Friday, February 1, 2013

You guys!!! We made it, it’s February!


I am so excited! Yes I know, it’s technically still winter. But February is garden show month up here in the Pacific Northwest and it’s the last full month of winter, heck it might as well be spring!!! My garden hasn't suffered much winter damage and there are even signs of things starting to wake up. Let’s take a quick look around…

Having listened to Lisa I left my Melianthus major 'Antonow's Blue' alone last fall, just mulching the base. So far this looks to be paying off!

The first Hellebore flower! Helleborus x ballardiae Pink Frost.

The Echium wildpretii is a little worse for wear, a few nights in the mid (and perhaps low) 20's look to have singed it's leaves a bit. Still it's alive!

This is the first year I haven't wrapped my Musa Basjoo (against the house, behind the Schefflera). Once the leaves got zapped I just broke them over to provide a tiny bit of cover, so far so good. In fact a new leaf is pushing out of one of them!

Brown leaves, green leaves and tiny green nubbins of new growth on the Clematis tibetana var. vernayi.

I kind of forgot about this "should be hardy with good drainage" Mangave 'Macho Mocha' during my get ready-for-winter prep...it's got a couple of sad leaves but all in all it's still solid.

Finally, as I mentioned, it's officially garden show season and Portland’s Yard, Garden and Patio Show opens just one week from today! I am so looking forward to wandering the show floor…looking to the display gardens for ideas (or to ask myself "what were they thinking?"), being tempted by plants from our fabulous local nurseries and best of all listening to hours of inspiring free seminars (really and truly free, you don't even have to pay to get into the show to attend the seminars). The line up this year is excellent: Willi Galloway, Lucy Hardiman, Dan Heims, Dan Hinkley, Sean Hogan, Maurice Horn, Matthew Levesque, Ciscoe Morris, Debra Prinzing, Ritchie Steffen and Marty Wingate are just a few of the speakers, woohoo!

The display gardens (always a mixed bag) have potential to be really good this year. Remember the fabulous display I discovered at Bauman Farms last summer (here) well the designer responsible for that has got a whole garden to work with at the show...could be good! Kym Pokorny (from The Oregonian) did a nice write up about what to expect from the gardens, read that here. If you're local you really should check out the show. If you're not, well...plan to visit! (you've got a whole week to work out the details).

And just think...there are only 48 days until spring!

31 comments:

  1. Some day, not this year, maybe next, I'd like to get down to Portland for the show. I'm glad there are so many signs of life in your garden.

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    1. Glad you plan to someday come down. While our show is smaller than the Seattle show it is much more plant focused (lots of nurseries) with great speakers. You'd enjoy it, do plan to stay the weekend!

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  2. Your garden show sounds like a real garden show. Ours is more about window, siding, and roofing sales. I've only attended once.

    Can't wait to see your reviews of the show.

    The garden is coming through the winter very nicely, I'm always jealous of hellebores. They are beautiful.



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    1. Yep this one is a real garden show. There is one like yours but it's at a different location and I've never gone.

      I really should be better about planting hellebores. I love them but then forget them once things really get going!

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  3. Looking really nice for Feb. 1. So green. We have barely had any winter but things don't look even a ¼ as good. No rain. I just came n from the garden and am feeling a bit down. Thought I'd check out the gardens of others. Glad I chose yours.

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    1. I spent a couple of hours outside yesterday taking pictures for the blog and marking off sections of lawn for my proposed planting expansion. I wanted to do more, but then I started to get down and overwhelmed...wanting to start projects that I really shouldn't quite yet. We gardeners are a funny group aren't we? I so wish I could send rain you're way...

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  4. Your garden is looking good as it always does! The Portland YGPS show speakers sound really cool...One of these days I'll save some personal leave time for February and visit the Portland show! Only 3 weeks until the Seattle Show! I remember going to the NFGS some years and thinking that it was the middle of winter (remember the year you drove up in the snow?) but something in the air this year is making me think that it's spring.

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    1. Yep... you too! You should come down to the Portland show someday!

      YES! Just 3 weeks to Seattle...you know how excited I am about that. Can't wait. I totally remember the snow and ice experience, I was seriously questioning my sanity that day. Then there was the time I got to fly up (long story) on an almost private airplane. But we couldn't land at Boeing field because it was fogged in so we circled the San Juans for about an hour. I had to pee so bad and the airplane was too small to have a bathroom but it was so beautiful and completely worth the "pain"...

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  5. I think I shrieked as I woke up today! January is over!!!!!!!! Yay!!!!!! Your garden looks fabo!!! I wish I didn't cut back my bananas this year. And I even lifted my melianthus (but it was going to move in the springtime anyways so it's not too much of a bother). I'm sooo glad hour schism is still kicking. I think is going to be an incredible season!! Yay for garden shows. If I can get the time off or convince the powers that be I might try and head down to the northwest garden show... Fingers crossed.

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    1. I hope your first day of Feb was as nice as ours. I've been fixing dinner with the kitchen door open and sun flooding in...heaven. Seriously wonderful.

      You know they've got the whole thing down as far as you buying plants at the NWFG Show and then taking them back to Canada, all the inspections happen right there with paperwork. You totally should come down. The Outlaw, Alison and I are meeting up for lunch one day. Email me! spikyplants at gmail dot com...(I seem to have lost your email again).

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    2. That would be soo fun!!! I hope I'm able to get the time off for that. And for real, the inspections right at the show!? That sounds like a dream!

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  6. Please do not post any garden show photos. I don't think I can take it, when compared to the St. Louis garden show displays. :P

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    1. You'll just have to close your eyes and vow to come out here next year!

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  7. February! Blue Sky! Let's all celebrate!

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    1. ricki you know it, what a beautiful day!

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  8. If I skipped the Fling, which I still haven't registered for, I'd head to Portland next week. Can't do it all, dammit. And do those hardy scheffleras ever take a bad photo? Seriously, that's what it looks like end of January!?

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    1. Yes ma'm! The only time it looks bad is on a sub-freezing morning. Like all the Aralias in my garden it loves to do a wicked witch impersonation when it's cold (I'm melting!!!!) but then it warms up and is happy again. Why aren't these more widely available??? Yep I'm gonna ask Mr Hinkley what's up with that next week when he's here.

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  9. The long period of darkenss is over! I had to congratulate myself this morning for pulling through another January - the month that feels like two. So glad you didn't cut the Melianthus this year. Mine is still standing tall and was not phased by winter at all. I'm sure you will have blooms this year.

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    1. We should have planned a party! Next year...for sure! My Melianthus got a little floppy with the cold rain but nothing a bit of string and a stake can't fix. I'm so excited to see what they do this year!

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  10. Yay! January finished now and spring feels much nearer! And yay for garden shows too, same here, the show season officially opens this month.

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    1. So glad to hear you get to pretend it's spring too! I'm so excited...

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  11. Spring is in the air. Daytime highs are in the 60s now. Still, our garden looks like cr*p. Hello, plants, get growing already!!!

    A new record: I managed to survive January without visiting a single nursery!

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    1. No nursery visits??? Well that just means you get to go crazy in February!

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  12. Even though February is very much still winter here, I use the meteorological system to define seasons so in my world spring begins March 1st! No matter what system you use, we are definitely in the home stretch.

    Hartford has a garden show in February too. Every year I attend but it's definitely not of the caliber of what you're used to. The gold standard in the northeast is Philly.

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    1. I like the way you think Sue (spring begins March 1), I might need to adopt this system! Although I think I'd have to tailor it for Portland (like for instance summer doesn't start here until July).

      Have you been to the Philly show?

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  13. I have the SF show in March to look forward to, but this month I have to go to Florida on business, so I'm going to sneak away and do a bit of hort-tourism. I'm hoping our nights in the 20's are over here.

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    1. Ah yes the SF show! Since I won't be there this year I'm counting on folks like you to report for me...

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  14. It's exciting! I love that we (gardeners) have always got things to look forward to: tests, new plants, experiments, even just plans getting bigger. I'm psyched!

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    1. Yesterday was sunny and 55 degrees...lovely! We gardeners are lucky folk.

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  15. So glad to hear you did not have too much damage during our cold spell. I was thinking of you and all your spikes! :) I'm looking forward to the YGP show as well! Spring is truly around the corner, hooray! Cheers, Jenni

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    1. I wonder if I'd recognize you if we ran into each other at the YG&P Show?

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