How is your garden looking today?

If you look at my garden beginning about 2 feet above the surface, things look lovely and shiny and very bright green. At ground level, things are sodden.

Our official frost-free date is April 15, so I've got all my bedding plants in ($300 worth!!!) and NOW THERE'S A GODDAMN FREEZE WARNING TONIGHT?!?!?!

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!

Better hurry over to Wallyworld and get some tarps or their's going to be a 400-thread count lawnsale at Eva's tonight.

Last night was cold! And tonight it's supposed to drop to 35. Freeze warnings in Georgia. In late April???!!! Gotta cover my tomatoes and peppers! Bring the annuals indoors. brrrrrr...

When I woke up this morning everything -- every little new leaf, every flower -- was covered with 1-2 inches of snow. It was pretty and everything but my heart just sank. Now it's melted and doesn't seem so bad. I haven't done a thorough inspection yet. (Still cold and yucky even without snow.)

Good luck to everyone else...

(Not sure if it's over for us tho.)

Snow? Yikes. That would be hard on the plants. For some reason we've had great weather -- it was 73 on Friday, in the high sixties yesterday and already it is in the mid-fifties this morning. Our highest temperatures come about 4pm so we could have another warm day today, though all things are relative. The Pacific NW feels "hot" when it gets over 72.

Yesterday, we (ie. men with backhoe, etc.) redid the drainage around the horse stall. The only things worth saving were four large sword ferns which were moved to a shady spot nearer the house. Meanwhile, the entrance to Pearl's stall was graded & crushed basalt laid. This stuff packs down but doesn't damage her hooves. It also drains everything well away from the building. Three swales have been created to slow down the water coming off the hill and I am supposed to plant them with water-loving plants. We'll be tossing some pasture grass seed down today today where the soil was disturbed, so I hope we get some rain.

Pearl viewed all this work with great suspicion and last night tried mightily to get to the stall without touching the crushed basalt. She is, as Mr.P says, fine yard art, plus she produces a near-unending supply of manure. While she does a good job of mowing, she crushed the garden soil & eats hydrangeas so there will be no more visits to the backyard for her. I don't think the climbing hydrangea will ever come back.

In the garden... the plants that were put in a couple of weeks ago look well and the azaleas are still in bloom. Everything is growing. The camellia just won't quit this year and is still loaded with blooms. Clear yellow poppies have popped up throughout the rock garden -- I love them. Last year's snapdragons made it through the winter and are beginning to bud. I still have a few tulips out. Bad news though, once again that crummy lilac has zero blooms while the neighbor's lilac hedge is covered in 'em. Grrrrrrrrr. I'd rip it out but I just put the sword ferns at its feet. Nearby, the oak tree has grown tiny leaflets that look like thousands of miniature helicoptors. My favorite time of year for that tree.

Best of all, Costco had some gorgeous fuchsias that were just being set out on Thursday and I bought two: "Dark-Eyes" and "Blue-Eyes." I hope they stay as happy as they are now... covered in blooms. I have two fuchsias that made it over the winter but they look like scrawny twigs compared to these. I will continue to feed them, but they've been relegated to the back porch and may end up in the bin.

43 degrees in Baton Rouge. Whassup??!!

[glum]snowing again[/glum]

We stayed above freezing last night (barely) and they've changed the forecasted low to be 36 tonight, so it looks like I might be ok. My garden looks pretty silly with plastic grocery bags poked here and there but they did the trick.

I know what you mean. That's exactly what I've done. Covered my tomato and green pepper seedlings with plastic grocery bags for the night. Tomorrow looks warmer. Thank goodness.

So odd - we haven't had any freezing. It's been down in the upper-30s, but no freezing.

One variety of clematis in my garden is ready to bloom, they've got big, red, bullet-shaped buds hanging all over them (there are 2 of them).

We lucked out last night. (Whew!)

Looks like I dodged a bullet. Front-page news item on Yahoo, "Snow Blankets Midwest and Appalachians", and then the article's dateline (whatever it's called) is "COLUMBUS, Ohio":



Now that last part I can identify with. Watched a lot of videos. Bleh.

The front yard as of twenty minutes ago.

The roundish leafed plants among the scilla are virginia bluebells.

the robin got the nesting spot up front. See my edit.


Elsewhere in the yard, the early tulips are making their appearance. These are t. clusiana, I believe.


A week later, the daffodils are showing up, and the virginia bluebells are showing flower buds.


....and on the following week, the virginia bluebells' flowers start to open:

Spring, warm sunshine and showers

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and my tree poppy, which has been in for about 3 years without ever flowering has decided to produce a massive gorgeous bloom

WOWSA!!!!

Lookit that poppy!

Gorgeous pictures all around. I have bleeding hearts too, love 'em. Lilacs and lily-of-the-valley are starting.

Are you sure that isn't a tree peony? (Says the pedantic one...)

Those are gorgeous photographs.

erm yes, probably Piffka!


it has sat there so long doing nothing that I'd kind of forgotten what it was so you are probably right. I'll have to look it up in the book.

Great pics, Vivien. My dicentra isn't quite that open yet, but it's getting there. I killed the only tree peony I ever planted and, at the high cost of the plants, I'm wary of trying another one.

We have another freeze warning tonight so I guess it's grocery bag time again for the petunias.

My trillium are starting to open and the moss phlox is spectacular. I love spring.