Over a year of blogging about the garden and greenhouse!  Here we are on New Year’s Eve and things are pretty quiet from a gardening standpoint.  It is truly winter, and you can see that in the following frost pictures.  I couldn’t resist!

Temperatures dropped a bit below freezing, but not super cold.  The next few days are projected to be sunny and clear.

In my walk around the property, I saw a few things preparing to bloom or blooming.  The cherry tree has lots of great-looking buds:

The Lenten rose that brother Tim gave me years ago has some buds showing amidst the ring of foliage:

It will be a few months before these open up, but cheerful to see them popping up, for sure.

The precocious blackberry still has its buds–hoping it will hold them until a more suitable time so we get some berries!

For winter interest, the black raspberry is stunning with the whitish bloom on its canes:

You can also see the alpine strawberries in these pictures and how hardy they are–not fazed at all by the frost!

A few plants are blooming on this last day of the year:

Calendulas act like they have no idea that it is cold and the days are short:

A few borage plants are still attempting to bloom, as well, and the feverfew in the pot under the Douglas fir:

The thug geranium on the sunny side of the house is blooming and the wonderberries still have some edible berries:

The greenhouse has a few orchids blooming and a holiday cactus:

 

I did manage to plant about 20 different kinds of seeds and set them on the heat pad in the window in the house.  We’ll see if any of them germinate.  I used seed mix mixed with cactus/succulent mix for drainage, as many of the seeds are cactus and succulents and bulbs.  I am not super optimistic that any of them will be come up, since the seeds are mostly older, but it seems likely I’ll get a few seedlings and end up with a few greenhouse treasures from this investment.

I’m doing some planning, as well, and looking through catalogs.  I love the looks of David Austin roses:  http://www.davidaustinroses.com/american/advanced.asp

I picked out five of them that I would like to plant around the edges of the orchard garden, once I cut the butterfly bushes that live there now way back.

I’m looking at these (photos from davidaustinroses.com):

Olivia Rose Austin

Boscobel

Fighting Temeraire

Kew Gardens

Lady of Shalott

Brother Tim is looking for a local source of the beautiful Austin rose “Eddie’s Jewel”:

I also have decided to dedicate more of the veggie beds to perennial food plants in 2016, so I’m looking at adding some rhubarb and strawberries.  I plan to order these two berries:

Mara de Bois from Gurney’s nursery:

Mara Des Bois Everbearing Strawberry

Intensely Fragrant and Flavorful

One of the tastiest berries we’ve tried! Developed by a French breeding program, this everbearing, day-neutral variety produces attractive red, small to medium berries that are intensely fragrant and flavorful. Enjoy a heavy set of berries in early summer followed by several more light flushes in late summer and fall. Good choice for terraced beds, barrels or pyramids. Zones 4-7.

And the strawberry, Tristan, from Farmer’s Seed:  https://www.directgardening.com/144-edibles/3501-tristan-strawberry#/quantity-1

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I woke up to a spring-like day today, despite the fact that winter hasn’t actually started yet!  Now is the perfect time for shopping, for planning, and for ordering things online!

To combat the seed hoarder in me, I’m not allowing myself to order any more ornamental plant seeds until I plant each and every seed that I already have.  Today I inventoried those seeds and I have 85 different kinds that have either not been sown at all, or that were plentiful enough that I had lots of extras!

Here are a few of the more interesting seeds I have that I’ll plant for 2016, along with links to photos of them:

Ligularia dentata “Dark Beauty”           Gladiolus carinatus

Eupatorium “Blue Mist Flower”              Watsonia knysnana

Hesperantha vaginata                        Sparaxis grandiflora v Grandiflora

Dierama latifolia                                              Lapeirousia fabricii

Gladiolus splendens                                             Babiana patula

Kniphofia multiflora                                    Massonia depressa

Freesia laxa Blue                                                  Rogeria adenophylla

Dorotheanthus bellidiformis                           Tritoniopsis pulchella

Chasmanthe floribunda Duckenii                        Tritonia crispa

Cortus matthioli                                                         Lapeirousia jacquinii

Dietes bicolor                                                            Cyrtanthus epiphyticus

Carmichaelia sp.  “Ribbon Tree”                         Amoreuxia wrightii

Lithops optica Rubra                                                    Gasteria liliputana

Talinum caffrum                                                                Rebutia minuscula

Senecio macrocephalus                                                   Onixotis stricta

Phaenocoma prolifera                                                   Frithia pulchra

Marlothistella stenophylla                                     Cheiridopsis pillansii

Hesperantha schizostylis                                            Solaria brevicoalita

Ideally, with seeds, they should be planted right away.  But even if only a small percentage of these older seeds germinate, I’ll have plenty of new treasures for the greenhouse and around!

Speaking of greenhouse, here are some pics from there from today:

The first open Cymbidium flowers–this is the dwarf orchid that brother Tim passed to me that we just call Mom’s.

Another flower, part way opened.

The Masdevallias are off to the races with flowers–completely off season.  I’m not sure what I did right or wrong this year, but usually these are March/April bloomers!

Other plants that are off season include this potted Hyacinth, sitting on the shelves outside the greenhouse.  This and another blue one are both blooming now in the fall, when normally they would bloom in April.

I was very surprised to see flowers on this Prime-Ark Blackberry here towards the end of December!  I’m not expecting berries, but it is funny to see this apparently very hardy plant blooming so close to Christmas!

Here are some other garden highlights:

This Canary Island Ivy is a show-stopper in winter.  Another excellent plant from brother Tim, this large vine lives in the Doug fir bed and is much less thuggish than the English ivy that shares that bed.

Each leaf is different and lovely.

Below is the Calanthe orchid that I planted out this year after several years in the greenhouse where it did not bloom.  This interesting plant is in the Doug fir bed and doesn’t seem phased at all so far by the cold.

In the Asian Pear bed, the Beladonna lilies have fresh leaves popping up.  I’ve yet to get flowers from these bulbs, but they live on year after year.  I’m not positive if the problem is exposure, depth or what, but they just haven’t bloomed yet.

The Camellia near the orchard bed is budding up nicely–should have lots of huge pink flowers in a few months.

Here is the Hakone grass in winter–it becomes an attractive tan color and maintains its graceful habit until the weather tatters it to pieces.

Close up showing the seed stems mixed with the leaf blades.