next to it gives me a little tropical jolt when I give it a good sniff.


I love this green amaryllis. I'm one of those people who likes the oddball plants.

Winter Warriors and Spring Promises

Our deep freeze has thawed and temps are back to normal. Today is a balmy 55 degrees with no rain. I took this opportunity to wander through the garden and make note on what survived with gusto (warriors) and what is a piddly mound of mush (non-warriors).

Almost all of the conifers emerged unscathed. This little beauty is my favorite Cryptomeria called 'Little Diamond'.



Although most of the plant mushed out to a brown mess, the pulmonarias showed some serious constitution by popping out new growth instantly. You can't keep a good pulmonaria down.



This whole vignette is made up of warriors. The Hebe armstrongii in the forground didn't even shrug. The Euonymus and Eleagnus in the back are tough cookies. What suprized me was the golden cypress that was given to me with the promise that it would break my heart because it wasn't hardy here. Well....it is.



With the deepening winter also comes the promise of spring and I go out regularly hunting for little treasures. This is the bud of Ribes 'Elk River Red'. I can't wait for the ribes (flowering currant) to bloom, because the hummingbirds always show up with the currant flowers.



Last year our temperature didn't get as cold, but we had some serious wind which resulted in this Garrya Elliptica 'James Roof' getting dessicated so badly I had to cut it back by half. This year, even with the cold, it held up great because we didn't have the wind.

As I walked through the garden, I also noted that the tips of the Reticulata Iris and the Snowdrops are popping through the soil. This is the beginning of a daily pasttime called "Snout Hunting". Each time I see the snout of a spring treasure erupting from the earth, it brings a special thrill.

For all of you who have enquired about Molina, my office cat... She is doing very well, living on a shelf in my bathroom, where she feels safe from our wussy dog. She finally came out of the bathroom on her own a few days ago and yesterday she took a walk through the garden outside, accompanied by Foos, who she thought of as a great bother.

Brrrrr.....It's Cold!

For the past few days, we have been getting very cold weather. Down to 10 degrees at night and never above freezing during the day. I took my office cat, Molina, home with me because it's too cold for her to be outside at night. So she's enjoying the warm nights in my house with 12 other cats that I can't bear to pitch out into the cold.




The cold has brought some serendipitous treats though, like the ice sculpture that our fountain created. Quite lovely.

So what do you do when it gets this cold? If you are lucky enough to have some snow with it, don't worry too much, the snow will insulate the plants. If it's dry, and no snow, you can do several things. Throwing sheets over tender shrubs will help keep desiccating winds from drying them out and causing further damage. A product on the market called "Wilt-Pruf" helps by coating the plant with a waxy substance that preserves moisture, but it needs to be applied before the freeze. Here at the Village Green, we have a "Survival of the Fittest" philosophy. If we lose a plant to the cold, we replace it with something equally interesting, but a bit hardier.

Poinsettia Care

'Tis the season for poinsettias and a little understanding can keep yours looking great well into the New Year.
Brrr...it's cold outside. And nothing feels the cold quite like a poinsettia. A good shock of cold air can defoliate your poinsettia in record time. Therefore when purchasing poinsettias, do not buy any that are sitting next to an outside door or in a draft. Purchase your poinsettia and get it right home. If you're running errands, get the poinsettia last. It will not appreciate sitting in a cold car. When you get it home. make sure it is placed out of the path of drafts.
Lighting is important. Your poinsettia will do best in bright, but not direct light.
Just like you and me, poinsettias like dry feet. Water only when the top inch of soil is dry and then make sure there is no water left standing in the saucer or pot wrapper. If you want to leave it in the pot wrapper, punch some holes in the bottom of it and place on a saucer. Leaving your plant sitting in water will spell certain death.
The red "flowers" are not flowers at all, but bracts (or modified leaves). The actual flowers are the little yellow things in the center. When choosing a poinsettia, choose one whose flowers (yellow thingys, remember) are not open fully. This is a less mature plant and it will last longer.
And not all poinsettias are red anymore. They now come in many shades of red, pink, white, yellow and orange and you can even find plants that have been dyed purple or blue or whatever. The bracts also come in several styles. There are rosette forms and marbled varieties.
The garden centers are bursting this time of year with all types and you should have no trouble finding your favorite and keeping happy for the Holidays.

Thabks to Gray's Garden Center, Eugene, Oregon, for allowing me to photgraph their poinsettias.

Garden Labeling

Over the years I have experimented with many different types of labeling. I started out, as many of us have, by sticking the labels that came with the plant into the ground next to it as I planted. Not only was this ugly, but these labels are cheap and disposable and degrade in the sunlight to the point that within a year they shatter. There is nothing fun about kneeling by a plant and picking up a hundreds tiny bits of shattered white plastic.
So I graduated on to sturdy plastic stakes that I wrote on with a sharpie. Not long after I learned that sharpies wear off within a year and I'm left with a blank label. Great for temporary labeling, but disastrous when trying to remember the name of some rare little something wonderful. Another thing I found really annoying with the white stakes was they looked like little headstones placed throughout the garden.
I finally began to hit on something great while I was visiting the Van Dusen Garden in Vancouver, British Columbia. They had black labels with white lettering. They were very unobtrusive, yet easy to find. I called the garden when I got home and talked to the volunteer who headed up their labeling program and she was very helpful. They bought their stakes from a Canadian company, but I was able to find black stakes through a wholesaler here in the States. The labeling was done with a Brother labeling machine, available at any office supply store. The hardest part was finding the label tape that is black with white lettering. Some office supply stores carry it, but you may have to special order it. It's also more expensive than the white tape.
I was told by the lady at Van Dusen that these labels would last for at least 3 years, but I have most of my original labels that I made 9 years ago, still intact and looking good. If the label is getting direct sun, the stake will fade to a charcoal grey color after 5 years or so, but it still is very unobtrusive.


This is an interesting way to label shrubs or trees. The label is just for the purpose of identification by the gardener. It isn't easy to read from the path. But if that's all you need. it works great. The wire slides as the shrub or tree grows, limiting the possibility of girdling.

One last tip - If I have a perennial that I think I may remember, but I'm not sure, I usually bury the label that came with it alongside it as I plant. The label will usually stay intact without the sunlight on it and if I forget what it is, I can find out again when I dig it up to divide it.

Appreciating Winter

Winter is the least favorite season for most gardeners, but it doesn't have to be all drudgery and misery. Keeping a positive attitude and looking for the beauty in winter goes a long way. The garden isn't dead, it's only sleeping, and walking through the garden on a frosty morning, you can see many of her dreams.
A few tricks I came up with to appreciate gloomy days are:
*Foggy days are now misty days. Mist sounds more magical than fog.
*The structure of the garden is much easier to see in the winter.
*Mosses are verdant, velvety accents.
*Seedheads left up in the garden feed the birds and add rustly sounds.
There are many plants that add interest to a winter garden. I would never be without Sarcococca (Fragrant blooms in January) and Daphne odora (fragrant blooms in February). I planted them by my front door so I can enjoy their fragrance as I go in and out. They both need shade in the summer, so plant them on the east or north side of the house by a door or window.
Hellebores bloom from late January into late March and then hold their bracts in muted tones much longer. New breeding has come up with fabulous colors and forms.
Witch hazels are another excellent choice for a winter garden. Most bloom in January -March and some are fragrant. My favorites are 'Ruby Glow', Jelena, and 'Sunburst'.



This picture of Hamamelis 'Ruby Glow' was taken on January 24th. It has wonderful fragrance and beautiful flowers. An added bonus is spectacular foliage color in the fall.


Flame Willow gives brilliant color in the winter. These plants benefit from a hard cutting back in the spring. The best color is one new wood. They grow back with amazing speed. Picture taken January 17th


Coral Bark Maple is another bright barked tree that glows in the winter. Picture taken October 21st


Snow is beautiful in the trees and on the ground. Ignore the negative aspects of it and savor the small gifts like these quail tracks. Picture taken March 9th.


Rime on roses is a sublime treat. Anytime there is heavy frost in the garden is a good time to get out with the camera. Picture taken November 27th by Greg Smith


A single Hellebore blossom frozen in a basin is a thing of beauty. Picture taken January 19th

From Ugh to Awesome for $0

I have learned that there are good things that come from a recession. One of them is creativity. When faced with projects that have no budget, what do we do?
One of my autumn projects is to replant the planters in front of the lodge. I usually fill them up with sword ferns, cyclamens, maybe some pansies and flowering kale. But this year there was no money for fall planters. Many of the plants I had in them over the summer were done, leaving more plants dead than living. Before I could wring my hands in dismay, however, Melinda (our so-savvy manager) reminded me of a planter I had done last year using twigs and berries and evergreen boughs. So off I went, clippers in hand to gather whatever I thought would look good stuck into the dirt of the planters. I concentrated on things that I knew would hold over for a long while. I didn’t want to have to do the planter over anytime soon. I collected artichokes, Corsican hellebore, cotoneaster berries, pyracantha berries, callicarpa berries (purple), red twig dogwood branches, rosemary, rosehips, gourds, small white pumpkins, and laurel clippings. I started by wetting the soil well and then just stuck the branches in until I had built up a pleasing arrangement. Most of these elements should last a month or more. Some will last all winter. I can remove anything that looks ratty later and add season favorites like holly and juniper. Where I would normally have spent approximately $150 - $200 for fall plants, I now have all of my planters done for free.