My final walks and plant moments of last year

If I were a better blogger (one who hadn't scheduled posts in advance and then paid no attention to the calendar) I would have published this post before the page turned and it was suddenly 2026. Instead we're looking back at a couple of walks and plant focused moments I had in the final days of last year.

First up a photo of my Helleborus foetidus in bloom and a few weather facts, cause I love talking about the weather. This was the warmest December ever at PDX, and 2025 was the 2nd warmest year on record, just behind 2015 (9 of the last 12 months were warmer than normal). We ended the month of December with 8.51″ of rain, which is about 3" above average for us. Half of 2025 was drier than average, and the other half was wetter. 

A few more tidbits: we ended 2025 with a total of 3" of snow (back in February), 35.72" of rain for the year, and an average temperature of ~57F (that includes day and night temps). We also saw 19 days at or above 90F. I wonder what 2026 will bring?

These opuntia fruit, just around the corner from me, are still ripening.

Yes hellebore bloom in the cold months but wowsa, they're ahead of themselves this year. This one (in a neighbor's front garden) is crazy happy.

Euphorbia amygdaloides var. robbiae at McMenamins Kennedy School (where the next 17 photos were taken).

Euphorbia rigida

The "parking lot desert garden," where the agaves are getting large!

Hydrangea quercifolia

With flowers.

I stop to photograph these Mahonia gracilipes every single time I walk by them. Every time!

Ditto for the Garrya elliptica, but only when it's tassels are this fetching. The rest of the year I don't even notice it.

Grevillea somesomebody...

And bam! The Edgeworthia chrysantha florets are opening. At home the hummingbirds have been working the not quite open flowers for awhile now. I wonder if they're getting anything?

I had to do a double take with those white blooms. When I first saw them from several feet away I thought Romneya coulteri, but I believe it's actually a Camellia of some sort.

With the warm temperatures in December our Tetrapanax papyrifer have gotten so close to blooming, a few around town are actually starting to open. I think a couple of these count as open blooms, although they were to high in the sky for me to get a good shot.

This was a fun find, a Podocarpus fruit, there were a few on the small tree.

Pulled back shot.

Eucalyptus and berries.

Hesperantha coccinea, blooming away at the end of December.

The second to last photo from Kennedy School, I think this might be an Agave americana? Maybe a hardier than average variety though, as this plant isn't widely thought to be hardy here.

I wanted to get a photo of this large Camellia in full flower but there was a guy standing in front of it smoking a cigarette and he had no interest in moving. He also didn't look like the sort that would take kindly to having his photo taken, so you get only a slice of the action.

This home landscape always has something interesting going on, the Echium wildpretii / Arctostaphylos combo was a good one. 

Another home with a super-spiky opuntia and (I think) a Choisya in bloom.

I tried and tried to get the catkins closest to me to be in focus but no.

Okay fine. But I wanted more of them in the background.

Back home now, my Arctostaphylos x 'Austin Griffiths' is in full flower...

Close up...

The coldest overnight of the season was Tuesday night's 29F. The forecast said 34 so I was surprised and hadn't done a thing to prep for a freeze, thankfully nothing seemed to be bothered by the brief cold.

Can you spot the bird on the palm frond? (upper middle of the photo) Birds have been all over the front and back gardens the last couple of days this one seemed to know I was trying to photograph it and posed for me.

I also stopped for some big-leaf Rhododendron appreciation (R. sinogrande).

Back out in the world, this shot wasn't from a walk but when I finally pulled over to photograph an agave I'd had my eye on. I think it's an Agave montana?

Great imprints...

This Agave parrasana started to throw up its bloom last summer but has paused for the winter months.

This sweet agave (NoID) was growing in front of a Pinus contorta 'Chief Joseph' I stopped to photograph. The lines on the leaves are an interesting feature.

New plants! I picked up a couple of new ferns in late December. This one a Dryopteris wallichiana...

And this which I purchased as Cyathea tomentosissima, aka Dwarf Wooly Tree Fern, but is probably actually Cyathea cooperi 'Highland Lace'.

Either way I love it.

I couple of blooming bromeliads in the basement garden wrap up this long and winding post.

The Bit at the End

We were here and there and everywhere in this post, so now I'm whisking you off to North Carolina and the secret tortured agave bench at Plant Delights Nursery. I'm drooling over their Agave x nigra ‘Sun Shark’.

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