I didn’t intend to start cleaning up the garden over the weekend. The thermometer never got over 40 and there is snow cover on about 40 percent of the garden. But on Sunday, after walk on the beach with the dogs (in which we saw two bald eagles fly just overhead, quite a rare sight here), the sun was warm and I thought it might be a good time to check on the status of the climbing rose I buried in fall.
The buried rose canes had nice buds and even a few shoots like this.
This bed didn’t get cleaned out because it was half covered in snow. And the greens are still frozen in the urn.
Three hours later I had unearthed the rose—laid on its side and buried to try to keep the canes from freezing out as they have in the past—and found fat buds (yay!), raked out a bed off the deck, cleaned up the chive hedge in the circle garden and even managed to get a little color on my face (pale Wisconsin skin hasn’t seen the sun in a looooong time). By the time the wind picked up off the lake to provide an uncomfortable chill I had accomplished a small amount of the many tasks that lie ahead for spring. But I may as well have finished the whole list for the amount of satisfaction I got from it.
Virgina bluebells pushing up in little purple nubs.
The buds on the magnolia tree are still very small.
That’s how it goes at this time of year thought. Mundane gardening tasks are joyful (well, most of them, anyway). Slowly you relearn how to get lost in the garden for hours at a time. You find fat buds on a climbing rose that you buried and you realize that the garden will come through another winter again.
Almost there.
After 2″ of snow on Monday, today has the promise of spring. Maybe 60 degrees, sunshine, hooray! Loved the Virginia bluebells shoots photo – ours look about the same. My journal from 2016 said the bluebells were starting to flower, but that was the year with 80’s in March! Hopefully the strong SW winds this week will bring some spring your way!
The only 2 things out in my neck of the woods (coastal MA) are the start of my peonies and the woodchuck. Yep, he/she’s already been spotted. OMG!
Haven’t done anything to clean out beds–just keep looking for signs of life. There are a few, but with 10″ of snow possible this Friday in our neck of the woods (N NE), I think I will wait a little longer…So hard to be patient, especially when we are at least 3 weeks behind last year. But spring WILL eventually arrive…
We are beginning the big warm up. It looks like 2 or 3 more nights of 30’s then I hope it will be smooth sailing from here into spring. My garden is ahead of yours. I have cleaned up as much as I can. I am ready to plant but it will be awhile yet. A short while.
Your rose looks perfectly happy. Good luck with clean up.
Mostly picking up twiggy debris and locust pods. But it makes such a huge mental difference. Pond is now fully open and I cut back a bunch of Epimedium foliage.