After scraping light snow and ice off my car this morning, I had a feeling that it would be a cold one today. The weather, while quite a bit different from Monday, was expected and no surprise. Unfortunately, many plants weren't ready for that frost and will get hit again tonight. See the pasque flower (
Pulsatilla vulgaris) below (featured in an earlier blog) that looks to be a bit bummed out with the cold temperatures and is dejectedly awaiting a warm-up. Daffodils looked rough today and the magnolia blooms will be browning out this week as they thought it was early May already. Oh well. All we can do is accept the vagaries of Mother Nature.
Many staff and volunteers braved the weather today and headed out in to the gardens. Marianne was here and worked primarily on her irises. She has really kept this collection organized and looking good too. Janice was here to work o
n various projects including more preparations for the spring plant sale, including information cards for our various herbs (100 varieties at the sale). Our website at
http://www.rotarygardens.org/ should have lists of our vegetable and herb offerings for the May 14-16 sale. Little Jerry was here composting the Japanese garden and Larry helped out with all sorts of activities and hauled off more daisies to be sealed with preservative. See two more entries at the bottom. Ron and Gary worked on running out the rest of our benches in the gardens. This has become a monumental task physically but also is stretching our memories on where particular benches go. I think the guys will have a system for next year. Bob C. and Roger continued to mulch the woodland walk garden and are doing a nice job. Vern, Bob A., Jim and Dave mounted more daisies and are starting on building so
me new benches for the alpine garden. Maury, Dick H. and Big John (above right) worked on the sitting area near the 'Dialogue' sculpture. This also involved a jackhammer (on loan) which was quite handy in cleaning off the old cap stones. John later worked on digging holes for our culvert planters which we hope will go in next week. We also saw Urban, Rose, Bev, Deb, Jumbo Jim, Jackie, Dave, Rollie and Dick P. here today. Lots of activity. To the left are the emerging spears of the variegated Solomon's seal (
Polygonatum odoratum 'Variegatum') which is beautiful in the shade garden with white bell-shaped flowers in May and variable leaves with interesting creamy variegation (see below) thru summer. Warning, this hardy perennial will double in size each year and can create quite a colony. This perennial is one that I promote as low-maintenance but understand that you'll need to divide this plant often to keep it contained (if that is the intent). See below for a nice shot of this perennial in early summer. The hellebores (
Helleborus sp.) haven't minded the cold snap and have a long bloom time. Beneath the variegated Solomon's seal image is a close-up of 'Red Lady' that I took today. While hellebore blooms can be variable, 'Red Lady' is promoted as having darker red tepals than what can be seen here. Whether this hellebore is misidentified and/or a bit exaggerated in terms of flower color, I like the "bi-color" look and this plant is a keeper.
n various projects including more preparations for the spring plant sale, including information cards for our various herbs (100 varieties at the sale). Our website at http://www.rotarygardens.org/ should have lists of our vegetable and herb offerings for the May 14-16 sale. Little Jerry was here composting the Japanese garden and Larry helped out with all sorts of activities and hauled off more daisies to be sealed with preservative. See two more entries at the bottom. Ron and Gary worked on running out the rest of our benches in the gardens. This has become a monumental task physically but also is stretching our memories on where particular benches go. I think the guys will have a system for next year. Bob C. and Roger continued to mulch the woodland walk garden and are doing a nice job. Vern, Bob A., Jim and Dave mounted more daisies and are starting on building so
me new benches for the alpine garden. Maury, Dick H. and Big John (above right) worked on the sitting area near the 'Dialogue' sculpture. This also involved a jackhammer (on loan) which was quite handy in cleaning off the old cap stones. John later worked on digging holes for our culvert planters which we hope will go in next week. We also saw Urban, Rose, Bev, Deb, Jumbo Jim, Jackie, Dave, Rollie and Dick P. here today. Lots of activity. To the left are the emerging spears of the variegated Solomon's seal (Polygonatum odoratum 'Variegatum') which is beautiful in the shade garden with white bell-shaped flowers in May and variable leaves with interesting creamy variegation (see below) thru summer. Warning, this hardy perennial will double in size each year and can create quite a colony. This perennial is one that I promote as low-maintenance but understand that you'll need to divide this plant often to keep it contained (if that is the intent). See below for a nice shot of this perennial in early summer. The hellebores (Helleborus sp.) haven't minded the cold snap and have a long bloom time. Beneath the variegated Solomon's seal image is a close-up of 'Red Lady' that I took today. While hellebore blooms can be variable, 'Red Lady' is promoted as having darker red tepals than what can be seen here. Whether this hellebore is misidentified and/or a bit exaggerated in terms of flower color, I like the "bi-color" look and this plant is a keeper.
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