What is really going on in my garden? Not much! I am looking around and bulbs are poking through and my Early Sensation daffodils are blooming (almost two weeks now - I will certainly plant more of these next fall),, but my Tete-A-Tete daffodils are struggling to bloom.
I am beginning to feel disapointment that many of the bulbs I planted in the fall are not coming up and were probably taken by the squirrels before I could cover them with chicken wire. I am using a new product (in three different gardens) for me called Plantskydd for Critters. It is a granular, non toxic dried blood type material. They guarantee that it will work and also make a deer repellant. It is expensive, but if it works it will save many of the plants those little rabbits and squirrels (bulbs) feed on. This is a bummer, I am definitely going to win next fall!
I am going to begin feeding my evergreens, boxwood (boxwood take a general fertilizer not acid), shrubs and roses. I used to buy spikes, but I haven't been too happy with the results in the past few years, so this year I am going to do an organic granular. I have pruned all of my roses and cut down the perennials and the hydrangeas that grow on both old and new wood. My Endless Summer Hydrangeas look good this year requiring very little pruning. The Salome daffodils that surround these hydrangeas look good this year, just coming up through the mulch.
Bleeding Hearts have poked through, no hosta yet, daylilies up in the vegetable garden and elsewhere. There is no Astilbe, no Foxglove, Phlox poking through, no Coneflowers, some Clematis showing buds, no grasses showing any growth, some roses budding, Shasta Daisies lots of green leaves, Hyacinths and Tulips poking through, no ferns, Heuchera showing growth, no Astrantia showing, no Polygonium (Soleman's Seal) , no Peony buds, no - Why am I doing this? It is making me so depressed! I guess I will just have to wait like I do every year.
