Spring paranoia

It may seem odd to admit to this, but every spring at around this time, I begin to wonder if my garden will completely fail to appear. Especially this year, when much of the beds are covered with a matted carpet of leaves and we really don’t know how much havoc was wreaked by the roofers when they cleaned up. I know they pulled a sweet autumn clematis out, chopped the mock orange to hell, and they scraped away a layer from almost every bed in order to make sure most of the nails and debris were gathered up.

At times like these, I begin to wonder what I could do if the garden really were gone beyond recovery. I guess there would need to be a major spending spree. I already have a lot of annuals and some perennials coming in from Select Seeds, Bluestone, and Plant Delights, as well as some bulbs from Brent and Becky’s. Then I could buy a lot of full-grown perennials from local nurseries, and tons of annuals as well. Vines would be more difficult. They do need a couple seasons to really mature, especially clematis. If the hydrangea doesn’t flower (in spite of Shrub Coat!), I could weave some trailing shade annuals through it. And then I could top it all off by buying a number of ready-planted containers, hanging and otherwise.


None of this would be very satisfying, though. And in my heart I know none of it will be needed—except maybe some kind of solution for the mock orange. The tulips can already be seen poking up and if the snowdrops managed to struggle up through the leaves, I imagine other bulbs and perennials will as well. Though I had better get those leaves off them. The cruelest month indeed.

(Shown above: the last of my forced bulbs and branches. The hippeastrum is in bud now, but I really think of that as a houseplant.)