Glorious

It has broken – the cold, the ice, the snow, the dreadful winter. Sure, it’ll try one or two final attacks, but it is defeated with nowhere to go but retreat. I stepped out onto a black asphalt parking lot this morning and felt the heat rising from the macadam, the warmth enhancing the scents of diesel exhaust, gas stains, and dumped coffee – stifling in mid-summer but now oh-so preferable to the odorless dead cold of winter.
Even though winter didn’t truly begin until February, it was still more than I could bear. The short days were enjoyable up until that point – hellebores, quince, camellias, and witch hazels in full vibrant bloom. But then the evil freeze came and cut down all of the brave blooms, leaving the bright red quince flowers an unrevivable brown mush on the stems, scorching new leaves and blooms of hellebores, making it very difficult to prune around the damage for a salvageable display. The only thing that has been able to start from where it left off is the witch hazel.
But now joining the first wave of blooms come crocus, pulmonaias, and the unbelievably intoxicating Daphne odora, whose scent lies heavy along the front and side of the house. I could just pull up a chair and sit and smell that sucker for hours on end – it transports me to heaven. And so far it has proven to be contrary to its reputation and is a most easy-going shrub, stuck on the west side of the house on a thin strip of ground under an over-flowing rain gutter, delivering seven years of glorious spring perfume.
I would mark this past Saturday, March 10th, as the official start of the 2007 garden season. I started to clean up all that was left to stand through winter and to take inventory of what has survived and what has perished. So far it looks as though most of my “mid-Atlantic tropicals” have survived.
The needle palm, Rhapidophyllum hystrix, has gone through its 5th or 6th winter, unprotected on the south side of our house with no apparent damage and evidence of strong new palms about to unfurl. This is a simple and beautiful native of our south that seems to have no problem adapting to northern Baltimore when sited well.
And the desert plants seem to have all pulled through – Dasylirion texanum is another easy care native of our west that doesn’t seem to mind a mid-Atlantic relocation. After three years it has yet to show any sign of winter damage. It is sited on a well-draining hill enhanced with course sand and pebbles, but otherwise no protection. It becomes more beautiful and full each year against a backdrop of mixed salvia greggii.
The agaves – neomexicana and lophantha – have showed small signs of scorching but nothing serious. Even the lophantha baby side shoot seems to have pulled through and is ready for separation and transplanting to another sharp drainage hill.
And how did other zone defiant specimens fair? Gardenia “Chuck Hayes” sustained a few burned leaves, but it hasn’t been cut to the ground. I’m hoping it will do a repeat of last year’s display of delicious blooms.
I coppiced the Eucalyptus neglecta to the ground – it stood untouched until the mid-February deep freeze, after which its leaves became scorched and brittle, but the braches remained green. I wish I had left it untouched to see if it would generate new leaves straight from old, green wood, but I also fear that if left unchecked it would become a monster.
Also showing good green wood is the Punica granatum “State Fair,” a nice dwarf pomegranate. And the Camellia japonica “Greensborough” is lush and unblemished, heavily laden with buds waiting to burst open. I’ll have to wait to see about the Musa basjoo banana tree and Hedychium gingers, but they’ve been around for more than 5 years now and are almost invasive in their plot against our southern wall. So the endless digging, cutting, pruning, weeding, mulching – it begins. Gloriously. At last.