I'm coming to the party a little late here. This is my first time to participate in Pam of Digging's Foliage Follow-up, and I'm even posting on the wrong day. But I'm definitely feeling "better late than never." I was having a very bad day today until I decided to take a look around the garden to check for progress among the leaves.
For Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day I posted, among other things, photos of two types of azaleas that have begun to bloom. The one other type we have in our garden, Formosa, hasn't started to bloom yet, but at least one of our Formosa plants is putting out new leaves already!
Our azaleas weren't damaged by this particularly rough winter, nor was our gardenia. It's putting out new leaves also.
Other plants experienced freeze for the first time and took it pretty hard. Many are just now letting me know they lived through it.
How subtle is the green of the new hydrangea leaf buds. They could easily be confused for flower buds, like those on our "Forest Pansy" redbud, which are starting to loosen up in this week's sunshine.
Elsewhere, agapanthuses are emerging from their dens:
And pineapple sage is proving its survival skills.
Old-timers more accustomed to spring returns, like spirea, refuse to be outdone by winter novices like sage.
Most delightful of all for me though was to see great use made of shed leaves from last season. A pair of Carolina wrens have been carefully selecting weathered leaves for their nest in our new birdhouse.
It's not a simple matter to get the leaves into the gourd, but they're dedicated workers; I expect great things from them.
While I was out this afternoon looking at foliage I also caught glimpses of these fairly infrequent visitors:
A downy woodpecker.
And tufted titmouse.
Thank you, Pam!
Thank YOU! I so enjoyed all of your pictures, especially the wren using decayed leaves for her nest. I would love to see my pineapple sage returning as yours is. Fingers crossed.
Posted by: Pam/Digging | February 17, 2010 at 07:42 PM