This afternoon I was prowling about the garden, enjoying the glorious January sun despite occasional raindrops from dark clouds that raced along on a stiff breeze. I wasn’t planning to stay outdoors long, but was caught up in the warmth, and stayed until the soil’s wetness had soaked through to my socks. In recent days…

The neighborhood deer were unusually active in the garden in early autumn. Leathery leaves of oakleaf hydrangeas and foliage of perennials that persisted late into the season were munched on, and deer resistant evergreens that require a protective spray only in early December were damaged. I haven’t a clue why. In recent years I’ve become…

The late autumn blooming camellias appear to be finished for the season, except for ‘Winter’s Interlude’ that has dozens of fat buds, but hasn’t flowered in any of the past several years. I am probably imagining that the buds are showing a hint of color, as if ready to open on the next warm afternoon,…

“Do you know what my tree is? It’s tall, with leaves shaped like fingers, except the ends are all pointy-like”. I’ve heard this a hundred times with some slight variations, and most often the description leaves me without a clue. I don’t fault the questioner, I can barely describe how to get to my own…

Occasionally, I consider that one plant or another might be my particular favorite, and then another pops into bloom and …. well, you can see where this is going. I’m fairly certain that it’s unrealistic for most gardeners to pick one favorite plant, and depending on the time of the year I have a handful,…

With several unseasonably warm January days it is not unusual for forsythias to burst into bloom, and occasionally a stray daffodil or two will flower weeks early. There is little danger in the premature flowering, and in most cases the blooms are scattered and don’t take away from the  usual display a month later. In…

In my enthusiasm showing off the red berried hollies last week I failed to mention the shiniest, reddest, and most abundant berries in the garden. One of my favorite plants is the common, but beautiful, nandina (Nandina domestica), sometimes called heavenly bamboo for its bamboo-like stems and foliage. I have planted several handfuls of nandina…

The hollies are appropriately adorned for the season with shiny red ornaments. There are at least ten, and probably closer to twenty varieties of upright growing hollies in the garden, and in early December many are loaded with red berries, more than I can recall in twenty-two years in this garden. I’m certain that there…

When the potted tropicals were brought indoors this autumn I decided that fewer would be overwintered in the dining and kitchen areas, with more being stashed by the double doors in the basement. This was done for practical reasons, mostly. The bananas and variegated gingers grew considerably through the summer, and the yellow striped agaves…

Wait, Wait! Perhaps the garden isn’t finished for the season. Until a few days ago November temperatures were milder than normal, but just barely so. The past week has been much warmer, and the Autumn Amethyst Encore azaleas (below) that bloomed only sporadically through September and October are beginning to flower again. Encore azaleas routinely…

At the end of November there are camellias blooming, and ‘Winter Sun’ mahonia (below) is still a few weeks from its peak flowering, but otherwise the garden is pretty much kaput. Despite somewhat warmer than average temperatures in November (but not by much), the flowers on the Knockout roses have shriveled in the cold nights….

With gusty breezes a few days ago the Japanese maples suddenly shed their leaves, and now only flowering pears (Pyrus calleryana, below) in the neighborhood, and Chinese and Rutgers’ hybrid dogwoods in the garden have not dropped their colorful foliage. The autumn foliage of the pears is extraordinary, with leaves that color by mid October…