Lily of the Valley (Convallaria majalis)

Photograph taken on Tuesday, May 01, 2018 by Henry
Lily of the Valley (Convallaria majalis)

Lily of the Valley (Convallaria majalis)

The lily of the valley (Convallaria majalis) is starting to bloom. This is a beautiful little plant and quite tough. It does take quite some time to get established and it’s fairly expensive to buy but it’s worth having. When we lived in our old house, we dug up a bunch (with permission) from a yard that was being bulldozed in order to widen a road. There were places it was growing up through asphalt. One thing about it, though, is that it seems to want to ‘move’ through the garden. That is, as it expands in one direction, it dies off where it was. So we have this mass of lily of the valley but as a unit, the whole mass is moving. In our case, it’s moving out into the yard and leaving an empty space behind. I’m not sure how to reverse that.

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‘Dragonflies’ Quilt by Dot

Photograph taken on Monday, April 30, 2018 by Henry
'Dragonflies' Quilt by Dot

‘Dragonflies’ Quilt by Dot

We had dinner at mom’s this evening. My cousin Becky and her boyfriend were there, as well, having come up for Jason’s wedding on Saturday. I took a bunch of pictures in the yard. The camellias are finishing up and the azaleas are just starting. I also took some pictures of Kai. But the picture for today is this quilt that my mom just made. It’s a pretty elaborate thing, with each segment on each wing being a separate piece of fabric. I also think the fabric she chose for the background is terrific, really showing off the dragonflies to good effect.

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Pieris japonica

Photograph taken on Sunday, April 29, 2018 by Henry
Pieris japonica

Pieris japonica

Yesterday I had a picture of relatively inconsequential flowers. Well, they are inconsequential to us because they aren’t all that pretty, but they are fairly consequential to the plants that have them. Also, they have a wonderful, sweet aroma. Today, we have leaves that are as pretty as (or prettier than) many flowers. They have no aroma, of course, but they are quite striking. This is a variety of Pieris japonica (Japanese andromeda), possibly ‘Mountain Fire’ or something similar. The new leaves are a bright red, visible from quite a distance against the glossy green of last years foliage. By the middle of summer these new leaves will have faded to green, as well, but for now, it’s a brilliant display.

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Holly Flowers

Photograph taken on Saturday, April 28, 2018 by Henry
Holly Flowers

Holly Flowers

We don’t normally think of hollies as being flowering tress but of course they are, as members of angiosperms (a.k.a. the magnoliophyta) they are flowering plants. Their flowers are not nearly as showy as their fruit, however, consisting of tiny, yellow flowers. Holly flowers are generally greenish white and as you can see in this picture, on this particular holly they are grouped along the stem in. They have four petals and this holly, like most species of Ilex is dioecious, meaning that there are separate male and female plants. This one is apparently male, as it has flowers each year but never has fruit.

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Shade Garden

Photograph taken on Friday, April 27, 2018 by Henry
Shade Garden

Shade Garden

In the shade under the dying cherry tree that I mentioned yesterday is a shade garden. There is Japanese spurge (Pachysandra terminalis). We’ve added a few things, including the sweet woodruff (a.k.a sweetscented bedstraw, Galium odoratum) and some bulbs including the grape hyacinths (Muscari armeniacum) seen on the right. There are also a few ferns of various types and I wouldn’t mind more of them. There are Spanish bluebells (Hyacinthoides hispanica) in the upper left that will be blooming in a little while and I’ll probably have pictures of them when the time comes.

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Cherry Blossoms

Photograph taken on Thursday, April 26, 2018 by Henry
Cherry Blossoms

Cherry Blossoms

Our second cherry tree is in full bloom. The two trees are different varieties and are quite different from each other. The first to bloom has small, single, pale pink flowers. This one, which blooms two to four weeks later, has large, frilly, double flowers of a much more vibrant pink. It’s also a healthy tree. The first to bloom is slowly dying. Each year, another branch goes. I’ve planted an apple tree not too far from the dying cherry and that will eventually will take its place. There is a second apple behind this cherry. They are ‘Goldrush’ and ‘Arkansas BLack’, the former a late-maturing yellow apple and the latter a dark red.

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Aquilegia (Columbine)

Photograph taken on Wednesday, April 25, 2018 by Henry
Aquilegia (Columbine)

Aquilegia (Columbine)

This is a little columbine (Aquilegia) plant that Dorothy potted up. It’s a very little thing but has two, beautiful blooms, one of which is shown here. Cathy moved it to the concrete bench outside our front door (which we call the stone table, with apologies to C. S. Lewis). So it greets us as we go out and welcomes us back when we go in. We have a few plants scattered around the yard but those in the ground are not blooming yet.

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Pukeberg Bookend Vase

Photograph taken on Tuesday, April 24, 2018 by Henry
Pukeberg Bookend Vase

Pukeberg Bookend Vase

This was, apparently, half of a pair of bookend vases, produced by Pukeberg, probably in the middle of the 20th century. Pukeberg was founded in 1871. In the 1930s, Pukeberg began producing decorative glass. We don’t really know a lot about it beyond that. We found a pair listed on eBay for $89, so they aren’t terribly valuable. I wanted to show off the various colors of the glass. In everyday room light it is basically amber colored. But I’ve shone a light through the glass and you can see reds at the bottom and greens towards the top. I think a more complicated light set up would do better but this was done with a flashlight sitting behind it and a flash bounced off the ceiling.

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Narcissus ‘Lemon Beauty’

Photograph taken on Monday, April 23, 2018 by Henry
Narcissus 'Lemon Beauty'

Narcissus ‘Lemon Beauty’

The daffodils are generally past their peak but there are a few that are still going strong. These pretty, mostly white daffodils, called ‘Lemon Beauty’ are later than some and still look quite good. I planted them in the fall of 2014 and they seem to have settled in well enough. They are on the western side of a bed that is around a nearly dead Colorado spruce (Picea pungens). I need to cut the tree down and replace it with something more ornamental (and what isn’t more ornamental then a mostly dead spruce?). But the daffodils can stay, of course. I bought these bulbs from John Scheepers. Their description of this variety, is:

Lemon Beauty is a rapturous 4″ Lefeber Papillion-type with a bright ivory-white perianth accented by a radiant, star shaped lemon-yellow heart. Narcissus Class: Split-Cup Papillon (Royal Horticultural Society Division 11). Bulb size: 14/16 cm. April. 16″. HZ: 4-8.

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Dryocopus pileatus (Pileated Woodpecker)

Photograph taken on Sunday, April 22, 2018 by Henry
Dryocopus pileatus (Pileated Woodpecker)

Dryocopus pileatus (Pileated Woodpecker)

It was a beautiful day and Cathy and decided to take a short walk in nearby Rock Creek Park. With her ankle problems we didn’t want to overdo it, so this seemed like a good way to get out, at least a little. Before we had even gotten as far as the bike trail that runs along the creek we spotted this piliated woodpecker (Dryocopus pileatus), who landed on a tree not too far from us. We also saw a few white-tail deer (Odocoileus virginianus) (White-tailed Deer), including one that was seriously not bothered by our presence. We saw a small flock of cedar waxwings (Bombycilla cedrorum). There was also a nice assortment of wildflowers including star chickweed (Stellaria pubera), a pretty, little, white, star-shaped flower.

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Silver Maple Leaves

Photograph taken on Saturday, April 21, 2018 by Henry
Silver Maple Leaves

Silver Maple Leaves

We spent the better part of the day on the deck at Cathy’s mom’s house today, going through boxes of papers. We found some interesting things, including Cathy’s first passport. There was a little bit of chaff among the grain, of course. The sun was out and shining on the newly opening leaves of a silver maple (Acer saccharinum) growing above the deck. They are a lovely orange color. Soon they will turn green, of course, but that’s just for the purpose of soaking up the sunlight. Come October they will return to orange in their lovely fall finery.

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Lilacs

Photograph taken on Friday, April 20, 2018 by Henry
Lilacs

Lilacs

Cathy grew up with parrots in the house. Her father’s family had one when he was young and after they moved back to the states in the 1960s, they had two for many years, Roscoe and Red Head. When Red died, Jim planted these lilacs in his honor and they continue to bloom, year after year. They are a bit leggy, at this point, and could do with a bit of pruning (and a bit more sun, truth be told) but they are still quite beautiful. The only lilac I have in my yard is one grown from seed that I got from The Seed Guild (no longer extant, I believe). It is doing well but has never bloomed. My memory is that it was called a Korean Lilac, but it doesn’t look like Syringa meyeri, which sometimes goes by that name. I’ll have to see if I can find my notes from many (many) years ago.

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Lake Frank and Clouds

Photograph taken on Thursday, April 19, 2018 by Henry
Lake Frank and Clouds

Lake Frank and Clouds

I stopped at the Avery Road parking lot above Lake Frank on the way home today. It was a beautiful, cool afternoon with—as you can see—billowy white clouds. This was taken with the sun at my back, looking northeast over the lake. I took a few the other direction, as well. This would be a good spot for sunset pictures, although it’s not somewhere you can just drive up to. It’s a few minutes walk down from the parking area. Still, if I am on my way home and there’s a good sunset coming on, it might be worth a try to get here in time. Of course, sunsets around the time I’m coming home are mostly a winter thing.

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Epimedium × rubrum (Bishop’s Hat)

Photograph taken on Wednesday, April 18, 2018 by Henry
Epimedium × rubrum (Bishop's Hat)

Epimedium × rubrum (Bishop’s Hat)

We planted a fair amount of Epimedium at our old house and had at least three different varieties with red, yellow, and white flowers. We only have a little here and all of it, unless I’m forgetting something, is the red Epimedium × rubrum, commonly called bishop’s hat) or red barrenwort, a cross between E. alpinum and E. grandiflorum. It’s easy to grow and the flowers are small but both lovely and borne prolifically and it’s certainly worth growing for the flowers alone. The leaves are quite nice, too, and even when not in bloom, it makes a handsome ground cover. In fact, we first saw it at the National Arboretum serving that purpose in a garden around a patio behind the gift shop.

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Flowering Almond

Photograph taken on Tuesday, April 17, 2018 by Henry
Flowering Almond

Flowering Almond

This little shrub seems to barely make it through each winter but then in late April, it surprises us with stems covered with beautiful, very double flowers of delicate pink. I don’t know that I’d go out of my way to find this plant for my garden if I didn’t already have it, but I’m certainly glad for it, since I already do. It isn’t spectacular and it isn’t large. On the other hand, it takes virtually no care. I just cut off the branches that have died from the previous year and it continues to do its thing. Who could ask for more?

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Rock Creek After a Rain

Photograph taken on Monday, April 16, 2018 by Henry
Rock Creek After a Rain

Rock Creek After a Rain

It rained quite hard over night and into this morning. When I got to work, the drainage pond next to my building was full to the overflow. It was a busy day, though, and I wasn’t able to get out and take any pictures. On the way home I stopped and walked a little by Rock Creek. It wasn’t as high as it would have been this morning but still quite swollen. Also, this is just downstream from Lakes Needwood and Frank, which act as a flow limiter to the stream below them. The stream, seen hear over a fallen tree, is usually about three feet lower than this, though, so it’s still quite high (for a little stream).

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Thalictrum thalictroides (Rue Anemone)

Photograph taken on Sunday, April 15, 2018 by Henry
Thalictrum thalictroides (Rue Anemone)

Thalictrum thalictroides (Rue Anemone)

After church Cathy said I should go into the woods because there were some wildflowers that I might like to photograph. There were, indeed. They are rue anemone (Thalictrum thalictroides), a native to eastern North America and a pretty little spring flower. As you might guess from the common name, the plant is quite similar to the meadow rue (in leaf form) and to the anemone (in flower form). It’s a pretty little woodland flower and would be a nice addition to a shade garden.

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Camellia japonica ‘Pink Perfection’

Photograph taken on Saturday, April 14, 2018 by Henry
Camellia japonica ‘Pink Perfection’

Camellia japonica ‘Pink Perfection’

Some things are worth waiting for. If they were not, we’d have a hard time planning for anything farther away than next week, I guess. Some things, like trees and to a lesser extent shrubs, take a while to be worth planting. In the spring of 2010, I planted a small Camellia japonica called ‘Pink Perfection’. It was small to begin with and struggled through the first couple years. I’ve lowered the pH of the soil around it, and that seems to have helped significantly. It bloomed a few times the first year but hasn’t bloomed since until now. Hopefully it is becoming well enough established that it will begin to grow and we’ll get more like this in the years to come.

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Another Daffodil

Photograph taken on Friday, April 13, 2018 by Henry
Another Daffodil

Another Daffodil

The is the other of my unknown daffodil varieties. Like the one pictured three days ago, these bulbs were given to me by a friend and I didn’t make note of the variety name. They were planted in the fall of 2006 and are doing quite well. This particular variety, unfortunately, has a bad habit of not always opening. Also, when they do, as they mostly did this year, if it rains the flowers are too heavy for the stalks and they all droop. But when they are open and upright, they are quite nice. I was happy we got to enjoy them at their best this year.

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Narcissus ‘Arkle’

Photograph taken on Thursday, April 12, 2018 by Henry
Narcissus ‘Arkle’

Narcissus ‘Arkle’

I hope you’re enjoying the spring flowers. I know some of my followers are in the south and your flowers started earlier and your daffodils may be finished by now. Others are to the north and the daffodils are only just getting started. The early dafs are done here but there are quite a few still in full bloom and one or two that are yet to come. This is a large, bright yellow daffodil called ‘Arkle’ that I planted in the fall of 2014. This being only their fourth year here, they are not as well established as the very similar ‘Marieke’ planted five years earlier. Still, they’re putting on quite a show.

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