Nicole PaullDoes anybody else like taking a walk after the world has had its face washed fresh and clean by a good rain? It’s a good thing I do, because we have had rain, rain, and more rain this spring!
This morning, I took my camera with me as I wandered around the garden after taking care of the hens. Want to come along with me to see what’s blooming and what’s about to be? Yay! 😊
The first thing we come to, on the way down the hill, is a blizzard of flowering dogwood (Benthamidia florida). That’s a ‘White Gold’ cherry in the background, toward the right. (It bears Mt. Rainier-type cherries, but we’ve never eaten any fruit from this tree. The birds are too quick for us! I’m glad to share anyway.)
At the edge of the woods, close to the bottom of the hill, is a chokecherry (Prunus virginiana). This is the first year it’s had flowers. Aren’t those little white candelabras of bloom pretty?
As we leave the chokecherry behind, we’re rounding the fire pit and starting our trek back uphill. At one point, a branch of crabapple arches over the pathway. Isn’t she gorgeous?
Growing beneath her, among some invasive shrub babies I still have to remove, is a hidden gem.
That’s a native wild flower called Solomon’s Seal (Polygonatum biflorum). The flowers will be white when they bloom – I’ll swing back around and get a picture for you when they do.
The really neat thing about the Solomon’s Seal is that I didn’t plant it. It sprang up itself. That’s the ultimate in right plant, right place. You know the plant will thrive with no watering or any effort from the gardener when that happens.
Still, I can help it along by cleaning out the invasives, which include a tiny multiflora rose (bottom right), some sprigs of winter creeper, and a young Norway maple.
Next, we come up on a silverbell (Halesia carolina), just on the cusp of blooming.
Passing her, we start up the path through the woodland, back towards the house. At the steepest part of the path, we spend a moment eye level with yellow, woodland poppies and young, Christmas fern fronds.
Back at the house, we finish up with a couple of ‘Apricot Beauty’ tulips, bowed down by rain but as beautiful as ever. Behind them is a young fothergilla shrub, just beginning to open its bottlebrush blooms.
I stopped to cut a single branch of Koreanspice viburnum (Viburnum carlesii) on my way back inside, This is one of just a few exotic plants I purposely have growing in my yard (more on that to follow soon).
It powerfully perfumes the front garden when it’s in bloom. As I write, that single branch is filling my office with beautiful, vanilla-clove fragrance.
How do you like to bring the outside in to enjoy?