The yellow leafed periwinkles (Vinca minor, below) have long turned to green. It is new leaves that are brightly colored, a splendid contrast to lavender blue blooms. As these colors fade in the summer’s heat, hostas and Japanese Forest grass provide the color, but of course these have all withered by early December. The yellow…

Anxiously, I wait for first color on a vernal witch hazel (Hamamelis vernalis) planted in late summer. This tree, a stocky seven footer I was fortunate to find, replaced a witch hazel that suffered in last year’s flooding rains, proving that even the sturdiest plants can suffer from too much or little. In fact, the…

This dusting of snow is not enough to call in, to claim that the sloped driveway is too slick and roads are too hazardous. Instead of another hour or two of sleep, followed by a lengthy tour of the snow covered garden, I must go to work. Almost certainly, the light snow will be gone…

Beavers, I suspect, are the culprits that gnawed two buttonbushes (Cephalanthus occidentalis, below) and a dappled willow (Salix integra ‘Hakuro nishiki’) to the ground this week. I haven’t seen a beaver, and it’s too swampy to get back to the farm pond to see the twig hut to confirm it, but it’s gotta be. As…

For a second year, the autumn flowering camellias are particularly delightful at the beginning of December. Yes, browned, freeze damaged flowers that remain are unsightly, but there are many lovely pink or white blooms that look out of place in the mostly brown and bare winter garden. A ‘Winter’s Star’ camellia (below) has only a…

Hollies along the driveway intrude over the asphalt edge, and while my wife has chopped out sections so branches don’t brush our cars, these capture the eye in autumn with clusters of red berries. Other hollies, scattered through the garden, are less evident until trees are naked in late autumn, and a few are buried…

I am quite pleased that seven Putty Root orchids (Aplectrum hyemale) have survived the year. All are in one area, with several other areas found not suitable, I suppose. The floral and foliage display of the Putty Root is modest, and unremarkable compared to other terrestrial orchids. It is native, found locally in damp, but…

This week, my cold intolerant wife has the urge for going south. The transition from autumn to winter is often gentle, with foliage colors mellowing to reds and yellows, but no day or days that obviously mark the change. No day when a freeze turns the garden from green to brown, from growing to dormant….

Though the season does not begin for another month, unquestionably winter temperatures have set in. The garden has turned following several nights that dropped into the low twenties, from scattered flowers to only a few. These will persist for weeks until witch hazels (Hamamelis), then hellebores (Helleborus) and snowdrops (Galanthus) continue flowering into early spring….

The suddenness of this week’s cold has turned much of the garden to brown. Leaves of Japanese maples that often reach peak autumn colors late in November changed to brown overnight. A year ago, a carpet of red leaves from the Bloodgood maple covered the front walk. Today, brown leaves cling to branches, the typical…

A week ago, the Korean Sweetheart tree (Euscaphis japonica) was successfully moved from a pot on the patio to a permanent position into the ground between the summerhouse and greenhouse. (I should clarify, the summerhouse is a square structure with a leaky aluminum roof. What else to call it? It’s shelter from the summer sun.)…

I am quite pleased that several of the garden’s camellias now tower above eight feet, with a few topping ten. Uppermost branching is not stocky, but even long, slender branches remain rigid in all but the dampest snowfalls. In this first week of November, many camellias are flowering, unaffected by recent twenty degree nights. Though…