An ongoing series, from commentor Jeffg166:
2.24.2023
[At top] Hardy almond tree. The photo doesn’t do it justice. This rainy day makes it pop even more. This is very fleeting. It will peak in a day or two.
3.27.2023
Looked out the back window and saw this. Worthy of being recorded.
4.9.2023
This year’s pot of tulips.
4.11.2023
Ornamental quince.
This seems like a very early bloom to me. Everything seems to be a week or two ahead of where it normally would be.
4.15.2023
Last year I grew tiger eye violas from seed. They went to seed. Collected the seeds. Put them in this pot in the autumn. They sprouted. Made it through the winter.
There is a tiger eye at the front (has the dark veins it the lighter color of the petal) with the other colors used to create it around it. Plus a few other things that were in the genes of the seeds.
Never know what colors I will get from the violas seeds I collect.
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What’s going on in your garden (prep / planning / planting), this week?
VeniceRiley
Rosebuds are happening. Have some other flowers blooming already.. Waiting for the lavender to tampt the bumble bees back. Blackbird pair nesting.
OzarkHillbilly
Beautiful flowers to wake up to Jeffg. Thanx.
rikyrah
Good Morning, Everyone😊😊😊
mrmoshpotato
But does a rainy day make it totally slap too?
Baud
@rikyrah:
Good morning.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@rikyrah:
@Baud:
Good morning
Dorothy A. Winsor
Lovely pics of this brief, beautiful time of year
Geo Wilcox
I spent yesterday planting the vegetable garden and was very grateful for the pounding thunderstorms that watered it so I don’t have to.
satby
Lovely pictures Jeffg! Seed saving is a surprise sometimes, to be sure.
It’s going to rain today and tomorrow, but at least the temps are warm again. My spring bulbs are almost done, the late tulips and daffodils have bloomed. The Iris in the south bed are getting buds, looks like at least 6-7 will bloom this year, far better than just two last year. The peonies have buds and so do my clematis and azaleas.
I have to repot more of my seedlings to give to the neighbors and pull the calla and gladiola bulbs out to plant this week. No frost in the foreseeable future and the last frost date is passing soon, so it’s time for planting the more delicate stuff. I may try between rain showers today and tomorrow.
OzarkHillbilly
Our redwoods are well past their peak, looking closely one might see the shriveled remains of a few buds, but more likely see only the season’s new leaves. Our dogwoods are shedding their flowers too now, with more petals on the ground than in their branches. My Spanish Bluebells are in their full glory and the irises have started blooming too.
I have been fighting the head cold from hell (thank you Addy girl and Vivi-Lou) for about 2 weeks now and it is finally relenting a bit. Besides giving me 5 gallons of snot in a 1 gallon head, it sapped all my energy and appetite. The past couple days I have begun to feel a little more normal and am able to do more than just the minimum of garden chores, so progress is once again being made. Hopefully I will have the energy to tackle the veggie garden this week. Due to the near total failure of my seed starts it’s going to be somewhat minimal this year, which to be honest is a bit of a relief to me. The old bones complain more and more every day, and I have a # of construction projects I really need to focus on this year.
satby
@OzarkHillbilly: I’m trying to hold off on the tomato planting because I preplanted purple potatoes in the grow bags first and wanted them to sprout so I could rebury them a couple of times before putting a tomato seedling in on the other side. So far, nuttin, and I may have to rethink the whole plan.
Gvg
Quite a few things blooming to start the summer. Our spring is pretty much over. Coreopsis, rudbeckia, milk and wine crinums, blue daze, Mexican hats. I need to start collecting the seed for next year. We still have a month more to go before summer rains will hopefully become regular enough that I don’t have to water all the seedlings I grew and planted which won’t establish like I want.
I was not feeling well this winter and did not start a lot of the seedlings as soon as I should have but others were on schedule and still aren’t doing well. Our springs are just too dry. I have decided I am not going to try and grow zinnias and sunflowers next spring. They apparently can’t get their roots down deep and withstand our dry springs. My hybrid coreopsis do better if I can get them established and the years I started them earlier were even easier.
in the long term I am cultivating more flowering shrubs and perennials. They cost more, I had to buy small and grow them up. I have acquired a mail order ever blooming ‘Hawara’ banana shrub, several new camellias, gardenia veitchii, Illicium Miss Scarlet, and others that need planting. The camellia cuttings from my deceased Uncle’s home are doing nicely, and my mother friend has offered to let me take cuttings from her camellias to soon.
Today I hope to take cuttings of other things to root mainly lots of the mundane ground cover blue daze and some salvias and Pentas. Things to fill in places in my garden as well as relatives.
OzarkHillbilly
@satby: If gardening teaches us nothing else, it teaches us to be flexible.
mrmoshpotato
@OzarkHillbilly: And if yoga teaches us nothing else, it teaches us gardening.
Kay
Love the tiger eye violas- I have to try some.
JPL
Love the pictures.
WaterGirl
Beautiful flowers!
MomSense
Yesterday I managed to clean and weed three perennial beds. I’m going to try to finish the last three today before I figure out what to add.
I also have a mess to deal with where something burrowed underneath the drip line in one bed. I think I have to redo the drip line and figure out how to get all the sand and stones out of the rest of the bed. Ugh.
O. Felix Culpa
Pretty pictures! Our flowering trees are done, but the flowering shrubs are now blooming. We just moved into our house two months ago, and so are still discovering what the plantings we inherited are. There’s a beautiful rock rose just outside our front door. The flowers seem to last one day and fall off in the evening. More replace them the next morning. I don’t know how long this cycle lasts, but they’re pretty…and I’m sure there’s a lesson in there somewhere, but I’m insufficiently caffeinated to bore you with it.
On the vegetable front, I amended the soil in a longish, narrow bed and put up trellises for peas, beans, and Armenian cucumbers, which I’ll plant this morning before it gets too hot. I’ll fill in the gaps with random flower seeds left over from previous years. My tomato seedlings–just one kind this year, a radical cutback–are about ready to be transplanted into larger pots. I plant to grow them in 5-gallon buckets. We’ll see how they do.
I also bought one of these raised planters because I have limited in-ground space and lots of bending for garden work doesn’t agree with me so much anymore. I might get a few more if this one works.
O. Felix Culpa
@MomSense: My sympathies. Our new-to-us yard has drip lines everywhere, but they’re not working properly, and I am not sure I have the energy to diagnose and fix the problem(s). Debating whether I’ll hire a pro to do the repairs. I can manage the system from there. Good luck!
Jeffg166
@mrmoshpotato: The day did make it pop more.
satby
@MomSense: @O. Felix Culpa: Ugh, after years of trying to regain control over my out of control back flower beds, I’m going to just dig up the remaining plants I want to save and smother what’s left. Part of next years rebuild will also include having to fix the buried sprinkler lines and I dread the thought.
O. Felix Culpa
@satby: Yeah, the buried lines are a great idea until they stop working. To quote the inimitable OH, blech.
MomSense
@O. Felix Culpa:
@satby:
I’m glad we can commiserate.
O. Felix Culpa
@MomSense: What else are blog-friends for? ;-)
WaterGirl
@MomSense: Fingers crossed for a happy gardening year for you this year.
StringOnAStick
Only a few more nights in the upper 30’s, then the warm season veggies can go out; we’ve had a long cool spring. The tomatoes have been out in Wall O Waters for two weeks, and I’ve been using the same to heat up the soil where the cucumbers and pole beans will go; the soil thermometer tells me this has been a worthwhile approach. It’s officially a 90 day growing season here so I’ve focused on season extension in the early months, gaining maybe 2-3 weeks.
We’ve had some terrific rain storms, and soon the high desert dry period will start. The native landscaping company planted the front yard this week; all natives and 3 serviceberry trees. My goal was a front yard that looks like a somewhat civilized version of the local Ponderosa forests, to go with our 80-100 year old single Ponderosa. I’ve had two neighbours ask if the sparsely planted grasses will spread to fill in; the answer is no, these are native bunchgrasses. It’s an adjustment for the true green chem lawn people to see a yard like this but it’s the future here; deserts require 3′ of water to maintain here but the annual precipitation is 15″ .