Winter Flowers

I still have flowers on plants that should have stopped ages ago. The mild autumn must have started them off, but this cold weather still hasn't stopped some of them!

Apart from a reasonable show on the Viburnum bodnantense 'Dawn', which should flower in mild spells over winter, I have fuchsias outside that have flowers, a couple in the cold greenhouse also.

The autumn flowering Camellias are doing well, they desparately need bigger pots or to go in the ground. I would have thought the hot summer would reduce their flowers, I managed to keep them watered but only just. It appears to be the opposite, they are flowering well.

I took this yesterday late morning when still at -1C. Today the flowers look OK, the transparent frozen areas still look the same but all the flower was crisp and frozen. Camellia Navajo

The whole shrub

Camellia Autumn King, frozen

Helleborus foetidus

Fuchsia Voodoo yesterday, next to the east wall and not frozen.

A seedling Hellebore just 2 years from sowing

A late flower on Rose Alpine Sunset, a little pale and frozen yesterday

This Rose Deep Secret took years to take off, this year it grew a stem about 5' tall with one huge flower on top. It has made 5 buds from near the top now, I think they will survive to open. I had one covered in freezing snow that was open on 1st January a few years ago.

Rose Tradescant, such a moody sight

Fuchsia Snowburner unfrozen in the greenhouse

A Tradescantia thinking it was spring

Cyclamen coum pewter budding up

Rhodochiton atrosanguinea loves this weather! Still growing in it's hanging basket, it has a new flower bud on new growth coming from the old wood near the base.

Wow Janet, you've been busy with the camera. I was going to photo the Ena Harkness rose I picked on Christmas Day, but the petals have nearly all fallen off this morning. It smells gorgeous though.

Your camelias look lovely. Mine is a later one, we get too many frosts for early ones here. There are lots of flowers on the Mahonia which the blue tits like eating and the Viburnum Bodnantese Dawn has been in full flower for a couple of months. The winter honeysuckle is wafting scent around the garden and there are still lots of flowers on the winter jasmine. One of the prettiest shrubs at the moment is the Viburnum Tinus which seems to have flowers or berries all the year round and is smothered in lovely pink blossom just now.

This message was edited Jan 1, 2007 7:10 PM

Hi Pat, the coldest day we had last Friday and I go out and take pics! My neighbour has a huge Viburnum that alwasy seems to be making flowers. We have so many flowers in summer it seems the few that may present themselves in winter are more interesting!

The Camellias are autumn flowering varieties, C. sasanqua is crossed with other species. Navajo can be risky when young but kept in a greenhouse until it gets some size it now lives outside, survived last winter easily. It has a strong musky scent too, Autumn King has a light scent. They desparately need ground space, I think next year will have to be their turn, I have about 20 altogether! Terrible job when the wind keeps blowing them all over.

Autumn King is a sprawling shrub

What beautiful and unusual photographs Wallaby, I thoroughly enjoyed looking at them (yours too Patbarr).
The Hellebore seedling is doing really well to be flowering so soon and it looks as if it's a lovely dark one too...very pretty!
I really like the rose and Camellia pictures, they are so beautiful but with a touch of sadness too, wouldn't you agree?
Here's a picture I took on Christmas eve, of one of my irises in bloom. I found it in bud a few days before and brought it into the greenhouse. It really has been a strange season. I go out looking for those plants that are flowering but shouldn't be, and there are so many of them.

Terri

Thanks Terri, the Camellias are fine, they can take frost without damaging them too much (not like the spring types), just some clear patches on the petals of Navajo. The roses look OK too, the red one may still open. We've had frost to -4C so they must be tough! Alpine Sunset only had a small clear patch on a petal too. Quite amazing really!

That is really amazing to have an Iris in flower now, I. unguicularis is a winter flowering species but that doesn't look to have any of it in it.

This is Fuchsia President George Bartlett in the greenhouse, it was slow to grow and started to move when the cooler weather came, it still has all it's leaves and these flowers undamaged. The leaf behind is a new leaf on a Pinecone ginger, there is another newer leaf, that looks like it could be quite hardy!