Sorry, that's all - I just wanna get going!!!!
You'll have to excuse me - this is the first winter I've had since leaving Phoenix (which strangely enough has gotten more snow than I have this year, bizarre as that might be) so I'm not used to waiting as long as I will have to.
Of course, if I don't get going on my seeds and stuff, it'll get here before I'm ready!
*sigh*
C'mon, spring...!
I hear ya!!!
I have lavender and yarrow and tomatoes sprouting -- as long as we don't get a freeze in March (highly unlikely but not unheard of) I'm getting it done! I couldn't help myself; planted about 45 different seeds in the little jiffy-7 plugs. I WILL remove the little cloth bit when I transplant them this time!
Ooops! lol
I am undecided if I want spring here yet ot not. Killing freezes are the norm through the middle of April, and that's a long way away.
I am also undecided if i would rather have really cold weather (in the single digits) and sunshine, or the "hover-around-freezing" temps and all clouds. I think I'd just as soon have it cold and sunny.
What would you rather have?
Suzy
I wish we could get one really hard freeze, actually -- it would eliminate a lot of the mosquitos and fleas. It's been cold and dreary and wet here for three weeks, and I just wish it would either get really cold and get it over with or go ahead and be spring. I've seen MASSES of robins, but the pecan trees are still very bare. They say you can't fool a pecan tree.
Suzy, I go with cold and sunny any day! Today is one of those days (although definitely not in the single digits - that doesn't happen here), and I am soon out of here with my camera. I'm going into town to see my parents, but the ferry ride often brings about good photo opportunities!
As much as I love rain, I really wish it would dry up for about a week and then snow like crazy. We've just put a trailer for my sister on our land, just where our property drops off fairly steeply. And oh, boy does the ground here get soggy - & stays soggy - so no one has dared drive down to work on it.
On a more gardening note - many of the bulbs have started sprouting, hopefully the later chill (which we'll undoubtedly get) will come quick enough to only get the tips and not kill the entire plant. Some of the wild roses will get nipped, too - I noticed them leafing out.
And it's true - I had pecan trees in Phoenix and no matter how warm it got, they simply would not leaf out until the length of day was long enough. They were usually the last.
I hear you, Pagancat! I started some seeds even though it's way too early. I just need something....
I can't complain too much. Here in central Ohio it feels like winter is just starting, after the longest fall I have ever experienced. We finally have a snow cover, a whole inch and a half. The temperature has finally dropped below freezing for a high.
Our lowest temperature here had been 13, which would make us zone 7b. We're *not* zone 7b. Last year we had one night of -7, and several nights of below zero cold. My honeysuckle (lonicera sempervirens var "Alabama Crimson") leafed out in December. :( I'm with brigidlily, I want to see a cold snap that is sufficient to keep our summer mosquito and biting fly population down.
Heck, I'm happy to see some snow. If the ground stays white through March it'll feel like we got a normal winter, and spring will seem short. In the meantime I am building my wannaplant list for April shopping! I love the anticipation! :)
-Joe
P.S. The list so far:
Half barrel beside path:
gloriosa lily; blue sweet pea (?)
Back of border:
2 Crocosmia “Lucifer”; 1 Formosa lily, lilium formosana; 2 Phlox maculata 'Natasha' , passiflora lutea
In Border:
Clematis x jouiniana 'Mrs Robert Brydon' “Big Dipper Farms”
Philadelphis “Snow Dwarf”
Front of border:
2 Candy lily, Pardancanda 'LSS Dandy Candy'; 2 Oenothera 'Fireworks'
Mignonette “Machet”,
Back of lot:
Seven Sons Flower, heptacodium miconoides
North side of house:
bletilla striata; Amorphophallus konjac, voodoo lily; 2 Arisaema dracontium , jack-in-the-pulpit; gelsemium sempervirens “Margarita”
Bed next to pine:
Datura metel, black currant swirl, triple yellow, and white
West side of house under crab apple:
Bletilla ochracea; Arisaema candidissimum 'Alba'
Specialty:
trachycarpus takil; rhaphidophyllum hystrix; serenoa repens “Cinera” (silver form)
I would like to have either spring or winter. I am trying to think of a name to call this wannabe spring summer in the middle of winter. There is a couuple of miles of flowering quinces in full bloom along I64 as you come into Louisville. I know they usually bloom early but this is ridiculous.
Joe - you dream big and in great detail, don't you? >grin<
Timeinabottle - are the flowering quinces the tall bushes with a coral colored bloom? I've been noticing some around here and wondering what they are.
We could call it "Spinter."
Pagancat, I'd say you're describing flowering quince. Mine haven't bloomed, but the buds began to turn color before this cold wave hit. Closer into the city they were blooming.
LOL Pagancat. If yer gonna dream ...
This is my purchasing "plan" though. As for "dreams, I'm hoping to snag enough railroad ties to put in several decent sized raised beds, as well as (maybe) finishing my fence border around the back of my yard, then there's putting the rest of the yard under mulch, jackhammering out a part of the cement driveway to put in another sheltered bed, maybe with a butia capitata "jelly palm", and jackhammering out a parcel of sidewalk that's just orphaned next to the street, nothing connecting to it.
My lot's only about 5500 square feet, so the undertaking is smaller than it might seem at first glance. My limiting factor will be finances. :)
-Joe
Great list, joegee. I can see it. I'm quite a bit more slapdash -- I DO plan things, but then I start planting and this gardening zen takes over and before I know it, it's entirely different from what I'd meant. Still, it works! Thank goodness I'm not in charge of a formal garden!
Some azaleas were blooming here this morning. I hope they're not thwarted by an ice storm in March.
I keep in mind something someone said on another thread -- "eat the elephant one bite at a time..." I do tend to take on a lot at once. But that's the fun part, isn't it? Keeps my chiropractor in the black!