Spring Is Finally Here

Came back from vacation with hope to see some green and a little more warmth than when we left, but didn’t expect the temperature to be just like the tropics where we vacationed.   It has been in the 70s in the last couple of days and the plants love it.  There wasn’t much of anything above ground when we left, but now everything is sprouting up all over the garden.  Garlic I put in last October has come up pretty nicely.  Hellebores perk up in the morning only to wilt a little under the afternoon sun.  Daffodils, Dutch Iris, Hyacinth and Hellebores are either blooming or just about to unfurl their petals.

I spent hours on my day off pruning and training the roses and haven’t finished yet.  This is a time consuming task as well as a time constraint.  If I don’t do it now when the roses are just starting to push out their little buds, it will be a lot harder to do when they have leafed out fully.  Deer have done a lot of damage to the tips of plants that came up early, including Irises.  Who said deer wont eat Iris?  But the worst damage to our garden is caused by squirrels that dig up the tulips bulbs, eat them and leave us the leaves to rub into our wounds.

Aside from the annoying squirrel problems, I’m glad to see color in the garden and the aerial show from our avian friends again.