Good morning, and the scent of spring is thick in the air. Welcome to Saturday Morning Garden Blogging.
We've had a very cool week for April here in Denver. The warmest official temperature out at the airport was 70° (76° in Denver proper), and lows have been mostly in the 30s.
We've also had a lot of cloud cover and periods of wind.
But, even better, along with the cloud cover, we've had intermittent rain.
Yes, rain. Not a lot. Only about a quarter of an inch spread out over 4 days.
But as dry as it's been here that quarter inch has felt like a monsoon.
Even better, the weather pattern is supposed to stick around for another week. Some sun, some dry days, with rain sprinkling in between.
A lot of trees and shrubs are coming into bloom, and it smells heavenly outside. My daphne is loaded with buds which have just begun to open.
Both the Korean lilac in the front, and the white lilac in the back are well budded but haven't started blooming yet. And the tree peony is really starting to take off — there are 3 big buds this year, several new branches, and a new shoot coming out of the root.
One of the things I accomplished this past week was planting the Incense passionflower out in my best little warm microclimate on the east side of the front steps. I'd had it planted in a different spot for several years where it managed to survive — but definitely not thrive. So last fall I dug it up and brought it inside for the winter to build up the size of its root ball. I'm hopeful that the little extra touch of warmth it will get next to the steps — where I had a tender datura survive for several years — will give it the little boost it needs to not just survive, but to thrive.
Finding the microclimates in your yard can be tricky, and often takes several years and just a touch of serendipity; I never expected that datura to survive, but it did show me the optimal, warmest spot in my front yard — southern exposure, near a porch footer which stores warmth, protected from the wind. The spring bulbs in that area also bloom a little bit earlier than in the rest of the yard.
The spot on the west side of the steps isn't quite as warm, I think because there's more wind exposure, and because there are trees to the west of our house which limit the amount of afternoon sun we get. The smallest change can greatly affect microclimates.
Moisture is another consideration. In the front yard, most of the plantings are xeric — but I can cheat and plant perennials or annuals that need more water near where they'll get run-off from planters and pots. Or you can group a few moisture-loving plants together and hand water them a couple of times a week. Even better — if you get "over water" from a neighbor's sprinklers (that happens on the west edge of our front beds), slip a dahlia or two along the edge and let the neighbor's water take care of your plants.
Which brings me to fuchsias — notoriously tempting hanging there in the nursery, and notorious for dying when you bring them home and hang them on the porch. The trick with fuchsias is they like to get a little bit of morning sun, and they demand high humidity. So if you want to make a fuchsia happy, put it near a water feature, or near a place where you're growing moisture-loving plants which will help keep the humidity high for your fuchsia.
So take a look around and find where plants are growing earlier in the spring or where annuals survive longer in the fall; in the winter notice where the snow melts fastest; find your microclimates, and expand what you'll be able to grow.
That's what's happening here. What's going on in your garden?