Snow and Fire

The snow is gone, but the creeping phlox is filling in. I still don't know what the healthy green next to it is (something I planted right after I bought the house--it has done remarkably well in the crappy clay "soil" along the house--it is now at several times its original coverage).

Meanwhile, in back, the Mountain Fire Pieris is brilliant red. Love it!
















And my first allium is in full bloom.




Now if I could just learn to embrace the dandelions...

Mystery Plant 2008

Anybody recognize this? Looks like it's getting a flower on top. Came up in about a week to 18" or so...

Probably a weed! I pulled out five bags of weeds from under my pine tree last night. I'll wait to see what kind of flower this one gets...

Tulips

The deer and squirrels haven't eaten all of my tulips. Either they're being discouraged by the new solar lights I added to the planting bed or they're tired of tulips and waiting for the hostas to get big enough to entice.

Anyway, these tulips are still around. Pretty cool color, eh?

Allium

A new plant for me this year is allium. I planted the bulbs last fall and here they come. Wow, this picture makes my yard look lush! That is probably the only significant spot of good looking grass.




Meanwhile, the horseradish and rhubarb are coming back strong.

Spring Flowers

The redbud and apple are flowering together. Maybe I'll get to eat one of the apples this year...
The bleeding hearts continue to bloom. What a cool plant :)

Happy Arbor Day!

Friday April 25 is Arbor Day in Ohio. Plant a tree (or just hug one) and celebrate!

Check out the Arbor Day Foundation for tree information and much more.

Poultry Netting

Remember chicken wire? It is now poultry netting. I kid you not. I don't know whether the chickens got tired of being singled out, the turkeys felt left out, political correctness has gone truly a-fowl, or what, but there it was, in my local garden store. I wonder what would have happened if I had asked for chicken wire? Would the guy with the "ask me for help" apron have known what I wanted? Or would he have looked at me with the same puzzled look as the young UDF clerk who couldn't find the skim milk (of course, it's fat free milk now).

Blooming Hearts!

Frost didn't get 'em.... Yea!

Time Lapse

The progress of the bleeding heart! You can just see the flower buds now, too.





Of course, the plants know when to sprout, but I do hope the frost we're expecting this weekend doesn't kill anything. Like my poised-to-bloom redbud. Or my first tulip.

Bleeding Heart

I wasn't sure at this stage that this was the bleeding heart coming back. I was pretty sure it was a goner after last year's drought. And I'd never seen one sprout before.



But here it is starting to really show the character- istic leaf shape.


Yea :)

More Bulbs

These crocuses are weeks behind the rest, but that's okay, it keeps the yard interesting!

Magic Fence

I know that this fence is not keeping any hungry critter out of this planting bed, but somehow these hyacinths are not being munched by whatever is munching the ones along the driveway...

Who Lives Here?

Eek! I don't know what made this hole, but it looks brand new and it's in the middle of the backyard. Again I say, eek!









Daffodils in bloom in the front!






Check out the red buds on my redbud...

My New Baby

Okay, I don't know anything about weeping pussy willows, but there it was, at the Home Depot, looking all needy like it had to be adopted. So, I put on a show for the other shoppers, getting it into my little bitty car (I should have taken a picture of THAT).

This is ideal hole-digging time in my yard, as swamp-like conditions are persisting even more than usual in the spring rainy season this year.

Isn't it the cutest thing? I am leaving the wrapper until I get some rabbit-control in place...

Bulbs Galore!

Crocus and snow drop.

A long row of crocuses (croci?) along the driveway.


Daffodils in front of the ubiquitous random boulder in the front.

Sorry, cuz, the bulbs are taking off here in Zone 6!

One Week Later

These little flowers emerged from what had been over a foot of snow not seven days earlier!


Now it is snowing again--a nice top-off to a several days of rain and flooding. I'm sure the frogs and locusts are on the way...

Blizzard 2008

I know there's a lawn under there somewhere. I do hope all the sprouting bulbs are tough enough to bloom once this snow melts! Of course, it is hard to see the depth of the snow, but that blue globe is on a stand that is about a foot tall. And there is a bird bath on the ground between the two lanterns.
Thank God the lawn service also plows snow!

March 1st

Finally, the long gloom of February is over! With the strange weather we've been having, some of my bulbs are already coming out. A couple of crocuses, and a whole row of tulips. Hopefully the tulips will survive the return to winter that we've been promised starting tonight...

Yea for YakTrax!

A great invention for walking around in the ice (especially while watching the neighbor's cat slide around on it!). Too bad that the beauty of an ice storm has to come with so much danger!

Above is one of my fountain grasses (I wait until spring to cut them back--they provide such great winter interest). Below, see the frozen russian sage and rose of sharon. By tomorrow evening, the coating of ice should be gone...

Winter Interest

We haven't really had much of a winter this year (although whatever winter we do have seems to come during the morning rush hour), but the landscape is still stark. Maybe it seems even starker without a nice blanket of snow. Sigh. There is some good winter interest in the landscape, however. I hope you can see the color of the crab apple branches. Kind of matches the house ;)



And, the choke berry has berries, still.

We seem to be getting all the rain that we missed last summer, so the ground is quite saturated. I hope that doesn't leave all my bulbs rotten and dead. The next month or so should tell.

The Lonely Bird Feeder

Here is my new bird feeder. So far it has been up just under a week, but I have yet to see a bird at it. I hear birds, but they are not eating the seed. Maybe I need to move the feeder, but this is the same place where the birdbath gets regular visitors all summer long.

San Antonio

I visited San Antonio a couple weeks ago. Below are pictures of the Live Oak tree which was relocated to the site of the Alamo in 1914 (at the age of 40). Aside from its historic location, I found it interesting that the limbs all seem to bend toward the ground. I guess that is typical of the species? As you can see in the close-up, various supports have been placed to keep the tree from toppling over.

Here is an artist's rendering of the same tree.

Winter Blooms

My Christmas cactus bloomed this year, after its move to my office. Clearly the bright office window and the natural light pattern agreed with it! It actually bloomed a bit before Christmas, but close enough. Now the indoor forced bulbs are blooming.








I added lots of bulbs to the yard, too. Hopefully the soggy weather in the late fall and early winter (in sharp contrast to the summer drought) hasn't turned them all to mush. We'll see in a couple of months...

Fall Color

I realize that the fall color is pretty much done here in SW Ohio, but my computer died a couple of weeks ago, so I didn't get a chance to post these before. My river birch--planted my first year here, it has thrived in its location, in spite of this summer's drought--and one of my rosy barberries (with a cotoneaster hiding behind)--just the greatest color!

Deer Strike Again

Look what he did to my poor baby weeping willow! As if the poor tree hadn't been through enough this year, between being turned into an archway by the ice storm and thirsting through the drought. At least the damage doesn't go all the way around the trunk. Then, look at my poor dwarf Alberta spruce! I have never seen a deer rut on an evergreen, so I didn't think to protect it.

The neighbor says she has lived here 40 years and the deer have never come up so close to the houses. They decimated her lilac bushes, too. And her weeping cherry. Not to mention the damage they did to our flowers and veggies all summer long.

Finally, the Rain!

I promised not to whine about the rain until day 8. It is now day 3, and I am still happy to see it. We've gotten about 4 inches, but we're still down another 8 on the year. Of course, if we keep up this pace until we catch up, things could get ugly! So far, no water in my basement from the back yard (thanks to the drainage work I had done just before the drought set in) and the sump pump is doing its thing for the side yard.

The heat seems to have broken finally, too. I would like to try out the new fire pit this weekend, so I'm okay with that, too. And I got to wear my Halloween turtleneck for the first time this October today.

I toured the neighborhood for Halloween yard decorations tonight. A few really cool displays (some even eclipsing mine), but not as many yards decorated this year as last it seems. Perhaps a contest is needed... I'll try to get some pictures tomorrow.

Fall Resurgence

These golden barberries were looking near death just a couple weeks ago. I thought they were done for, but lately they've been coming back with fresh, bright leaves.

These cosmos are looking healthier--bushier and greener--than they've looked all summer. The shorter days seem to be agreeing with them. We've had so few cloudy, let alone rainy, days this summer that many of my plants have been very stressed.