Spring in New England is glorious this year and I’m finding myself spending every free moment fussing around the garden. I don’t have a big garden as I had in years past but time spent in this one matches the time spent in my larger gardens. I pinch, I plant, I weed, I transplant, and I visit with nature. The frogs are singing, the toads are hopping, bees are buzzing, and the birds are visiting. It seems easy to dismiss or put off all other jobs and tasks on my ‘to do’ list…. like blogging.
Bleeding hearts are still vivid spots of pink here and there in shady areas. The blooms below hover over a tiny moss and lichen covered pagoda that once graced my mother’s garden. I can’t think of a more natural way to honor and remember her than having some of her garden passed down to my garden… both plants and art.
This is the first year for my Purple Sensation allium, a bunch of ornamental onion plants, and it seems to be a great sensation indeed for the bees. My bees seem to prefer anything in the blooming onion family more than other flowers in the garden. That also goes for chives that are beginning to open and soon to open garlic chives.
The most stunning blooming plant in the yard right now is our doublefile viburnum (Viburnum plicatum var. tomentosum ‘Mariesii’). The layered horizontal branches are clustered with blooms in great profusion. Great white blooms like little soldiers are standing at attention in rows along the branches and it is breathtaking. Each flower is flat with large sterile flowers surrounding the center of smaller fertile flowers. This shrub was pruned to a horrible round ball before we bought the property and I’ve been working with it for a few years to help it regain its layered branch look. It has responded well and has grown to about 10′ in height.
Lots more going on around here in the garden and elsewhere… the noisiest of which is a small addition being added to the home, an office/gathering room that I’ve longed for since our move from Virginia. It’s happening and I can’t wait!
Your gardens look lovely. We have seen an abundance of pollinators this year which always makes a gardener smile. 🙂
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Our bumblebees are nesting somewhere else this summer. They visit but we don’t see as many as last summer when the nest was right here. Lots of honeybees though!
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That is one of the only viburnums that I like, but it is not grown here, or at most, is very rare. We have only the evergreen viburnums that naturalize into spots where I really do not want them. They are not so much fun.
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Yes, the doublefile is a beauty. I love many of the viburnums except maybe the leatherleaf.
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I dislike the Viburnum tinus so much that I would be hesitant to plant any viburnum, even though I like them in Oregon and Washington.
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Great shots, Annie! 🙂 We’ve had quite a few honey bees and bumblebees despite the extremely dry weather.
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I have to knock on wood because we have had the perfect amount of rain this spring. Everything is lush and the green is vibrant in the landscape.
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I have the same viburnum (in the suburbs outside of Boston) and it is not flowering at all! Have you had that experience at all? It looks healthy enough, but no blooms. Any idea why that may be?
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Oh wow. What a disappointment. My shrub has taken a lot of abuse and still performs each spring. Questions I might ask are: is it planted with enough sunlight? Mine is in full sun. Could it be receiving too much nitrogen from fertilizer or is lawn fertilizer leaching into the shrub’s root system? Could your plant be too young? It might take the root system some time to develop. I found a tiny offshoot a few years ago, replanted it, and it finally produced blooms this spring.
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It’s in full sun for about 6 hours a day, so I don’t think that it is. No lawn fertilizer either. We just planted it last year so maybe it’s taking some time to adjust! Hope so. Thanks for thinking it through with me.
Anyway, your gardens are so lovely – and I’m glad your all-white garden now has some color and brings you joy!
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