Spring has Sprung

Well at least I think Spring has come.  Where there was one bunny

Now there are two more, one of which is a baby.

The guy at the shop did warn us they multiplied.  I guess cold weather doesn't deter them.

It hasn't been a warm spring, that's for sure.  Just last week we had a frost warning.  Frost, in mid-June!!!  I have struggled getting the vegetable garden in because I was afraid to plant out the warm weather plants like basil, peppers and pumpkins.

It was a good year for tulips though.  They like it cold.

Last summer I moved all of my spring flowering bulbs and plants to one side of my flower bed and grouped them together.  I was looking for impact and the results were beautiful.

Just as I had hoped, cushion spurge mixed well with pink and white tulips, the hostas opened up and complemented the daffodils.

The anemone has finally spread into a considerable mound and provided a fantastic backdrop to pink and purple tulips.

Of course, there's always a few hiccups along the way.  The late frosts killed off the majority of our apple blossoms.  and the daffodils appear to be dwindling.  Usually daffodils multiply and expand but this variety seems to be dying off.  So I will need to try a different variety next year.  Something a little more robust.  Any suggestions for a favourite daffodil and where to buy them?

A Long Cold Spring

I was beginning to think Spring would never come.  The cold weather clung to us with an icy grip and refused to let go.  In mid-April we thought it was starting to retreat and the snow began to melt creating icy rivers of gushing water.

A river of melting snow behind our house

That wasn't the last of it though.  It snowed all day on April 28.  April 28.  All. day.  Thick fluffy flakes.  I wanted to cry  ...  and move South.

But the cold has now finally passed.  The snow has (mostly) melted and plants are beginning to show signs of growth.  I have begun the work of winter clean up and spring preparations.

The first task was to survey the winter damage.  The sheer weight of all the snow we had this year took its toll on the trees.  Broken limbs littered the ground and I spent hours pruning away ripped and torn branches.

Some trees were snapped right in half but the majority will survive.  Perhaps a little thinner than they were before.  Others received emergency repairs.

A large branch on this birch is partly split from the trunk and is being held together temporarily.  My hope is the bark will eventually grow over and heal the wound.  It's not a surefire solution but I'm hoping it might work.

Around the garage I cleaned out the flower beds, removing some old plants and making space for new.

Dead plants littered the beds around the garage

Post clean up things are looking a lot neater

Although the vegetable garden still needs a lot of work I have managed to plant some spinach and lettuce.  I'll need to work hard though to get beds ready for the big plant in the next couple weeks.  These tomatoes will need to move from their hut on the porch to larger quarters.

The same goes for the flower garden.  Tulips and daffodils are starting to sprout but they are having to work through a layer of dead leaves to get to the sun.

Lots of clean up is needed to get the garden looking good for summer again.

And it wouldn't be spring without a few household chores as well.  We finally got round to fixing up the front door.  After we painted the exterior of the house the door looked pretty ratty.  The old wooden screen door kept blowing off the hinges in the winter storms so we found a tight fitting storm door to replace it.  Then we decided that ugly old metal door had to go.

The screen door was replaced first with a proper storm
door but that metal door just looked wrong

We found a perfect vintage door to replace it but it needed some work.  Cracked glass was replaced, a new coat of paint was added as well as a brand new lockset.  This is the result.

It looks better than new and suits the house much better too.

How is spring coming where you live?

The Always Unfinished Flower Garden

Some of you may remember that I promised myself I was going to finish my flower garden last year. After working away for the past 4 years I swore up and down that 2014 was the year I would finally complete it.

Siberian Iris 'Caesar's Brother' and perennial Bachelor's Button in June

I'm here to report.  That didn't happen.

This garden is taking off at the speed of a turtle stuck in a pool of honey.  It started out 5 years ago as a small circle around a forlorn apple tree and I thought, well that's just too small.  It looks out of scale against this large house.  So I enlarged it.  A lot.  It's now 50 feet long and 25 feet wide.

It's not that the size was a bad idea.  I love how big it is.  Passerbys can see it from the street.  I can see it from inside the house through my bay windows.  But I didn't take into account how much work it would be to plant all that space.

Oh I tried.  I dug and dug, put in yards of compost and plants.  I have had some good results.  One end of the bed is fully planted and even starting to mature a bit.

The original starting point around the apple tree is now filled in with flowers

I'm quite pleased with some of the plant pairings.  Siberian Iris 'Caesar's Brother' and 'Snow Queen' look wonderful together.

 Late in the season Autumn Joy sedum and blue fescue combine for a cool autumn look.

 This unplanned collaboration of Jupiter's Beard and Evening Primrose was a lovely surprise.

The problem was I didn't plant enough plants, nor did I mulch.  And so the weeds took over. For the last couple seasons I have been battling weeds in an attempt to gain my garden back.

those aren't flowers, those are WEEDS

I came close.  There is just a small corner of the garden left to dig over.  I'm ready for that corner this year.  I have bags of mulch on hand ready to fight the good fight, and I have pre-purchased plants so once the ground is dug the space will be promptly filled.

 the left side looks good but the right needs some work

Part of what is slowing me down is that in addition to digging out the weed filled areas I'm constantly assessing and reviewing what I've already done.  It's hard to finish the whole garden when I keep going back and changing things.

That's a garden though isn't it?  As it matures we realize what works and what doesn't.  There's one thing I found that I really don't like.  What do you think of these?

Rudbeckia hirta

It's not that I don't like Rudbeckia.  In fact they're great flowers.  The bees love them and they grow easily from seed.  But they are SOOO ORANGE.  At least they look really orange when they're planted next to a bright pink flower.

Filipendula and Rudbeckia clashing in the August garden

These seeds were originally tossed in as filler and I think it's high time I removed them.  Jody likes them but every time I look at those flowers I cringe.  I have yellow in the garden but the Rudbeckia is not the right shade of yellow in my eyes.  What's your opinion, would you pull them or keep them?

Another issue that was giving me trouble was the spring flowers.  Originally I planted spring blooms all over the bed thinking I should spread them out.  It didn't work.  Cushion spurge sat alone in an island of not quite living perennials.  Tulips sprang out of a sea of dead foliage and looked quite lonely.  So I moved them all.  Grouping them together in one section I planted anemone and columbine, spurge, February daphne, tulips and daffodils.

Anemone are early bloomers in my garden

I'm hoping for a spring explosion this year.  I don't want to hunt and peck all over my garden looking for flowers.  With any luck this will give more impact in one area and later in the season the other areas will take over.

Columbine are the first blooms to follow the bulbs

And so you see why this is taking so long.  I make a choice and then I take it back.  And then I change my mind again.  By the time I get settled the weeds are back and we start all over again.  Wish me luck trying to 'finish' my flower garden this year. 

Van Dusen Botanical Garden

Since my world is covered in white these days I'm going to step back in time again and revisit a favourite garden.

While I was in Vancouver last spring I managed another trip to my favourite public garden.  I volunteered at Van Dusen Botanical garden for a couple years and it has held a special place in my heart ever since.  It doesn't seem to matter what time of year I visit, there's always something to see. 

It was still early in the season when I arrived and many trees were only just beginning to show their buds but there was still more than enough flowers to keep me occupied for hours.  Spring blooms carpeted the garden and there was something to see in every corner you cared to look.  A large grove of native trilliums was particularly eye catching.  White trilliums are always beautiful to look at but red ones add some amazing contrast.

Bulbs were prominent on this trip.  I particularly liked this combination of soft yellow tulips, pink hyacinth and blue forget me nots.

Many spring blooming trees, like these magnolias, were underplanted with spring bulbs to great effect.

Early blooming Rhododendron shrubs were also putting on a great show.

 

One of the things about Van Dusen that always impresses me is the scale.  Public gardens can do things that would seem outrageous in a small garden.  Like artwork.  The sheer size, not to mention the quality, of the artwork was impressive.

This giant minotaur was woven out of wire and towered over us.  In the context of the large trees though it appeared perfectly at home.

A grouping of stone persons gathered in front of a grove of white birches also seemed perfectly natural. 

In the heather garden a series of white figures gazes at you from across the hillside.

I don't expect I'll be putting any large sculptures in my garden in the near future but I really enjoyed seeing them here.  It really emphasizes the idea of scale and context.  Plant according to the size of space you have.  A large space can accommodate and will look more natural if large trees and gardens are planted.  Small sculptures will go unnoticed in a large space so take note of the context and place your art accordingly.

What is your favourite public garden?  Are there any garden lessons you've learned from visiting another garden?

Daffy for Dahlias

The days are inching closer to winter and when I go into the garden these days my fingers tend to go numb.  Luckily I managed to complete my list of garden must dos last weekend.  The last chore on the list was digging up my dahlias.

Just a sample from my garden

Every year I wonder why I bother with these tubers.  They are a lot of work to plant each spring and dig up each fall but something in my DNA just cannot resist.  It must have something to do with the fact that they are reliable plants that produce multiple blooms in every colour and shape imaginable.

White dahlias mixed with rudbeckia

Back in the spring I visited Vancouver, British Columbia for a couple weeks.  While there I popped into Van Dusen Botanical Gardens.  I love visiting Van Dusen and this time was no exception.  The day I was there turned out to be the annual Dahlia Sale.  How could I possibly resist??

Come On In!!

Tables of tubers sorted by size

Since I was travelling I had to keep my purchases small but I still managed to walk out with Ferncliff Cameo, Ferncliff Copper and Longwood Dainty.

Longwood Dainty

Longwood Dainty has done very well for me, the plant itself was very strong and by September was covered in blooms.  Unfortunately Ferncliff Cameo did not survive the trip home as the bud broke off the tuber.  Ferncliff Copper had a pretty rough start, the plant broke in a storm and although it recovered it never did bloom.

Despite those setbacks I still had a lovely show of plants this year.

I like to plant my dahlias together.  Combining yellow, white, orange and pink.  A few sunflowers, rudbeckia, gladiolas and canna lilies filled out the bed.

Unfortunately what I've discovered is that my lower garden gets hit with frost before the rest of the property.  The blooms were all killed in September leaving me with blackened plants.

Frost kill in the dahlia bed

So next year I'm contemplating moving the dahlias to the front yard.  Plans for a new bed are underway in a more protected spot.

Of course, that might mean I have to purchase some more dahlias.  That shouldn't be a problem though.  I also visited the Halifax Public Gardens this summer and did you know they have a dahlia collection?

Halifax Public Gardens

The garden contains dahlia cultivars developed by Nova Scotia gardeners, specifically geared towards our maritime climate.

Scarborough Brilliant dahlia

I photographed the flowers and their names to remind me for future shopping.  Just in case I happen to need a few more dahlias.  They're kind of like chips aren't they?  You can't have just one.

The First Flush of Spring

It seems difficult to believe but the first flush of spring blooms has finished and we are well on our way into early summer.  I say difficult to believe because it has been darn cold around these parts.  We're looking at a high of 15 degrees for the next couple days.  That is not normal for June.  It should be in the low twenties at least.  It has been so cold that my vegetable garden is still not planted.  I fear putting out my basil seedlings lest they die in the frigid overnight temperatures.  I loathe the idea that it may never warm up enough to allow heat seeking plants like pumpkins to grow to full size.  It is looking like one of those summers.

For now though we'll look at the positive side.  Cool temperatures meant that daffodils opened their sunny faces and stayed around for weeks.

Golden Echo Daffodils

 Taking a tip from Jennifer @ Three Dogs in a Garden I paired my daffodils with Snowdrop anemone.  

Daffodils in the foreground are echoed by anemones in the background

The plants are similar colours with similar bloom times.  The anemone lingers longer though and hides the withering daffodil leaves in their foliage.

snowdrop anemones

I also enjoyed how the daffodils picked up the white fringes of the hosta leaves.

There is a lot of white in my spring garden.  The tiny flowers of sweet woodruff, the bells of Solomon Seal.  There is more than white in my spring garden though.  Tiny purple violets peek out at me from shady corners.

Tulips blushed and then blossomed.  Shades of pink and purple gracing the bed day after day.

 And a good dose of yellow as well

Cushion spurge makes a great foil against the yellow trumpets of daffodils and pops against the pink of tulips. 

I must say I am feeling a major sense of accomplishment this spring.  Although the daffodils and tulips have faded I can see the next crop of blooms starting to push out.  It's taken four years but this bed is finally starting to resemble a mature garden.

Time for a happy dance I think.