Some of my favorite things about a garden cannot be shown in pictures or even conveyed in words. Last evening when I was walking back from getting the mail and then again early this morning when I opened the doors to let the dogs out the sweet smell of spring drifted in, from the pink jasmine I'm assuming. Or maybe some blooming fruit trees in the area or the Indian hawthorns that are starting to wake up? Whatever it was it woke up those hormones in me that say that spring is right around the corner more than anything else I can imagine. The days are getting longer and although we haven't really had a winter, and we are looking forward to the rain in the forecast for next week, the balmy, perfumed evenings are always welcome. Don't forget to think about the scent of the garden and make it a part of the over all plan or it will be missing an important dimension that makes the difference between a nice garden and a magical garden.
I remember when we first looked at this property I was already mentally choosing what I would plant on this arbor before we even decided to buy the house. I love arbors and use them all the time in my gardens to add interest and height to an otherwise flat area. This one is tall and very sturdy, however, I don't think it has ever lived up to its potential and a week ago I looked at it in dismay and told my garden helper to just strip everything that was growing on it off and we would start over. (By-the-way, this is a garden technique that I find much under appreciated, ripping everything out and starting over!) We will relocate the plants that were growing there to a bare spot on the always needy fence on the back lot.
It's not that I hadn't tried. Here is what was tangled together growing on it; 'Graham Thomas' rose (not a climber but it does grow very tall here and it did grow up over the top), 'Sally Holmes' climbing rose, purple potato vine, a variety of passion flower, and a clematis of some kind, I think.
I've decided to just go and buy two of the same kind of climbing rose and plant one on each side and then monitor them weekly and tie the growing canes horizontally along the sides of the arbor. I started to do this on the previous roses planted here but obviously got distracted as evident by the top notch of blooms showing in the pictures. This is the key to getting climbing roses that have flowers all along the sides of the arbor and not just at the top like the yellow Graham Thomas rose in the picture above. They must be diligently tied in a zig-zag pattern so they will bloom on the horizontal branches like here or here. Which roses I choose will be somewhat dictated by my choices in the nurseries or whether I am willing to order on-line. Usually we are better off choosing ones that are available locally because they are typically proven to do well in our area. We need ones that will put up with June gloom for months without succumbing to mildew. Strong foliage is always good to discourage those pesty sawfly larvae that haunt us all. I looked a couple weeks ago and although some of my favorites from my Laguna Garden were at the nursery I usually go to, like 'New Dawn', it typically only has one long and full bloom in the spring and is flowerless the rest of the summer. They also had 'Polka', a beautiful peach colored climber that I find very difficult to get to bloom. Of course there is always the popular 'Eden', but I find it so disease prone, at least in my area, that I am a bit wary of the maintenance involved. Oh well, the search begins!
This year I've started using the winter blooms of my many camellias as cut flowers indoors on a regular basis. I always tell people that camellias are to winter what roses are to summer, but I do know that they do not quite have the scent of roses and the long stems that lend themselves to beautiful indoor bouquets so I am not surprised when I am met with a bit of skepticism over my enthusiasm for these beautiful blooms as cut flowers. Although I do sometimes cut them with stems and they do fine in small vases, my favorite way to display them is floating in flat bowls of water. On my coffee table all winter I have a large glass bowl of water that holds five to seven blooms and they last at least a week and are a lovely change of pace from the usual bouquets that are gathered from the garden. Add a few of the lovely dark green leaves tucked in around the blooms for a full look. One single bloom and a few leaves in a pretty saucer is lovely on a nightstand or in the powder room too. I did plant a couple new varieties this year for the sole purpose of adding to my choices to bring inside. My sister has moved into a home that has some established bushes and she always calls them "those peony-like flowers". Maybe I am missing the mark when I compare compare them to roses!
On a side note, camellias are shrubs that prefer shady locations and once established and well mulched, can survive with minimum additional watering during droughts. Do clean up spent flowers under them though to prevent fungal diseases.
Here we are in the second half of February and while the rest of the country is experiencing a deep and difficult winter it feels like spring here and my liquidambar is finally looking like autumn! I know we gardeners are feeling guilty because we are really enjoying the weather but we know how much we need the rain. There is no rain in the 10 day forecast, and I am going to have to turn on the sprinklers for at least a good soak this week and hope for some relief soon. Maybe we'll have a wet spring!
I turned the sprinklers off a couple weeks ago to try to conserve water while the weather is cool and plants other than natives are somewhat dormant. There are some spots in the yard like this one, that stay cool and damp in the winter with minimum water due to the deep shade and being at the down side of the slightly sloped property. This area was originally a swampy mess when we first moved in and it was only grass, but now the ferns and flowering shade plants and ground covers keep it in check. I added some primrose a few weeks ago for a touch of winter color in hopes that we get some rain this season and sure enough, we have had some this week to keep them perky, although we will need much more to catch up and make a difference in the drought conditions. It is not just the rain along the coast we need, but snow in the mountains to fill the rivers and creeks this spring and summer. We still have time in our rainy season, but today the sun is shining beautifully and there is not a cloud in the sky. As much as we love our mild weather, we understand the need for rain and will gladly welcome it when it comes. There are always some plants that can be sacrificed during a drought in the gardens and many more that will survive tough times, but let's hope we get the rain and can look forward to a lush garden this summer.
So today should be an interesting day. I have been very busy lately, doing everything except gardening. A few weeks ago I was contacted by a photographer from Minnesota who was going to be in our area this week and was hoping to get to visit a garden with the goal of photographing a California garden in the winter to sell a story to a gardening magazine. I told her I would be happy to show her my garden, but not to expect much because although we do live in a mild climate, our gardens are not exactly spectacular year round. As I walk through my garden this time of year it looks rather bleak to me. Most of the roses have been cut back (there are a few that were blooming away and were temporarily spared that are still in need of a cut back), the ornamental grasses that are abundant in my gardens and add so much movement and character other times of the year look like short whisk brooms stuck in the dirt and many of the trees and vines that I love for their changing fall colors have shed their leaves and are a tangle of bare branches. There is more bare ground than I care to see after the winter clean up and I'm afraid the rabbits have had their way with many of the winter annuals and ground covers that I had high hopes for earlier this season. Still, when she asked last week if anything was in bloom, I had to admit there was a long list when I started to think about it. There are camellias and azaleas of course, and the pretty abutilons that I adore and have been combing the nurseries looking for more to add in shady spots. I have noticed some lavenders starting to bloom and the Russian sage is putting on a show. There are a few daffodils starting to wake up and a few reblooming iris that never know when to stop blooming. The unseasonably warm weather we had confused some of the daylilies and there are even a few of them showing their blooms. This is also the time of year for succulents to bloom their unusual flowers and natives to flower and I'm sure there are some of those blooms to be found around and I did notice lots of buds on the Anna apple trees. I guess although it doesn't exactly look like spring, there will be more to see blooming than my guest this afternoon will see in Minnesota at least! I'll let you know how it goes!
We are having summer like temperatures this week, but my SJC liquid amber tree thinks it is autumn and the leaves are just starting to turn yellow and fall to the ground. I had planted this tree, of which there are many in our neighborhood that turn beautiful shades of red, burgundy and orange in the early to mid fall, right outside the dining room window to add an ambiance of autumn color to our Thanksgiving holidays, but it is putting on the show a little late, not to mention somewhat less colorful than I had imagined. I am going to be patient and give it more time, assuming it is still young. I still love it though for the pretty color of green and the shade it gives us all summer, but I am still hoping for next year.
Sooooo.... I went to the nursery yesterday to buy rose fertilizer, but I have to go back today because I came home with everything but fertilizer. Mainly I stocked up on one gallon lavender which it seemed like I looked for all last fall and couldn't find at all, although I still couldn't find any Spanish lavender yet. I also was seduced by a beautiful camellia and some complimentary azaleas because let's face it, the window to plant them is going to close soon. A few flats of fairy primrose also made it home with me because I plant them every year this time.
But I really wanted to buy some beautiful lettuces and peas that I haven't planted in years due to being discouraged by the rabbits that have their way with most of my gardens. But I have really been missing the vegetables and now I think I will try to grow them in containers around the fountain on the back patio. The fountain splashes everywhere, making it rather damp and I started putting plants around it years ago when one of the dogs was a puppy that kept climbing in it and to discourage toddlers from getting too close. I am not crazy about the choice of prickly plants that my garden helper has grown from slips there and I think I will try to replace them with veggies and see how that works out. It is right outside the kitchen, gets lots of sun and is a ways away from the rabbit territory so maybe it will work. I'll let you know!
Although most of the roses have already been cut way back and stripped of all their leaves for the winter, some that are blooming away in this mild weather have been spared a week or so until the end of the job is at hand. The blooms are not the big full ones that will come back in a few months, but they are appreciated nevertheless. I must say though, the foliage is flawless this time of year!
There are no daffodils coming up yet, but the narcissus are almost done blooming, much to my dismay. I rarely get out in the gardens during the holidays and I usually miss the few that I have here in SJC and if I don't get over to Laguna soon I'll miss those too. I thought I did plant some more last year but maybe they were late season bloomers. I need to keep better records!
I am off to the nursery this morning to get some organic rose food to make sure the roses are well fed before the mulch goes down. I'm not sure how long this lovely weather will last (the weather forecast does call for rain on Thursday) and if there wasn't football on all weekend this would have been where we would have spent the warm afternoons even though things are pretty bare!
It has been a while since I have posted on this blog and it has been a while since I have been out in the garden! A combination of a sore knee and way too many responsibilities involving the holidays have kept me from even taking a peek at what is happening out there other than a quick glimpse as I hurry by on my way to doing what must be done at this time of year. Somehow I made it through the holidays (with the help of others) and now I am looking forward to taking advantage of this beautiful weather we are having and getting out and doing some sprucing up and a bit of winter planting (also with the help of others). As always we will have a number of visitors at the end of this month and I like the gardens in SJC to look good and it is a good excuse to add some winter annuals as long as the rains hold out. Although I am enjoying the sunny days, I know we are in need of the rain and I am hoping for a wet winter to flush out the soils and give the trees a good deep soaking, but maybe not until February?
Note: My sincere apologies to those of you that are suffering through blizzard conditions back east. We hope for the best for all of you that are being hit by this latest storm and I really didn't mean to rub it in!
