Dave – Page 102 – Ramblin' through Dave's Garden

A must have

Unfortunately, no space can be found in the garden to add ‘Bihou’ Japanese maple (Acer palmatum ‘Bihou’, below), no matter how desperately I try to determine one plant or another as expendable to make room. I suspect that many gardeners are unrestrained by logic, bound more by the beauty of the flower or foliage than…

Shiny baubles to tempt the gardener

As plant catalogs clog the mailbox in mid winter, the gardener must be wary to resist temptation to foolishly purchase any shiny bauble that catches his eye. I suppose that resistance is greater when the gardener is entertained by hellebores, witch hazels, and winter jasmine flowering early in this mild winter, but on a chilly…

After the blizzard

I’m getting too old for this. When will it be spring? But, it’s winter, and some amount of snow is expected, even, and perhaps particularly, in a mild winter. With less frigid temperatures there is often more moisture, and when cold collides with moist, deep snow is often the result. Today, the driveway has been…

A significant snow on the way?

Note – The following post is reprinted with minor revisions from March 2013. Due to temperatures hovering just below freezing, the snow forecast for this weekend is expected to be wetter, and thus heavier. A wet snow tends to cling to branches, accumulating more quickly, and increasing the urgency in removing snow from vulnerable trees…

It’s winter, after all

So far, so good. Certainly, a gardener should not cheer on the warming of the planet, but he can hardly be blamed for enjoying a period of mild temperatures after severe winters in recent years. After a warm December, more typical winter weather has returned. Through the morning there was light snow as a cold…

The first snowdrop

The gardener rejoices with the first snowdrop (Galanthus spp., below) in January, and when foliage of daffodils first breaks through the soil. This is the hope for spring’s arrival, that winter’s end could be near. Though expected, flowers of the Vernal witch hazel (Hamamelis vernalis, below) and Winter jasmine (Jasminum nudiflora) are viewed joyfully, the gardener…

Cold? No problem

Winter flowers continue to progress despite low teens and single digit temperatures this week. In most of three decades in this garden there have never been so many blooms in early January, so there was little to go by to predict how flowers would react to cold after an extremely warm December. I expected that…

Hellebores in early January

Flowers of many hellebores are nestled close to the crown, beneath large leathery leaves, and thus are best viewed once the evergreen foliage has been removed. Typically, organized gardeners will remove leaves in December, long before flower buds grow fat and the chore becomes somewhat more difficult. In this garden, if there was ever a year…

Warm or sun?

With warms days, and more flowers than I can recall through any December, I do not miss frigid temperatures, ice, and snow that have brought a degree of ruin to the garden in recent winters. But, continued dreariness and rain are becoming bothersome, and I would greatly prefer some middle ground, even if cooler temperatures must…

Trouble for daffodils?

Sorry, I cannot assure that daffodils and alliums will not be harmed by cold that will arrive sooner or later in this so far very mild winter. Any local gardener who has been around for a few years has seen daffodils popping up in January, and has probably seen an occasional flower with a prolonged…

March in December

I will not be alarmed unless dogwoods and redbuds begin to flower in January (Azalea ‘Autumn Amethyst’, above) . In recent weeks I’ve cautiously described this early winter weather as only mild, but who am I fooling, temperatures into the sixties in northwestern Virginia in late December are more aptly defined as warm. More than…

Berrily, berrily

The abundance of berries on hollies in the garden varies, being subject to weather conditions at the time of flowering that might discourage pollinators from being out and about. This year, there are no berries on the deciduous Winterberry hollies (Ilex verticillata ‘Winter Red’, below), which are otherwise healthy, but have exhibited fewer berries in…