bulbs and other things

It was cold but not raining today so I did a little survey of the yard. I have a lot of chickweed and pulled some. The forsythia and the pizzaz loropetulam are both budded up with flower buds. My big pieris does not seem to have a lot of flower buds and some of the flower stalks it does have look dead. Don't know if this is because of the couple super-cold days or what.

The fatsia is looking okay, no further damage. Oddly, the dead parts I cut off last week or so still look perfectly healthy in the garbage, so I don't know if the plant is alive or dead, only time will tell. Some of the hydrangeas are trying to break leaf already and Ayesha has some damaged looking leaf buds as a result. Hopefully Ayesha's early attempt at breaking bud won't do away with all the flowers.

My daylilies are starting to come up in several places. I'm not sure if all the Mattie Mae Maxwell's will come back, as I only see three coming up so far. If not, I'll have to buy more and replant them again.

The daffodils are up and a few now have what looks like flowering stalks. A few of he small irises I planted last year have come back and are currently blooming. I have some sort of bulb coming up in one container and a few muscari blooming pretty weakly in another container. All my containers that have bulbs will need to be dumped once they have bloomed as this is the 2nd year for the bulbs and I didn't get any blooms from the paperwhites this year.

I a VERY happy with my hellebore. It has a bunch of blooms and even more buds! Debutante camellia is still blooming but also still losing blooms to the frosts. I'm waiting for the buds to open on my other camellias. There are no buds on either Miss Biloxi and the plants look pretty bad. The leaves on the Tom Knudsens have some black spots on them, not sure if it is disease or the cold or what. I need to pull leaves and take them to Underwoods for a diagnosis. Maybe this coming weekend.

more hellebore blooms and more rain

I have been sick again this week, so no work on anything, not even any photos. The hellebore really has a lot of blooms on it now and looks very nice. I am hoping I'll be able to get a few good pictures before the blooms begin to fade.

We got over 1" of rain earlier this week and some more rain tonight. We are supposed to get even more rain over the weekend, which is good for the plants but bad for any yard work.

My daffodils continue to come up more and I have a few other mystery bulbs that are coming up. The crocuses seem to be done, it was a very short time for them. I will have to plant more this fall since so few seem to have come back from last year. The paperwhites under the tree never bloomed this year, don't know if a frost got them or what. I think I will plant some daffodils in that area next fall as well.

I guess I am not going to start any seeds this year. It is already just about a month until when I put out transplants in pots last year, so I guess I will be buying all my veggies as transplants this year. I want to get a few more big pots to use for growing tomatos and try a few more varieties this year.

spring bulbs coming up

I have been out of town or busy every weekend for the last 4 weekends, so I haven't done ANYTHING around the house or the yard. I did notice that my crocuses are up, but it seems that only the yellow ones came back this year. My Brandywine hellebore is also blooming as is the little unnamed hellebore still in its little pot.

My narcissus foliage came up, but either they weren't going to bloom or the timing was off and I have gotten no blooms. The daffodils I planted this fall have started to come up and I've seen daffodils blooming already in other people's yards.

I am finally home this coming weekend, so if the weather is good I hope to move the ruined gazebo up to the road to be hauled away and then try to do some work in my yard. Luckily we have been getting a fair amount of rain, as I have not really watered this winter.