Today was another perfect day–temps in the 60’s and bright sun all day.  It is impossible to believe that any real winter weather might befall us after these last few weeks of warm and calm.  However, nights are still chilly and we had frost last week here, so that was a useful reminder to not get ahead of myself in planting and fertilizing.

I performed a few chores today–dug around the two columnar apple trees in the orchard garden (Scarlet Sentinel and North Pole) and the dwarf cherry (Glacier).  The plum tree is in bloom, but only a few flowers–doubt if any fruit will set.  There are bees around, but I’m not sure they are finding the flowers I want them to find.  They seem obsessed with finding water, instead.

Not a great photo, but these are all the flowers this Beauty plum has.

The bed that this plum and the grafted, espalier Asian pear occupy is completely filled with crab grass, buttercups and bindweed.  The bindweed isn’t up yet, so I’ll dig it out as best I can.  I did tackle some of the buttercups today and will tackle even more at a later date.  I plan to bed out a bunch of the English wallflower seedlings in this bed and then cover the ground with very aggressive groundcovers to keep the weeds down.

Other sights from the garden, pots and greenhouse:

This is the winter hazel (corylopsis) that is blooming next to the forsythia.  I love the soft yellow and the grace of the flowers.  The branching pattern is very graceful, too, and excellent for flower arrangements.  Looking up, you can see the details of the flowers and the graceful zigzag of the stems.

The leaves, once they unfurl, will be striking, as well–they resemble hazel leaves, but more graceful and with touches of red.

I’m not sure I would plant the two early yellow bloomers together if planning the garden again, but I do find the combination works.

Amazingly, three weeks after the first flowers burst open, the forsythia continues to impress.  It appears to be an excellent cultivar.  I would normally prune it back right after flowering, but it is so striking and such a graceful, natural shape that I will let it be for one more year.

This is the camellia that was here in the yard in 1995 when we moved in.  I pruned it once to make it more of a tree and less of a shrub, and I think it could use that treatment again.  The flowers are lovely, but we don’t usually get to enjoy many pristine ones, as the rain ruins them.  Something is bothering this old shrub, as it has dropped a bunch of leaves for no apparent reason.  I’ll keep an eye on it.  The flowers don’t appear affected, and there are plenty of them.

There are a few flowers open on the bigroot geraniums (geranium macrorrhizum)already. Again, not a great picture.  It can be easy to overlook the individual beauty of these flowers, as typically they bloom in clusters all over the garden. When there are just a few of them, they beg closer inspection.  This is one of my favorite ground covers–seems to like my clay here.

Here is an anemone blanda blooming in a clay pot on the shelves outside the greenhouse.  It was lovely in the sun today.  I also saw the blue variety (really a lavender blue) in one yard en masse on my run today and they were impressive.  I might try them in the ground again, as they obviously can work nicely in this area.

 

This interesting delicate blue hyacinth is impressive in form and fragrance.  It came in a mix, so I’ll have to see if I can figure out which cultivar it is to order some for next year.  Normally, my instinct is to dismiss flowers that have been so gaudily hybridized, but the giant flower spikes of hyacinths are an exception for me.  They retain grace in the individual petals/florets, and I just love the scent.

I was gifted with three hybrid pitcher plants last year that I’ve kept in a tray in the greenhouse.  I wasn’t sure I was meeting their needs, but today I noticed that one of the Sarracenias has a couple of flower spikes coming on.  The flowers of these unusual plants are even more impressive to me than the miraculous leaves–it should be fun to watch their progress.

 

 

 

One of my favorite seedling clivias, this one is called Starlight of Buddha and features leaves that are variegated in broad bands.  This plant is at least six years old and is flowering for the first time this year.  It is very compact and gorgeous, and mostly carefree, like all clivias.

I forced this tulip mix in the produce drawer of the fridge.  Most of the flowers are purple, but this light yellow one caught my eye in the windowsill yesterday, glowing in the sunlight.  These smaller species tulips have not been ideal as forced flowers–the show isn’t particularly “showy”.  Yet the individual flowers are exquisite.

 

Here is a current photo of the Veltheimia in the greenhouse.  The leaves are lovely, undulating and shiny.  The plant to the left in the photo  is a giant seedling Chlorophytum krookianum.  Closely related to the common spider plant houseplant, I’m hoping to get flowers from this giant in the next year or two.