Life in Winter

It's not entirely true that winter gardens have been put to rest. at least not in the milder zones of the Bay Area. And especially not when one considers that evergreen shrubs and cacti or succulents can be just as beautiful in winter as flowers are in spring or summer. Beauty is of course always in the eye of the beholder. Here is a sampling of winter interest in my garden in mid-January, sampling from all corners of the horticultural palette.

Christmas cactus offers brightly colored flowers in winter, whether indoors or outdoors. This is the first flower on this specimen that was started from a cutting. Vivid!

Camellias are a great way to bring color into a mid to late winter garden. Here's my Camellia japonica 'Silver Waves.' Huge pure white flowers and yellow bosses make a great combo.

Though it isn't colorful right now, my front yard walkway bed is filling up with bulb shoots. There's tons of Dutch iris, Ipheions, Freesias and Sparaxis all up. The freesias are only weeks from blooming.

Winter is also the 'promise of spring.' Here is my Leucospermum 'Veldfire' filling up with fuzzy flower buds, the first of which will open in mid-February.

Median strips need not be wastelands. Here I have a Smoke bush as the central plant, plus a dwarf bottlebrush tree, Bouvardia and dwarf African honey bushes, and a host of perennials in pots, many with bulbs within.

Though not done intentionally, this 'difficult' area under a fir tree is now being populated with dwarf conifers in pots, as well as newly potted bromeliads.

I just noticed that my Aloe striata has the beginning of  a flower spike nestled in its center. It's beautiful in its own right but the orange flowers will provide lots of nectar for attentive hummingbirds.

Here's a shot of my planted dwarf conifer bed. It has matured into a densely planted bed, from what once were tiny specimens in a somewhat bare bed 8 years ago.

Aloe plicatilis. I never did find a home in the ground for this fan aloe so it's stayed in a 5 gallon pot. It's tripled in size in just 4 years.

Art is a nice part of the garden in any season but I appreciate it just a little more in winter. Here's my metal sundial, resting against the wrought iron railing of the front house.

This curious plant is a Dodonea sinuolata (the shrub on the right). Very different from the more instantly recognizable purple hopbush, this species eventually forms a mass of little red 'wings' (seen here) that are its seedpods or fruit. Their miniature size but proliferation gives the shrub a most curious look.

Rhipsalis variety. I love Rhipsalis for the tangled collection of multi-branching segments. 

Begonia acetosa. Here's the underside of my favorite Begonia of 2019. Large broad leaves are a vivid burgundy-red underneath, though that pleasure is normally hidden from sight.

My Daphne odora marginata is just now opening its first flowers. Famous for providing both winter color and that intoxicating fragrance, daphnes come in a variety of forms and even flower color.

Last week I took a somewhat hazy photo of my Camellia Frank Hauser. Here's a close-up of the flower, to show what all the fuss is about.

Impatiens apiculata. Though yet to bloom, this newly added Impatienns is growing quickly and filling out. It will eventually produce lovely 2-lipped orchid pink flowers.

Winter is also the bloom time for many Hellebores. Here's my H. argutifolius Pacific Frost. It has the signature green flowers of this species but here the leaves are speckled with white.

Bulbs native to South Africa, such as this Lachenalia aloides 'Orange,' are usually the first to bloom and Lachenalias as a group are often up first.  They offer up a range of colors in their tubular flowers, as well as many sporting spotted leaves or flower stems.

This photo isn't an attempt to capture the Hebe that takes up most of the photo but rather the tiny blue flowers of Salvia bullulata that are dangling in front. Robins-egg blue flowers aren't common and the petite tubular flowers add to this plant's charm.

Last week's entry was on bromeliads and here is one of them - Aechmea correia-araujoi. Its feature are the dark horizontal bands that decorate the undersides of the leaves.

My Helleborus Tutu didn't bloom for several years but made up for it this year by being the first of the japonicas to bloom.

Even bulbs sometimes have interesting foliage and that's certainly true for Babianas. The several clumps here show the signature 'pleated' leaves that make them instantly recognizable.

Many would not recognize this guy and if I said it was a jasmine that doesn't easily bloom you'd be forgiven for not seeing it as a jasmine. It's Trachelospermum asiaticum and it does indeed feature tri-color leaves (yellow, green and pink). VERY slow growing but makes a nice mat forming ground cover aver time.

Cyclamen variety. Nothing says winter color for shade like cyclamen. Lovely!