Snowy Garden

This morning we awoke to several inches of snow, and I caught a few photos before my children trampled it to mush.  At center above is the dwarf Arctic willow, whose lines are so pretty in winter.

Here is the same area from the other direction.  Substance is provided by evergreen boxwoods, lavender shrubs and deciduous butterfly bushes whose leave haven't fallen yet.

The sitting area at the Northwest arbor doesn't look very inviting right now.  Brrr!

The three contorted filberts (two green, one red-leaved) all look great in the snow.  This one has been in the ground for three growing seasons and hasn't gained much size, but maybe next year it will finally leap.

The honeysuckle on the swing set holds the snow beautifully, while the surrounding honey locust trees show off their elegant winter form.  This is just the sweet corner, eh?

The butterfly bushes leaf out late in spring, but they've held onto their leaves longer than any of the other deciduous shrubs.  In the spring I'll cut them down nearly to the ground to keep them dwarf.

Sadly, the view in the front yard is a little different after the big wind storm (up to 70 mph gusts) last week.  There should be a blue spruce in the background of this photo, but look what happened to it . . .

The spruce tree kept leaning farther toward our porch with each monumental gust of wind, so with the neighbors' encouragement, my husband tied a rope from the tree to his truck and pulled it over in the other direction.  It popped off at the base and has since been cut up and carried away.

Even if the tree had fallen, the damage would have been minimal compared to what many in Spokane experienced.  Hundreds of trees fell and many hit houses, cars, and even people.  Fences blew over, shingles flew away, and I watched a neighbor's metal shed somersault over their fence.  Power is still out in many areas.  This was the one time I was glad to live in a young neighborhood without mature trees.  Of course the damage would have been even worse a month ago when the deciduous trees had their leaves.  As it was, the toppled trees were mostly evergreens.  But on the bright side, many of us here are feeling sincerely grateful for blessings we often took for granted before, which is perfect for Thanksgiving week.
I am going to take a break from blogging until the new year, so I wish you happy holidays!

West Garden Through the Year

The robins returned to our neighborhood last week so I had high hopes for spring arriving soon, but it has been snowing again the past few days.  The west garden, pictured above, looks empty.  I dug out a few photos from last year showing the progression of this garden through the seasons.



In March the small bulbs begin adding some color and the other plants send up green shoots.  It's still kind of bare, though, isn't it?  When the evergreen 'Wee Willie' boxwoods mature to 2' tall and wide, they will give a little more structure to the space in winter and spring. 



By the end of April, the larger bulbs and 'Axcent Blue' Aubrieta are blooming while fresh green growth begins to fill in the area.



Here is the garden in May, as the last 'Blue Spike' Muscari bulbs finish up and the big show is about to start.



June is the best month for this garden, with plenty of color and lush growth.  I didn't get a photo of the garden in July, but the upright lilies and daylilies bloomed during the first part of that month.  My 'Lady Emma Hamilton' English rose also had its main flush of bloom in early July last year. 



In August there is less color, though the 'Walker's Low' catmint and 'May Night' salvia have been cut back and are now on their second flush of bloom.  I am planning to transplant several divisions of deep rose 'Dazzleberry' sedum to this garden to provide more late-summer color.  One year I planted a bunch of petunias here that bloomed hard in late summer, but I don't want to have to coddle annuals while their roots get established each year.  Perennials and shrubs are more sturdy.



By the end of August, the 'Teasing Georgia' climbing rose began another flush of flowers.  You can see the violet salvia looks gangly by this point, but it provides a little color along with the catmint.  To the right is a newly planted 'Fine Line' Rhamnus (buckthorn).  There are two of these shrubs in the garden that should grow to 5-7' tall and 3' wide at maturity.  They will give height to this narrow garden along with the climbing roses and one honey locust tree. 



Some years we don't make it very far into October before a hard freeze turns everything brown.  Here the 'Stella d'Oro' daylily leaves put on a pretty fall show at the south end of the path.



This photo was taken at the beginning of November, when winter began in earnest.  Spokane winters are long, but this one is almost over.  If we get a few warmer days to melt the snow and warm the soil, the earliest crocuses will start blooming soon.  Until then I'll just be glad to be warm inside instead of fluffing my feathers on a frozen branch with the poor robins. 

Snowy Shots From The Garden

We woke up to snow this morning, much to the excitement of the children.  I immediately thought of the hundreds of bulbs still waiting for me to plant.  Hopefully the snow will be gone by Friday, when my husband generously offered to help me get them into the ground.



You can see the roses still have leaves and mounds of catmint still need to be cut back.  I need more fall weather before winter arrives to stay.



Here is the view from just inside the back gate.  We have been enjoying watching the cute little birds that flock to the crabapple trees to eat the fruit.



The contorted filbert is lovely with branches stripped almost clean of leaves and catkins dangling like Christmas ornaments.  It actually produced a couple of nuts this year.



A clump of Siberian iris in front of 'Green Mountain' boxwoods forms an interesting contrast of textures. 



For now there is plenty of texture in the garden, though soon the last of the deciduous leaves will fall from shrubs and perennials will collapse into piles of mush.



The dwarf Arctic willow still has leaves, pretty fluffy thing.  I'll cut it back to the ground in spring to keep it from getting too large.



This is the main sunny garden.  I'm still scratching my head about what changes to make next spring, because it's not quite right yet.  Maybe I can fit a few more English roses here, but do I really need more roses? 



Straw-colored hydrangea clusters hold mounds of snow.  Just looking at that chilly metal bench makes me shiver.



Maybe by next winter the swing set will be mostly camouflaged by quick growing 'Hall's Purple' honeysuckle.  The leaves did turn deep purple last month, which made a Halloweeny scene with the deep maroon leaves of the 'Shasta' doublefile viburnum in the corner. 



The jagged boulders look interesting in the snow.  The little shrub on the bottom right is the Koreanspice viburnum that had such great fall color.



I can't count the number of time my toddler tipped this fountain over in the past year.  Maybe by next summer he'll have outgrown that urge.



Here is a final view looking east, with one of my favorite 'Green Tower' boxwoods taking center stage.  Glancing out the window, I see that the snow has melted from the street and from the edges of the garden beds.  Phew.  There is hope for bulb planting later this week.   

Icy Daggers in the Garden

We had some interesting frost formations outside the other day.  They looked more dangerous than delicate - like thorns or daggers or something nasty to touch.  The photo above shows twigs on a 'Kwanzan' cherry tree.



Here is the frost on a 'Green Tower' boxwood.



You can see the boxwood looks a bit faded from the winter cold, but this type doesn't turn completely bronze.  Our new front door is in the background - I love the extra light it lets in through its south-facing window.



A clematis vine growing on the east side of the house gathered some frost.



The branches of my dogwood trees have such a pretty form in winter.  When it snows, the twigs catch big clumps of snow like hands with fingers outstretched.



Here is one of my two frosty 'Blue Moon' wisterias.  I planted them two years ago and hope that this year they'll finally bloom.

Hopefully the earliest crocus will start flowering next month.  I heard birds chirping outside today, though spring is months away.  I'm enjoying the garden through the windows until then! 

Evergreen in Zone 5, Huh?

This post is a followup to my post last year on which evergreens actually looked good by midwinter in my zone 5 garden. The 'Queen Charlotte' violet surprised me with fresh-looking green leaves and an actual flower (in January! - a miracle for sure), but be warned that the rest of the photos are more dreary. Honestly I feel like I'm posting pictures of my armpits - very unsavory - but here are the facts on the evergreen situation.



The Sagina subuluta groundcover looks about the same color as it is in summer - with some straw-colored bits mixed in. It doesn't make a huge statement at less than an inch tall, but it's nice to see some patches of green on the ground.



I had high hopes for my two 'Green Tower' boxwoods (click on the name for more info from Monrovia), and they're looking OK but not spectacular. They aren't totally bronze like so many boxwoods, but they aren't a very 'fresh' shade of green, either. Some of the long stems were sticking out sideways (like a bad hair day) after heavy snow, but they have mostly recovered now that the snow has melted.



The only juniper I find attractive, super-hardy 'Blue Star', is of course looking fine despite the cold and snow. You can see the touch of pink in its needles that appears during the cold months. Other types of needle-leaved evergreens do well here in tree or shrub form - arborvitaes, spruces, firs, pines - but they just seem boring and prickly to me, so I don't have any in my yard.



These hellebore leaves are growing in full winter shade on the north side of our home, and the leaves are still a beautiful green but buds have not yet formed. I figured out that if I want my hellebores to bloom before May, they have to get some winter sun. Of course they need summer shade, so planting under deciduous trees is perfect. Their leaves turn brown faster with winter sun, but in exchange I'll get early flowers. All of my other hellebores are getting winter sun and have buds formed and blotchy brown leaves.



The various heucheras in my yard are looking OK, if a bit flattened by the snow. Above is 'Lime Rickey'. 'Green Spice', 'June Bride', 'Prince of Purple', and 'Autumn Bride' all look similar, with slightly faded colors from summer. They'd look better if I would clean out the brown leaves around them, but that hasn't happened yet.



The Juncus spiralis 'Corkscrew' clumps still look pretty good, and they bounce back from the snow easily.



This photo shows Thymus 'Elfin' in front, Penstemon 'Elfin Pink' on the left (how cute, the Elfins are together), and Aubrieta 'Axcent Blue' on the right. All of these plants are doing fairly well this year. The grey thyme looks dreary, but perhaps it's better than bare earth? The penstemon leaves are holding up better this year than last year, looking wilted but green. And the aubrieta even has a few small violet flowers on some plants.



The 'Big Blue' liriope is pale and listless, but still somewhat green. Again, better than bare earth, I guess.



The poor 'Otto Luyken' laurels look like a joke, with the top halves burned brown by subzero temperatures and the bottom halves pretty green where they were protected by snow. They looked better last year. Here's hoping that the stems are still alive and the brown leaves are quickly replaced by green ones during their spring flush of growth.



I'll finish with a 'Golden Lotus' hellebore bud to show that there is hope for spring eventually! As you can see my grand plans for including non-needle-leaved evergreens in the garden haven't been as successful as hoped. At least all the boulders are looking good. It's so hard to find the right balance between winter interest and summer interest in zone 5 - with every 'boring' evergreen shrub you plant, you give up space for flowers and interesting foliage in the summer. Even though our growing season is shorter than most, I spend so much more time outside during that time of year that I'll probably keep weighting my garden toward summer interest. What's your opinion on the right balance?

Amaryllis Blooming & Igloo Building

The amaryllis (is the plural amarylli?) and the igloo have been the stars around here lately. Above is 'Zombie', a striking coral-pink double amaryllis from Van Engelen.



It has been so fun to watch the show on my kitchen windowsill. First one bloom opens, then more and more.



I shot pictures with the cloudy sky as a backdrop. I thought having three blooms on one stalk open all at once was beautiful . . . .



. . . and then a few days later a second stalk opened up three more just beneath the first.



One of the three bulbs the arrived in the mail is obviously not 'Zombie', but it doesn't look like anything else on the Van Engelen website, either.



I didn't mind getting a surprise, though. The stalk on this one is very short and the flowers are so sweet, don't you think?



Finally, here is a shot of the new garden structure that my husband built, with my son posing in front. It was tall enough for me to stand up inside, and my adventurous husband was planning to sleep inside one night (that's what people do around Spokane for fun in the winter, didn't you know?). Unfortunately warmer weather and rain began to melt the igloo immediately after it was finished, and now it's just a small pile of snow in the grass. R.I.P.