We got back from the cabin today and I can’t believe how fast things are growing!  Spring is bursting forward and I feel like I’m behind already!

Here are some pictures from the garden and greenhouse today:

The big Pelargoniums are starting to bloom.  The flowers are intricate and quirky, and a welcome change from the heavier flowers in the greenhouse.

This is a first-time blooming Clivia that appears to be pure yellow.  I can’t get at it through the jungle, but I plan to pull it out this weekend and label it, along with labels of the others that are blooming.

I can take no credit for this, but I think this is the most full, gorgeous Clivia umbel I’ve ever grown!  It is fantastic!  I didn’t do anything different–it just happened to turn out this way.    Flowers like these remind me why Clivias are my favorites–well, that and the fact that I have 100+ of them!

This Clivia has the largest flowers of all of my seedlings.  It is the same one I photographed earlier with more pastel-looking flowers.  They are less pastel now, but the light colored centers are more cream than yellow, and their size and substance are unsurpassed.

More Pelargonium papillonaceum flowers.

These are offsets from Miss Clivia, brother Tim’s first plant that introduced us to this genus.  I’m not sure when he got that plant–I think it was from Park’s, maybe 40 years ago!

Above are the Pleione formosana flowers I’ve been waiting for.  Five of them opened while we were away and two additional buds are nearly opened.

The Masdevallias continue to shine in the greenhouse–lots of big, loud flowers!

The biggest surprise in the greenhouse this week–just when I had given up on the Coelogyne cristata, here it is with flowers for the first time in maybe four or five years!  It seems much happier where it is currently in the greenhouse, and there look to be maybe 20 or more flowers coming on!  I can’t wait to see and smell them!

The Camellia bloomed a bit while we were gone, too.  The show is less than spectacular, but the individual buds and blooms make up for it.

Another fuzzy photo, but this is a tree peony bud on the plant that Tim and Cate gave me for my birthday about 20 years ago.

Another bloom.

Another bud and bloom.

Too much sun on this giant flower, but you get the idea how full and huge it is–the leaves below it are Daphne laureola.

The Corylopsis is in full bloom–I think this is Corylopsis spicata.  This large shrub is having to pull the weight for the Forsythia that got cut back hard last year and is barely blooming.

Another view.

Very first Beauty plum flower opening.  I hope there are some pollinators about!

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Sister Cate’s Hellebore, sparkling in the spring sunlight.

Wallflowers planted out last year are budding up again.  I love that you can tell the darker reddish-orange ones from the yellow ones.

Here you can clearly see the yellow–should be open in a week or so, with a little sun on our side.

I keep adding to the front patio “show” with forced bulbs.  The little Narcissus are blooming and I added some Hyacinths that had been in the cold frame way too long today.

Just a few sweet flowers of this Primula poking through the Lamium.  I didn’t realize it was even still there!

These surprise Chionodoxa popped up in the Doug fir bed.  They are gorgeous–I should order more of them.  I suspect they were free with another bulb order.

My Frittialria imperialis lutea is going to bloom again this year–it seems to be getting bigger/stronger over time.

Closer up view of this interesting bulb’s flowers.

Lone Trillium left in the Doug fir bed–going to bloom.  I think these woodland plants prefer moister soil than what this giant conifer allows, but it has hung on for probably ten years.

The Hyacinths pulled from the cold frame a few weeks ago are starting to open.

 

The golden hop in the woodland garden is erupting from the ground!  It is gorgeous and if provided with a bit of guidance, it stays in line.

Epimediums starting to bud up–they’ll be bright yellow flowers in another week or ten days.

Leon bought this grouping at the Flower and Garden show this year–we haven’t decided on a final placement, but he may install them in the pond.

This qualifies as the largest Hyacinth I have ever seen!!!  It was forced in the cold frame and set in the kitchen window while we were away–and here it is!  I had to move it outside–the fragrance was overpowering!

 

The danger of buying myself thinking time at our secluded cabin is that my mind runs amok with ideas I want to pursue with little reasonable thought given to my capacity to complete these projects.  One thing is for certain, though—I am ready to recreate our entire front yard and parking strip.  To make it seem more plausible, I’m breaking the parking strip down into its own project.

I estimate that the parking strip in question is about eight feet wide and sixty feet long.  I’m estimating because I’m at the cabin and don’t have access to it now—only in my mind’s eye.  I found out that some gardeners refer to parking strips as “hell strips,” which seems appropriate.  Ours currently only features bad grass, dandelions, and the water meter/shutoff valve.  I only use it to for placing the garbage, recycling, and yard waste containers for pick up.  So, it is a hideous waste of 480 square feet of what could be a colorful garden.

An eight-foot long, eight-foot wide patio to accommodate the waste containers and make the water valve accessible will be built first.  I don’t see this being particularly challenging—I just need to root out the sod and make the ground level before putting the bricks down.

The strip is too public to be useful for food production and dogs do their business there every day—another factor in looking more toward aesthetics and less to food production.  So, my idea is to turn it into a long perennial border.  24” edges on the street and house side will feature ground hugging mats of plants so as not to interfere with parking cars or the walking neighbors/dogs.  The center strip will feature taller perennials of varied heights, colors, and bloom times.  This is the south side of the house, so gets a LOT of sunshine and should be a great place to grow sun-loving flowering plants.

For the low-growing edges, I plan to use the following:

• Ceratostigma
• Dianthus (several types) from seed
• Campanula poscharskyana from divisions
• Geranium macrorrhizum from divisions
• Cerastium tomentosum from purchased plants
• Thymus (several types) from purchased plants
• Sedums (several types) from cuttings/purchased plants
• Sempervivums from cuttings/purchased plants

For the middle of the bed, I plan to add:

• Achillea (Summer Pastels or similar) from seed
• Anemone–japanese “Honorine Jobert” from purchased plants
• Aquilegia (long-blooming mix) from seed
• Aster from purchased plants
• Dicentra from purchased plants
• Iris sibirica from purchased plants
• Lychnis coronaria from seedlings in the yard/seeds
• Nepeta from seed
• Papaver orientale “Pizzicato” from seed
• Penstemon from seed or purchased plants
• Echinacea from seed
• Agastache from seed
• Geranium (various) from purchased plants
• Sidalcea from seed

This will be a full-year project, to end in April 2018, featuring the following steps:

• Find out if the City of Seattle has any limitations on parking strip use and if approvals or permits are needed. Notify City of intent to dig parking strip up—have them mark any danger zones—May 2017
  • Note:  See the CAM here for Seattle parking strips
• Order the seeds needed and start them Summer 2017
• Measure the “patio” and put landscape cloth and paper down to kill the grass (Summer 2017)
• Pot up divisions and cuttings Summer and Fall 2017
• Order the patio supplies and build patio Fall 2017
• Cover the rest of the strip with newspaper/tarps/landscape cloth/mulch/leaves to kill it over the winter—Fall 2017
• Winter the plant starts in the greenhouse
• Order the purchased plants February/March 2018 for April delivery
• Peel away the landscape cloth and all else and dig leaves and fertilizer into the entire strip—March/April 2018
• Plant out all the starts – late April 2018. Shop for fillers if any space remains.
• Weed and water carefully until the strip is bursting with plants (Summer 2018)

Spring starts officially next week and I’m a bit behind in starting some seeds.  I’ve gotten some of my patio pot flowers started (geraniums, pansies), but neglected to get the peas started until today.  I soaked them overnight and that, combined with the saturating rain the last few weeks, should get them off to a great start.

The first type I planted were these:

Blue Podded Blauwschokkers Garden Pea

I also planted a lot of these:

Tom Thumb Shelling Pea

And lastly, I started some of these:

Sugar Daddy Pea

I probably planted 100 seeds in the raised beds today and planted 7 pots with the remaining seeds.  My hope is that I overwhelm the pea snackers with so many plants that some of them survive.  I may put out some netting, too, just in case.  I suspect that birds get most of my pea seedlings every year. 

The leaf mulch got removed and put in the compost bin today and the peas were planted underneath.

Other peas were planted in this cleared area — weedy dead nettle, Lamium pupureum, had taken over.

Now, for a look around the garden and greenhouse:

Deep, rich burgundy flowers on this hellebore in the woodland garden.

Another view–amazing color!

Pachysandra blooming in the woodland garden–odd flowers have brownish tips.

Exquisite corydalis blooming the same pot as the Osmanthus fragrans.

A big pot of hyacinths that should bloom in the next two weeks.

I really like this sturdy pot, filled with a few hyacinth bulbs this year–and the ever-present chickweed!

In the greenhouse, the orchids are blooming madly.  They love this cool time of year combined with the improved light.

Geranium seedlings pouting on the greenhouse shelves.  I started them inside the house on a heat mat, but had to move them outside to make room for more seed starting.  I think they will thrive once things warm up a bit.  The sun predicted for tomorrow will no doubt get them back to a happy place.

This lovely clivia is spiking–this is Light of Buddha seedling.  A tree peony seedling is next to it, leafing out vigorously.

The Pleione orchids are budding up. I counted six buds today on the big mother plant.  I realized I can pot some up for brother Tim’s plant sale in May.

More seedlings that I’ve cast out into the greenhouse–geraniums and petunias.

The gorgeous pastel clivia is opening its giant blooms finally–it opened two about a month ago, then waited to open the rest until now.  Two different pictures show the color differently–but it is orange leaning toward pink and very softly colored.

This cymbidium is trying to be pretty–but it struggles every year with marks on the flowers and the fact that it doesn’t open its flowers all the way.

More traditionally colored Clivia miniata flowers–this is a gorgeous umbel.  The plants are blooming well this year–I expect at least a dozen spikes.

Another striking clivia umbel.

Another cymbidium about to bloom.  This one opens green and turns creamy white over time.  It is a full-sized plant given to us by Karl Huffbauer (an artist friend) ten or more years ago.

The Voodoo lilies are coming!  Here is a strong clump and you can really see the spotted/striped stems.

Close-up of these Dracunculus vulgaris plants jumping out of the ground.  Their stinky blooms will expand in six weeks or so.

Plant Delights hellebore blooming beautifully in the Doug fir bed.  This plant outlasted the two others that were planted at the same time.

Another view–a few of the flowers look outward instead of down.

Another view…

And another….

Here is the brother Tim hellebore near the downspout on the corner of the house.  It isn’t blooming as heavily as I’ve seen it in the past, but it is still remarkable.

Too lazy to get down on the ground low enough to photograph these flowers responsibly…but the camera did a decent job without any help from me.

Another view…

And another…

The poor Fred Meyer plants that I bought a month ago to perk up the patio pots outside the front door have been deluged by all the rain and aren’t looking their best.  The blue primrose is impressive, though.

I set a couple of pots of dwarf narcissus in front here–they’ve been flooded, too!  You can just hear the ground and the plants drowning!  But the sun will be out tomorrow–maybe that will help.

Sister Cate’s hellebore–similar to brother Tim’s, but the white is maybe whiter and there are fewer freckles inside.

Another view, showing the wet, dripping blooms with spots inside.

 

Close up–and you can see all the raindrops, too!

About a month ago, my Ebay seed order landed and I got them planted.  They are growing well.

Here are the pelargonium seeds I received:

“Cola Purple”

“Cola Mix”

“Cola Appleblossom”

My Pinetree Garden seed order landed this week.  I’ll plant the seeds this weekend.

Nepitella…an herb.

Petunia “Multiflora Hurrah Mix”

Petunia “Blue Wave”

Viola “Brush Strokes”

Pansy “Cool Wave Series Pastel Mix”

Pansy “Cool Wave Series Berries & Cream Mix”

Geranium “Multibloom Salmon”

Geranium “Multibloom Lavender”

Geranium “Multibloom Mix”

I had started the Ebay seeds several weeks ago and they are growing really well.  I’ll move them to the greenhouse this weekend, then will plant the Pinetree seeds.  I plan to have lots of geraniums for pots around the house and then a dozen or two for brother Tim’s plant sale.  Same with the pansies.

 

 

 

Some of the prettiest things in the garden aren’t plants–these ceramic mushrooms are pretty awesome.  Leon made them all and he continues to add to the grouping.  These are a great solution for this area that hasn’t been easy for growing anything very ornamental.

More toadstools along the fence.

A different view, showing all the different fungi.

The old Hellebore that friends Bonnie and Pam gave us maybe fifteen years ago still blooms reliably.  It is an amazing deep red color.

I take entirely too many pictures of the Masdevallias in the greenhouse, but how can I resist.  Especially welcome this time of year, when dreary days pile one on top of the other, I love stepping in to see these electric wonders.

Close-up.

 

Clivia miniata is a beautiful spring burst of color.  A few of them are early this year, but the rest are just budding now, so I should have flowers February through April.

Holiday cacti are still blooming, too.

 

Mom’s Cymbidium blooming in the greenhouse.

Older flowers on a different plant of Mom’s Cymbidium.  At least four of these plants have bloomed or are blooming in the greenhouse.

The pastel Clivia clone hasn’t opened any new flowers lately.  I watered everything in the greenhouse today.

A different holiday cacti flower.

Slightly different view.

Veltheimia budding up in the greenhouse.

Aloinopsis rubrolineata, grown from seed four or five years ago–getting a flower for the very first time!

Osmanthus in a pot starting to bloom.  The fragrance isn’t out yet, though–maybe all the rain washed the sweet smell away!

I pulled a few pots out of the cold frame of forced bulbs–they are looking pretty yellow, but should green up in the next few days and they should all bloom nicely.

Kalettes have finally formed on this odd plant.  I’m not exactly sure what to do with these!

Close up of the Kalettes.  They are kind of cool…

One of the veggie raised beds.  This one has all the garlic in it, including the elephant garlic I planted last fall.

Species crocus budding up in the Doug fir bed.

A different species tulip in the Doug fir bed–amazing color.

Another crocus bloom with Baltic ivy behind.

 

Group of species crocus in the Doug fir bed.  They weren’t open because the sun wasn’t bright enough.

Hellebore from Plant Delights blooming in the Doug fir bed.

Unfortunately, the flowers face down and the soil has sunk in that garden, so it isn’t easy to look in the flowers.  Maybe on a sunnier day they will open up more.

Stepping back with the camera, you can see that the plant is about two and a half feet wide.

Daphniphyllum seedling looking cold, but alive in the Doug fir bed.  This seedling is at least five years old and was planted out about two years ago.

The Hellebore from brother Tim is just getting flowers near the drain pipe at the front of the house.  This plant is easily two feet across.

Crocus next to the planting bed in the front of the house.

More crocus pics.

Another view.  These beauties weren’t shy today, despite the spotty sunshine.

Stepping back, the bloomiferous crocus against the brick.

I pruned the clematis and the climbing rose on the Jeff Tangen arbor today, and I have the scars to prove it!  This rose is very vigorous and I cut it back pretty viciously to get it to stick closer to the arbor and bloom better.

Tag to record the type of cherry in the right driveway bed–this is Vandalay.

Not a clear picture, but you can make out the many flower buds expanding on Vandalay.

Tag of the Morello cherry in the right driveway bed.

Flower buds on Morello.

Tag for Tangy Green apple.

Tangy Green columnar apple.

Slugs have have been after the primroses in the garden, but a few flowers are still showing.

Flower buds on the Beauty plum in the orchard bed.

Swelling buds on the Glacier cherry in the orchard bed.

Daphne laureola blooming under the Camellia near the north fence.  I rooted out about five or six seedlings from these weedy daphnes, but I do love the fresh leaves and the flowers.  I think they would be great for containers.

Blackberry bud on Apache.

Another shot of crocus flowers.  These were tough to ignore.

Bodhi and Mona were helping me out in the garden by warning me whenever any dog or person (or leaf) moved within their sight.  They got cold, though, and I had to let them in the house after an hour or so.

Close-up of Bodhi.

 

Ready to go inside–and letting me know about it.

Here are the three domes I’m using as terrariums to keep some mini gesneriads happy at work.  The plants are from the Violet Barn.

One of the plants even arrived with a perfect little flower–and it lasted for a month before it fell off this week.  No sign of new flowers, but the plants seem to be doing okay.

Another picture of the little Sinningia blooming under a dome.

There were a lot of great flowers at Sky today when brother Tim and I visited.  Above is an amazing primrose.

Narcissus with a wonderful fragrance.

More narcissus…

Cheery tulips.

Pot after pot of hyacinths.

Sweet violas.

And more…

 

Coming off multiple snowy weeks and wind/rain storms, today dawned bright and warm.  My goal was to get out there and spend a few hours cleaning up the orchard garden–and I made it!  It felt wonderful!

I tackled the shrubs along the fence today–including the tatarian honeysuckle in the corner.  This is the only shrub that I actually pollard.  Because of the aggressive growth, its really the only way to keep it in line.  You can see to the right of it, there are three trunks.  These were suckers from the black locust tree that is haunting that fence.  The tree was cut down over 20 years ago by our neighbor.  It suckered a bit after being removed, but I kept on top of it pretty good for many years.  Somehow, one of the suckers snuck up and reached about 25 feet tall, with a six inch diameter trunk.  I had it cut down last year when the bitter cherry was cut out.  These three suckers were the result–ten to fifteen feet tall each!  I have a love/hate relationship with black locust trees (Robinia pseudoacacia).  I love them in other people’s yards and hate them in mine!  I’m still bleeding from fighting those three suckers–they bite back with stout thorns!  And it is even tougher to cut them down, knowing they will be back!

I pruned the David Austen roses, too, but not much.  Most of them look pretty good–one of them (Ebb Tide) looks a little sickly.  You can see what Ebb Tide looks like here.  It is so beautiful, it is definitely worth babying a bit.  I pruned everything around it so it should get more sun.

The espaliered Asian pear with five cultivars looks pretty good.  Some of the grafts are more vigorous than the others.  I pruned it a bit to eliminate growth that was headed the wrong way.

Here is a Chester blackberry start that I purchased online last year from Raintree Nursery.  It isn’t in a great place for a small plant, but once it gets some growth on it, I think it will do fine here, between the Asian pear and the Santa Rosa plum.

The wallflowers that I grew from seed two years ago didn’t die back at all–they seem very healthy and happy near the plum tree.  I should get good flowers from these this year.

View towards the street.  The large tree in the foreground is a Glacier cherry on Gisela 5 rootstock from Raintree.  The tree is approaching ten feet, which should be its max.  The challenge is keeping the birds away from the cherries.  I planted a few wild cherry trees and two other cultivars last year so that there would be cross pollination.  This tree is supposed to be self fertile, but it only seems to produce ripe cherries every other year so far.  It was planted five years ago.  The other berries, the goumi and the aronia are all in this photo.  Things look pretty clean at this point–just need to wait for warmer weather to fertilize things a bit and enjoy the show of flowers and fruit that will hopefully follow.

Here are two containers of prunings from the orchard bed.  You can also see the trunk-like end of a branch that came down from the Douglas fir tree late last year.

You get more of a sense of the side of the branch that fell into the Doug fir bed.  I didn’t have the energy to saw it up today–will tackle it next weekend.

 

Things have been busy and I haven’t had a chance to update for a while.  I have taken some photos every week and I’ll do a bit of catching up here, however brief.

We’ve had snow several times already this year, and it continues even tonight.  Above, a squirrel enjoys the view from our Jim Heltsley sculpture in the front yard.

More snow pics…

The squirrel enjoying some treats we set out for the crows.

  

The Masdevallia orchids in the greenhouse are setting flowers–not as many as last year, but they seem healthy, nonetheless.

The Persicaria capitata in the greenhouse is blooming better than I ever remember.  I cut it way back in the fall and that has paid off.  The cold doesn’t faze this plant at all.

Cymbidium flowers.

And more of Mom’s Cymbidium flowers.

Holiday cactus flower in the greenhouse.

The giant Huffbauer Cymbidium is setting flowers, too.  I was worried, since the buds weren’t visible when I moved it to the greenhouse.  But here it is with multiple spikes.

A few weeks later, the Masdevallias are opening.  The flowers are an amazing color and a fascinating shape.

Not the clearest photo, but the color and shape are discernible.

I love this photo of a Mas. flower and the leaves of Geranium maderense nearby.

More Mom’s Cymbidium flowers.

The Clivia miniata clones started to spike several weeks ago.

More Clivia buds.

And more Mom’s Cymbidium flowers.

Cardinal tree is still throwing a flower here and there through the winter.

Lot’s of buds coming on the Hellebore from Plant Delights in the Doug Fir bed.

The leaves of the Hellebore hybrid–big and showy.

Our sculptor friend Elaine MacKay passed away in January after a long battle with lung disease.  This is her sculpture on our back patio, complete with its own worry stone.

Another view.

I moved the forced hyacinth bulbs out of the refrigerator and into the windowsill in the kitchen.  This is an unusual color for me–lavender with a soft fragrance.

 

Close-up.

Another view.

  

This is an awesome Clivia hybrid–a pastel with whitish center and pinkish outside.  Some bugs obviously have nibbled it, but you can still see the great color.

Another view.

Another view.

The more classic Clivia flowers–likely to be orange and yellow.

Another view of Cardinal.

Brugs blooming still in the greenhouse, despite the snow.

You can really see the bounty of the Persicaria capitata here–lots and lots of flowers.

More Mas. flower pics.  As bright as these appear, the camera can’t capture the electric nature of this magenta.

And again…

More Mas. buds–love the way they appear like cranes amid the leaves and then open like even more exotic birds.

More holiday cactus flowers.

Inherited from the neighbors when they moved away, this jungle cactus looked anemic all last year, but I fed it with compost tea and pulled it down into a shadier spot.  It seems happier–blooming better than it ever has.

‘Tis the Day After Christmas, so thought I would see what I can see around the garden, greenhouse and neighborhood.

It snowed on Friday–not enough to really impact travel, but it was enough to light up the lawn and give a nice holiday feel to everything.

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I took Bodhi for a quick walk today and found the following at Ingraham High School:

The gorgeous form of this pine tree really stands out in winter.

I believe this is Cotoneaster lacteus.  This photo is of berries on what I believe is probably the original shrub planted around the school.

A close-up of the brilliant berries.

This is one of my favorite Ingraham trees–I think it may be a weeping white spruce.  It’s graceful leaning trunk, bright blue color and beautiful cones make it a stand-out.

Close-up to show the color and cones.

A seedling of the cotoneaster–there are several large seedlings around the school now.  I took some berries to see if I can get some starts, as this would make a great bonsai/pot plant.

Hollies are a bit despised here in Seattle, except maybe the last six weeks of the year.  Nothing says Christmas like a well-berried holly tree.

The leaves and berries are wonderfully shiny on a dull day.

Winter forces us to really see the beauty of plants that we’ve missed the rest of the year.  This is likely Chamaecyparis lawsoniana, with its distinctive cones and graceful foliage sprays.

The driveway display isn’t fresh, for sure, but it has an artistic flair provided by the Hakone grass and Leon’s beautiful sculpture.

Close-up of the forest grass.  It has turned a tan/yellow for winter.  The hardy fern next to it is laughing at winter.

Leon installed a new bird feeder.  We don’t have a lot of different species at this point–mostly chickadees and juncos.  The jays haven’t figured out how to reach the seeds yet.  The crows pick seeds up that have spilled.  And the squirrels steal seeds, too, having figured out how to climb the stone sculpture that serves as the feeder’s stand.

Junco checking things out.

One camellia flower decided to open for Christmas!  It was fully opened for the snowy weather.  Tucked back at the bottom of the shrub, it didn’t get totally ruined by the snow/rain.

Sadly, the Prime Ark blackberries didn’t make it to black before the cold weather hit.  The berries are still there, but they are brown and squishy.  Sad.

I was worried about how the pineapple guava (Feijoa) would fare in the cold weather, but it isn’t even fazed at this point.

The Plant Delights hellebore is throwing buds up.  These plants are so incredibly hardy–the freezing and snow didn’t even slow this one down.

Aucuba glowing bright in the Doug Fir bed.

The elephant garlic I was gifted by friend and artist Janet Still.  There are two of these monsters and they both are showing growth–not afraid of winter at all.

Plectranthus showing December what for in the greenhouse.

Persicaria capitata perking up the greenhouse shelves.

I couldn’t reach these pelargoniums easily to get a good picture, but they are pretty impressive with their clear pink blooms.

The cymbidiums in the greenhouse are blooming wonderfully this year.  It is safe to say they thrive on neglect.  I pulled them out of the greenhouse in spring and put them around the edge of the Doug Fir bed, watered sporadically, fertilized maybe twice…and here we are!  These generous plants don’t ask for much.  These are all from the clone (divisions) we call “Mom’s.”

Close-up of a freshly opened flower.

More buds ready to burst…about 18 more flowers from these two spikes.

Just days from being opened, these buds hold so much promise!

Fuchsia “Machu Picchu” blooming, oblivious to the cold and low light.

The brugmansia in the greenhouse is putting out one flower at a time now.  There are two more buds coming along–so could have flowers through February!

The holiday cactus has an impressive flower open.

I was very close to this chickadee.  It was hiding in on the Jeff Tangen arbor and I was underneath trying to get shots of the birdfeeder.

This is when it realized how close it was to me!

I won’t say it was a guilt-free process, but I threw out the four Phalaenopsis orchids that were in the window garden today.  The Paphiopedilums were spared (this time), as one of them looks so incredibly healthy–even though it hasn’t bloomed for a few years, I couldn’t just throw it out!

In the open space of that south-facing window tray, I planted a  batch of seeds today, including the following:

Onixotis stricta (this is a water-lover, so the seeds were planted in mud.

Freesia laxa “Blue”

Leucocoryne vittata

Phaenocoma prolifera

Dorstenia mix

Marlothistella stenophylla

Dorotheanthus bellidiformis

Pink Rain Lily

Massonia depressa

Tritonia crispa

Gasteria liliputana (photo from worldofsucculents.com)

Lithops optica “Rubra” (photo from worldofsucculents.com)

Kniphofia multiflora (photo from biodiversityexplorer.org)

Hesperaloe parviflora (collected seeds from Arizona) (photo from xeraplants.com)

All of these seeds were from several years ago, so I don’t anticipate I’ll get many seedlings.  I’m giving them my best shot, though, to see what surprises might appear in the next few months.  Come March, the pots and trays will get moved to the greenhouse and I’ll start some annual and veggie seeds in the window tray.