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I just wrote a post about trees for my main blog The Transplantable Rose, so I decided to do a Garden Bloggers Bloom Day list for the Addendum. The weather has been colder than usual here. It's no big deal compared to the deep cold and deep snows in other parts of the USA, but it's cold for the plants that grow here in Austin.
Plants that were in bloom a year ago are brown sticks now - I hope some of them will come back from the roots but know there will be blank spaces in the borders this spring!
Here are my best tries at the slippery botanical names for what is in bloom now. Everything on this list was observed in bloom or bud on February 14th.
*Buxus unknown species/Boxwood. There are buds ready to open on two boxwoods in the back yard
*Camellia japonica 'Pius IX', rose-red camellia - some freeze damage but quite a few flowers this year.
*Camellia sasanqua 'Shishi Gashira' / a Rose Pink Camellia that bloomed weeks ago, but a few faded flowers are still hanging on to the interior
*Citrus x meyeri, Meyer's Improved Lemon in container - many flowers and buds in the breakfast room
*Gelsemium sempervirens , Carolina Jessamine, a native, evergreen vine covered in buds just starting to show yellow color
*Hyacinth 'Woodstock'/ purple fragrant hyacinth 3 small flowers near the patio arch
*Ilex cornuta Chinese holly - buds showing on one tree-form holly
*Lobularia maritima, sweet alyssum, in a hanging basket
*Loropetalum chinense/ Chinese Witch Hazel, Chinese Fringe Flower - the taller plant began opening more flowers after an earlier crop of blooms was frozen
*Mahonia, species unsure, probably M. beali, A Grape holly blooming in a front container. A bee flew away before I could snap the photo
*Narcissus tazetta ‘Grand Primo/ small daffodil, highly recommended for Austin area by Scott Ogden. This one is blooming near the front steps; another clump near the back fence is showing bud stalks.
*Narcissus ?, an unnamed yellow daffodil that came with the house. The bulbs were dug up and replanted in different places as the garden grew and changed. In the photo below, some are blooming in a back border. More bulbs of this daffodil are blooming in the front parkway.
*Osmanthus fragrans/Sweet olive AKA Tea olive. I have four of them and two are opening buds right now.
*Pelargonium hybrid, 'Fantasia Salmon', zonal geranium in breakfast room window a few florets
*Phlox subulata/Creeping phlox in lavender blue - one solitary flower under the big pecan
*Rosemarinus officianalis, upright Rosemary in a hypertufa container, with a sprinkling of small white flowers
*Rosmarinus 'Huntington Carpet' dwarf groundcover Rosemary - 1 plant in parkway covered in blue flowers
*Rosmarinus officinalis 'Prostratus' - Prostrate Rosemary with many pale blue flowers in a hypertufa trough
*Tecoma capensis Cape honeysuckle, in a big pot. This is a tender perennial brought inside for winter. The garage windows let in some light so it has opened a couple of flowers in the garage
*Tetraneuris scaposa, Four nerve Daisy AKA Hymenoxys, a few flowers on plants in two different beds. Plants in patio bed do not look good.
*Viola something or other– unnamed annual hybrids of Pansies in containers and hanging veranda baskets .
The basket of pansies embodies my ambivalent feelings when it comes to losing plants to harsh weather. On the one hand, I really liked the Asparagus ferns that grew in the baskets hanging along the veranda. They'd made it through a couple of winters and grown enormous.
On the other hand, when an evergreen plant lives for years and years, things can get boring.
There were no tears when it was time to say Goodbye, Fern! Hello, Pansy!
To see what other gardeners have written about what's blooming today, go to the Garden Blogger Bloom Day post by Carol of May Dreams Garden.
This post, GBBD LIST for February, 2014, was written by Annie in Austin for her Annie's Addendum blog.
