A Grower Perspective

The weather has been strange this year, to say the least.  Today's weather was no exception.  It's almost May.  We've just had some gorgeous warm spring weather.  And yet today, hail.  A crazy few moments of hail.  It was so loud on our metal roof that sitting in my office upstairs, I felt briefly that I was sitting within a snare drum.  Thankfully it didn't last long and there was no damage.  But it leaves you wondering, when it comes to weather, what in the world is next?

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Today is the 28th of April, midway through an unpredictable month of spring coming and then reverting back to winter. We actually had hail today. At the nursery we are creating a crazy quilt of wonder. The quilt is what we call GroundWorks. GroundWorks is front and center in the nursery, it is the ‘see what we have' spot, the place where gardeners and landscapers can walk around and play pick. It is part of my job to create it but the more I try to do it the more it seems like it is a place of everyone's input and creation. We line the aisles with flowering trees, we stitch in smaller evergreens, we patch together the grasses and daylilies. What won't fit here will be lovely there and so on. It sounds like a mess but it carefully and naturally comes together and looks unbelievable. String is laid out so every plant is placed in a very orderly way. As we sell plants others must fill in and it doesn't always go in a planned way.  That's what makes it crazy and unpredictable and gorgeous, especially looking out the second story window. A lot of flexibility is required laying out plants, some give and take between the ‘designers', and an observation of what is ‘looking good'. Come look, all the Rhodendrons are just starting to bloom now and soon we will be glowing in living color.

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For those of you who only shop nurseries in the spring, you are short-changing yourself. It is really ideal to visit nurseries several times throughout the year. If you make an annual pilgrimage in spring, you are only seeing the things that bloom or look their best at that time. If you don't shop nurseries in, say March, you might miss the beautiful blooms of Pieris. The same goes if you don't shop nurseries in June, July or August. Miss this summer window and you miss the color offered by Cistus, Crocosmia, daylilies and Rudbekia. And the list goes on.

Another thought - visiting a nursery like ours (Pleasant Hill Nursery) or any other commercial grower-type nursery in late spring may seem

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There are so many wonderful tree varieties - most with interesting attributes that make them worthy of planting. I certainly have my favorite trees but the Mount Fuji Cherry (Prunus serrulata ‘Mt. Fuji’) tops my list.

A very dear friend and former employer of mine, Rhoda Lomsky, had a mature Mt. Fuji cherry tree in her landscape and it was there that I first noticed what a gorgeous tree it was. Her tree, with its thick and somewhat gnarled truck and tree structure, seemed majestic and somehow wise. It was in full magnificent bloom, covered in delicate white flowers that looked so soft and pure next to the aged trunk. With the ground covered in white petals that had begun to fall, it gave the appearance of snow surrounding the tree on a warm spring day.

Not long after my discovery of this tree, I planted one in our own landscape. It was a little whip of a tree, not much to see in the beginning. My thoughts turned to other things in a busy life over the span

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Yesterday I noticed the first wild plum trees in bloom along the east side of the property where the creek flows. It is all so very leafless over there; conifers border the sky and below them grow the lichen covered bare trees. Yet now there is the pale white of the plum trees. Hurray for spring! Also, I filled out my first basketball bracket yesterday and to date I'm 10 and 16, so there you go. It's a six dollar pot and I'm not likely to win but we are having such fun doing it. And yes, today is the first day of spring.

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