Is this winter? I mean, this weather is as far from winter as it can get. Yes, there has been cold days. Yes, there HAS been some snow. But most of the time the temperature is above zero centigrades and it is raining, raining, raining. When you got into the garden and step on the ground it feels like stepping on some spongy material. The ground is SO wet. All these pictures were shot yesterday on December 30th.
The garden is ugly this time of the year. BUT you already see traces of what will come in spring. It is a long time until then though.
The giant verbena is still alive even though it is not blooming. I see the beginnings of next years digitalis in several places.
The flowerbeds are really ugly and everything is withering even though some plants still stand.
This plant above plant, Ajuga Reptans, is beautiful also in winter with there dark lilac leaves. There was some frost on them when I shot this picture.
The alumroots look fine also at the end of December. Less colorful, but still alive.
We have four different alumroots, each a different color. The above ones are a little bit flatted by frost and the earlier snow, but otherwise looking fine for winter.
Next years digitalis have come up in several places.Their leaves are really big. Just hoping they will get flowers in the summer.
The giant poppy did not bloom last year. I hope it will bloom the coming year. It was bought as a ready plant, not sown by seed.
The flowerbed by the parking looks terrible… But there are traces of plants to come.
The blackberry bushes have large buds for next years leaves.
The astilbeflowers from last year have an interesting color…
These are the raspberry-bushes in winter. We got almost no raspberries last summer. Hoping for more the coming summer.
In one of the flowerbeds I yesterday found this round, white thing. What it is? Probably a flowerbulb of some kind that somehow has escaped the earth… I covered it with new soil today to protect it. Size approximately 5 cms in diameter.
By the birdfeeder the vegetation is just unordered…
The climbing hortensia at the backside of my patio is all naked in winter. It has large buds though for next years leaves, and, hopefully, more flowers the coming year. This year it had three flowers.
The snow remaining from the latest snowfall a couple of weeks ago, is dirty, but frozen and filled with sand. It will probably stay like that until some time in April… This where the snowplows leave the snow they have removed from the parking. Other parts of Sweden has got a lot of snow this year. But here, just outside Stockholm, very little.
The rhubarb-box has no rhubarbs that you can see during winter. But they are there… It also houses my neighbours carnations over winter plus her thyme and oregano.
The sedum telephium are still standing, but look awful. The little snow we had destroyed them.
I found some pansies in bloom. Are they supposed to bloom at the end of December?
This is how the flowerbeds at the entrance to the patio from the garden look like in winter (when there is no snow). Not particularly inspiring…
But, if you look closely, there are green leaves and and plants coming up here.
The yellow honeysuckle has green leaves where I cut it. Not only here (picture) but on several other places as well.
The beach roses in the backgarden really look tired. As they should in winter. No leaves, just molten fruits. In spring I will cut down the bushes to about 20 cms heights. Or dig them up and remove them…
These treestumps normally stand in the garden with flowerpots on them. Over winter I keep them on the patio. They are getting old. Nature changes them. On one of them moss has started to grow…
There are more things alive in the garden at the end of December than one might think. Here are some examples.
I actually prefer so called green winters to winters with lots of snow and really cold weather. But for the garden, snow is better. It protects what grows there. There might still come snow… But not in 2017…
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