Despite the rain and snow that continues to fall around here signs of Spring leak out everywhere. I’ve had a terrible time trying to keep up with everything that I see blooming. When I had the idea to keep track of what was in bloom I was going to do it with just my garden. Unfortunately, my garden doesn’t pack a lot of punch when it comes to flowers. At least not in the Spring. Therefore I’ve been making mental note of what I see while I’m out and about. Also unfortunately, having a child has decreased the number of brain cells that I posses to hold hands and form a line and remember what I see. I’m sure it is illegal to take notes while driving too. So with the best of my recollection abilities here goes:
Plum and Cherry Trees
Star and Saucer Magnolias
Spring Bouquet Viburnum
Kale
Hyacinth
Pansies
Primroses
Helleborus
Tulips
Daffodils
Grape Hyacinth
Forsythia
Candy Tuft
Rock Cress
Pieris
Heath
Azaleas
Early Rhododendrons
Bergenia
Euphorbia
One would assume that the nice weather around here has had me out in the garden. I wish that were not the case. My seeds still have not arrived (and I’m getting impatient). Instead of sprucing up my garden I’ve been remodeling my kitchen. I kills me a little that it was over 70 degrees yesterday and I was inside sanding and staining cabinets. I did take a moment to photograph a little of what is blooming in my garden these days.
Within the last two days my Thundercloud Plums and Weeping Cherry have fully blossomed. I also noticed one of my odd primroses has now bloomed and the smell of the hyacinth is a reminder that it is actually spring. It makes me ignore the fact that it might snow on Friday.
We purchased our house in the fall of 2003. That summer preceding had been exceptionally hot and dry. The previous homeowner had left the house vacant for months and other than a lawn scalping not much was done. We spent two weeks prior to moving in resurfacing nearly every surface of the interior. We made 35 trips to Home Depot in that two weeks span. We were nearly on a first name basis with the cashiers.
Once I felt like the inside was live-able I moved to the outside. This house was the first we’d purchase therefore this was the first garden that was totally mine. The garden was in worse shape than the circa 1982 interior. I spent weeks in the cold January rain pulling Ivy, Vinca, Fatsia, Honeysuckle Bush and anything else that I could get my hands on. I also wanted to cut down 1 or two of the three trees in our front, but my husband wouldn’t let me. However, I still swear something has to go. Honestly… who puts Thundercloud Flowering Plum next to a Photinia (and this is a 20′ tall Photinia tree). The Red Hat Society is a great organization. I just don’t want to be their signature garden.
Unfortunately, all three trees give us a great deal of privacy in the front and the Plums are pretty when they flower. Everything stays.
Once I had my fun of tearing everything out I started to put back plants that were pretty. One afternoon my neighbor stopped by to chat. She asked me why there were no flowers in my garden. I also heard two women on their walk mentioning that my garden would not look nice in the winter because there were no evergreen shrubs. I was crushed. Here I had spent all of this time and money to start creating a garden that was just mine and my neighbors thought it was awful. Granted, it was better than what was there. I got to thinking about it and realized that I wasn’t planting my garden to be beautiful to them. I was planting it to be beautiful to me.
Now notice that I did not say that I planned it. For a landscape designer my garden is anything but planned. I was so eager to put plants in the ground I skipped the planning stage. I would go to the nurseries and have a full on episode of, “oh that’s pretty,” and in it would go. This proved to be a bad idea in the long run. I didn’t know where the shady spots were. I didn’t know what portions would be difficult to water. It was a mess. Five years later I’ve almost figured it out.
I also began to realize that my neighbor who told me that my garden had no flowers was wrong. My garden is full of blooms. It is also full of amazing textures and shapes. Her definition of “flowers” was that every garden needs to have a flowering Dogwood. I would love to have a flowering Dogwood. I just have a mile long list of other trees that I want first.
Topping my list of favorite trees is the Paperbark Birch (Betula jacquemontii). The stark white bark and the pyramidal shape make this the most elegant tree (in my opinion). I love the fine texture of the branches and how it almost glitters in the summer breeze. Nary a showy pink flower, but still beautiful.
In the shrub category I would have to go with dwarf conifers. I am a sucker for a dwarf conifer. I have a huge collection of them. Some are sited in an area that is far to shady so they are getting leggy, but for the most part they offer that evergreen backdrop that my nosy neighbors failed to see.
For perennials I would have to go with New Zealand Flax (Phormium tenax). There are three of these in my garden and I would love to have more. The bold texture and color add weight to the garden. They are easy to grow and wonderfully drought tolerant once established.
I do have flowers in my garden. I have a little Rose garden (that I truly dislike) and I once had the most beautiful Dahlias in town. I’ve let the roses go to pot and I decided to divide my Dahlias, but forgot to put them back in the ground. My cut flower selection if fading. Re-establishing that is my main focus this year (oh and the weeding).
The point is that you don’t have to have a garden full of bright and bold flowers to make it beautiful. While I have a large population of weeds, my garden is still spectacular come summer.
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In bloom this week:
Forsythia, Primroses, Pansies, Heath, Daffodils, Christmas Cheer Rhododendron, Grape Hyacinth, Thundercloud Plum (starting), Hyacinth
Spring rolled into the Northwest on Friday a nasty rainy mess. It was as winter had a tight grip on its dominance and was reluctant to give up. Although, the people on the Kitsap Peninsula are probably saying, “what is this Spring you speak of?” Winter relented (somewhat) for the weekend allowing me to get a few things done.
First and foremost, I squeezed in the Tacoma Rose Society Plant Sale. The Rose Society works in conjunction with Metro Parks to tend the rose garden at Pt. Defiance park. If you’ve never visited the garden I highly suggest that you take a moment and do so. Just don’t do it this afternoon. Unless you like looking at thorny twigs. I suggest sometime in the summer.
This is the first year I’ve attended the sale and I was rather impressed. It is not a gigantic plant sale by any means. However, if you want some beautiful roses $8.00 a piece will get you quite far. I have a tough enough time managing the ones I have so I admired their shapes and skipped straight to the buckets of perennials. So many perennials need to be divided and what in the world do you do with all of those divisions? If you are me you let them rot in your garage and then cry when you have to compost oodles of Dahlias. If you are the Rose Society you sell them. And on the cheap. Most things were selling for $5 or $10. Good sized divisions that really can be divided yet again. While I was waffling about how I wanted to spend my allotted $20 the nice lady informed me that everything was 1/2 off… wait? did she just say these huge divisions are now $2.50. Damn! I brought the Bug and not the truck. Needless to say I walked out with only $15 worth of plants. But for that $15 I purchased 2 Hosta, 2 Red Hardy Lobelia (which I later divided 1 of), 1 Bergenia and 1 Daylily (of an unknown color, my luck it will be orange). Not bad.
I sweet talked my husband into helping me plant my treasure Sunday afternoon. In addition to the planting I dug up both of my Sword Ferns and transplanted them to new locations. I divided one of the ferns, planted most of my new plants (including a double Hellebore and 2 Primroses) and now my shade garden is nearing completion. It was a lovely feeling.
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In bloom this week: Heath, Tete a Tete daffodils (and a few other varieties), Pussy Willow, Snowdrop, Forsythia, Christmas Cheer Rhododendron, a blue flower that I forgot the name of, Primroses and Pansies.
This year we are planning our garden with the assistance of 2 books. I will do a review on both of them at a later date. The first is Growing Vegetables West of the Cascades by Steve Solomon. The second is All New Square Foot Gardening by Mel Bartholomew. Oddly enough, these two books are vastly different in technique. Mr. Solomon claims that 1000 sq ft of garden space can keep a family of 4 in veg year round in the Northwest. Mr. Bartholomew says he can do it in 144 sq ft. That’s a huge difference. How can I combine two vastly different gardening methods? It actually is not that difficult. We are using West of the Cascades for culture of plants. It gives more information on how the plants grow, pests and diseases and gardening in the winter. Square Foot is the foundation of what we’ll be doing this year. Again, this is not a review post.
Last year we added on to our vegetable garden by constructing a 5′x10′ bed and 2 5′x5′ beds. That would mean that we have 150 sq. ft. of potential vegetable growing space. According to Mel Bartholomew that is plenty for our family of 3. Let’s hope he’s correct.
In order to plan our our garden I drew a scale plan of my 4 vegetable beds. Hey, I’m a landscape designer by trade, would you think anything less? I then broke it up into a 1′x1′ grid. I also made a list of the seeds that I had purchased this year (which have yet to arrive). Theoretically, everything will fit into my 150 sq. ft. Including the herbs and some squares filled with flowers. I think that’s rather impressive. The trick will be if it will give us enough veg to last the year. I’m doubting it.
To help keep me organized I also used one of our many calendars and made a rough plan of when I need to plant things. This would be great if I actually had my seeds. Trouble with this much planning is not having a reference as to when things should happen. There are so many resources out there to tell you when to plant things, but the majority of them are based on last frost date. Around here that last frost date could be mid-May. Ok, that’s a little excessive but considering it has been snowing off and on for the past 3 days I wouldn’t rule it out. The range of last frost for the Puget Sound region can be from March 24th to May 24th. Pretty broad wouldn’t you say. I haven’t kept records in the past so I split the difference and went with April 20th. (I’ll cover tender plants in another post). Having an estimated last frost date helped determine when seeds should be started. I also use the good ol’ Farmer’s Almanac to determine plant specific planting ranges. My calendar is highlighted with the ranges for each plant and then I keep notes as to when I actually planted the seeds.
For example: my range for the first sowing of lettuce was supposed to be March 1-March 10. I planted 2 squares of Black Seeded Simpson Lettuce (it was left from last year) on March 3rd. Assuming my seeds arrive this week I will be planting carrots (March 11-25) and beets (March 15-25) this weekend.
My suggestion is if you use this type of planning method find one system that works for you, and one set of dates. Otherwise you’ll get a million resources saying when you should be planting. In addition, take notes. When did you put your seeds in? When did they sprout? What has the weather been like? Each year you will get better at anticipating germination and have less plant loss.
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In bloom this week: Tete a Tete Daffodils, last of the crocus, heath, primroses, pansies, fading Witch Hazel, Helleborus (new addition to the garden)
Yesterday’s weather was so beautiful that I just had to get out and snap a few photos. We have very few blooms in the garden at this time of year so any little bit of natural color is very welcome. I’m also going to try to put together a calender of blooms so that you can refer back to it. When those fantastic fall plant sales come up you can look back and say, when does that tree bloom again? Ah ha! Mid-April. We’re handy like that.
This week I have Crocus, Primroses, Pansies, Witch Hazel, and the end portion of my Heath. I also spied a few Vinca Vine blooms starting to show their faces.
To add winter interest to the garden look for plant material with interesting bark, textures and shapes. To cheer up our wet rainy months we gaze at Paperbark Birch, Cryptomeria and variegated Boxwood. In addition to that you could add Redtwig Dogwood, Coral Bark Maple, Yellowtwig Dogwood or a Harry Lauder’s Walking Stick (Contorted Filbert). A winter garden need not be boring.
So we would like your help. There is only so much that actually blooms in my garden. I’m a textures kinda gardener. What’s blooming in your garden this week, and where do you live?
One of our readers, Kim, posed the question:
I have two very large, potted [Hibiscus], outside in the summer, inside in the foul weather of winter. They are getting a little “stringy”, I know they need pruning, but not sure how far down to go….please help!
Hibiscus syriacus (Rose of Sharon) is what we have in the Northwest. It is a deciduous shrub that buds out late in the season causing most people to think that their plant has died over the winter. My assumption is that this is not the variety you have. Odds are you are the owner of Hibiscus rosa-sinensis (Chinese Hibiscus). This is what we would call a “patio-tropic.” A lovely plant that looks pretty in the summer, we take it inside in the winter and it promptly dies. Therefore, I actually had to consult a book for help with this one.
According to my research these plants can sprawl over time. The first rule of pruning is “Dead, dying or diseased.” Prune those out first. To rejuvenate the plant remove all the older branches and cut the remainder back hard. Yes, it will look ugly at first. 9 times out of 10 the plant will come back and bush out. On occasion the plant can’t handle the stress of the excessive pruning and will need to be replaced. Pruning should be done in the spring.
This is true about many plants in the Malvaceae family. I have a Tree Mallow (Lavatera thuringiaca) in my garden and it sprawls like crazy. I prune it back to the ground in the spring.
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In bloom this week:
Primroses, early crocus, Witch Hazel (Hamamelis x intermedia), Heath (Erica carnea)
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