Garden Report: January 28

This is the time of year when my East coast and Midwestern friends insist it's spring here. Of course, it's not spring; we're still weeks away from getting enough sun for that to be the case. But they say that because the soil is warm enough here that the flowers that herald spring in freezing climates start coming up.

This year we have a kind of funny set of sprouts, because when I widened the path last year, some bulbs stayed behind.

This allium, for example. Just outside the path markers.

And more amusingly, these crocus, who trace the old location of the path edge. Am I going to dig them up and move them? No. It's OK with me if flowers grow on the pathway itself, as long as they are flowers I'm OK with running over with a laden wheelbarrow. On second thought, I might try to find and move the allium, though those guys can dig themselves quite a ways into the soil.

Another lovely spring bloomer that came a little early this year -- it's been extra-warm here the last week or so -- is the flowering quince. It's a great source of nectar for those warm days when the bees are flying, and in the last week, when we had record high temperatures (nearly 70F one day), it's had lots of little visitors. My efforts to plant year-round nectar sources have paid off.

In the meantime, I've been pruning. I pruned much of the orchard, the magnolia tree out front, and this week I've been working my way through the rose hedge in preparation for building a retaining wall out front. As I go, I've been spraying the trees that need it with sulfur for peach leaf curl.

On the actual house front, we're waiting for the city to approve our permits for the constellation of work surrounding our foundation project -- none of which is the foundation itself, of course. Those should be ready by Wednesday next week, at which point I will have no excuse for not getting to work on that project.

posted by ayse on 01/28/11