Gardening — Just a Gamble

White Quince

Trillium – Pusillum

John’s fancy electronic rain gauge/thermometer read 15 degrees this morning.  Wow!!  That was 10 degrees below the predicted reading.

We had lots of hydrangeas budding out and I can only imagine what they look like this morning.  Many of those bloom on old wood and we’ll probably have few, if any, blooms this year.  Last year was a wonderful year for the hydrangeas and we had oodles of blossoms.  Guess we shouldn’t expect success every year.

My good friend who is a professional photographer and I had planned for several days to get good pictures of the shade garden plants, but one thing after another came up and we kept putting it off.  Well, yesterday he came in the freezing weather and he and John rode the golf cart to “glory land.”  When I was there last week it was absolutely beautiful, but they found a few things already going out.

I am especially fond of the tiniest trillium — the pusillum. (It’s only about three inches tall at maturity). I have two varieties — one is Alabamensis and the other Virginianum.  The Virginia Bluebell was still pretty and the white flowering quince was really strutting its stuff.

There were oodles of Columbine plants up last week, but they come up from seed, so this weather probably means they’re gone for good.

Hellebores were still very showy and since they are cold weather plants, they are still in good shape, I’m sure.

I love riding over there in the golf cart and oohing and aahing, but this time I”ll dread going, but anxious to see what the damage has been.  This, too, is part of country living.