My Buck roses are my babies and they all are showing green growth.
Another prize of mine is my Bluelight Clematis. It's coming along nicely.

Shelley

I'm thrilled and relieved when anything and everything shows up after our crappy winters..lol..One thing I was waiting and hoping for was my Summerwine daylily..it made it through with flying colours. I have tried a couple times with Strawberry Candy daylilies only to have them send up a weak puny set of leaves the next spring and expire so I didnt have much hope for the Blackberry Candy one DH picked out last year..well its up and growing really well..another yippee..savona

This spring I was interested in if my newly planted valiant grape survived. While I read it was one of the hardiest grapes and didn't need mulching, I debated on removing it from the trellis and laying it on the ground so that it could benefit from insulating snowcover.

But, I thought, if I did that I may never know how hardy it is in my particular spot and I might cautiously do it every year. So, I left it on the trellis thinking the worst that can happen is it might winter kill to the ground. It ended up coming through winter fine, maybe 8 inches of tip kill, but otherwise the vine is leafing out.

Glen

Just HAD to bounce in here. Don't post too often as I mainly grow only lilies and iris.

Had to really boast that I forgot to bring in a Louisiana iris last year and ..... It is growing like mad. Can't wait till it bloom to see what it is. Probably Black Gamecock or another Chowning. Very tough, thats for sure.

Another thing is that my Lucifer crocrosmia are all coming up too. Didn't dig them up last fall as wanted to see what happened. They all survived. Global warming???

Shelmerdine's have some japanese maples. Think I'll try one this year. Glen manages to have his survive so ......

Inanda - off to plant tons of iris for rest of the day.

Inanda in Winnipeg.

Great to know about the crocosmia, Inanda. I just put some in this spring in a west facing bed against the house. I was planning on leaving them in the fall, too, to see if they come back. Gives me hope that they really might be back next spring.

Shauna

Wow, that's great to hear about your Louisiana Iris and Crocs.

I bought some Lucifers and will try some in the ground too.

Did you watch the news last night about gardeners enjoying the global warming on some plants. (see the link below).

I've been holding off posting to this thread, still waiting to see any signs of life with my $$$ Pink Lady Slippers, I'm still praying and crossing my fingers ;)

Sharon

Here is a link that might be useful: Garden Zones

When I was cleaning up my garden this spring, I saw some green leaves where my rosemary was. I plopped the clump of green leaves and roots in to a pot, and sure enough, I have a growing rosemary bush! Take that zone 6 and 7!

Mcavoy, that's amazing. I think you win the prize! LOL
Inanda, good luck with the Japanese Maple. That's one plant I can only dream of growing.

Sharon, any sign of your pink lady slippers yet?

Mcavoy, that's fantastic to over-winter rosemary! Hmmm, may have to give that a try and see.

My Japanese maple still has no signs of life, so I think it's a goner.:( But the smoke bush is coming back for it's sixth year, foxtail lilies have multiplied like crazy, and both of my tree peonies have flower buds, so things are looking up. That is, except for the -6C they're forecasting for saturday night......hope that'll change.

Nope, no signs of the pink slipper, what a shame because I paid a pretty penny for it.

Same with my foxtail lilies that I planted last fall, I see nut&honey ;(

Sharon

Laurie am very interested in how your smoke bush is doing. Do you have any pics?

Inandal am amazed you have live Crocrosmia. I have never bought them cause I didn't want to haul in and out each year. Maybe I'll give them a try.

Also curious how Glen's Japanese Maple made out this year.

Wonder how much Shelmerdine is charging for their Jap. Maple, anyone know?

Thanks Mona

Sharon, my yellow lady slippers are only an inch or two tall now. Maybe yours have the good sense to keep hidden until all this crappy weather is over with! My foxtail lilies are planted right up against the south foundation of the house. I counted 7 flower stalks, and they're about 18" tall now. The foliage starts coming out at the same time as the daffodils are sprouting and they look a lot alike(mine are side by side)so until the flower stalks come up, I can't tell them from daffs. Did you have yours in a very well drained spot? I've heard too much moisture is lethal to them.

Mona, I'll have to go looking to see if I have a pic of the smoke bush from last year. The leaves are really tiny right now, and I doubt they'd show up much in a picture. I usually have to cut off the top 12"-18" of branches from dieback in the spring. But it usually gets to about 4' tall by mid summer. I doubt that I'll ever see any "smoke" plumes on it, because it only blooms on old wood, but with climate change, maybe that'll change too. The purple round leaves are very interesting anyway, even without the plumes. Btw, the Japanese maple that I had over-wintered for 2 years, I got at Patmore's in Brandon for $12. For that kind of money, it was a fairly cheap experiment.;^) I've now got a Black Lace elder instead, and I'm hoping that it'll be hardier......so far so good!

Hi there,

I don't have black lace elder but have sambucus nigra 'aureomarginata'. It always survives but dies back pretty well to a foot within the ground and grows to about 2 feet high in summer.

Another plant that closely resembles a (green) Japanese maple is Korean maple, acer pseudosieboldianum. Apparently though they are 'hit and miss', some people report winter damage in zone 4, others successfully grow them in zone 3. Mine has grown well in my sheltered city yard.

Regarding my Japanese maples I originally got mine at Schriemers in a one gallon pot for $25. This year I changed my winter protection method. Previously I surrounded them with a cardboard box and filled in around the plant with mulch. That was too messy and time consuming.

This year I mulched the root zone with peat moss, wrapped the tree with quilt batting and placed a sturdy type plastic garbage can over it. When it snowed I briefly removed the garbage can to mound some snow around the tree (maybe a foot high), covered it back up and mounded more snow up the sides of the garbage can.

It came through winter with some tip kill and I had to trim it a bit to get the garbage can over it. Plus, mine's in a sheltered spot 3 feet from the north house foundation.

Interesting to hear about smokebush. I bought a bareroot one cheap last summer and have it growing in a pot. It pretty well winterkilled to the base but was in a spot with little snowcover.

Regards,
Glen

Glen, I had tried a Korean maple one summer, but it never made it through the first winter.:( Your elder only gets to 2 feet tall? I was hoping that the Black Lace would get to at least 4 feet. It's about a foot tall right now, so time will tell I guess. For my Japanese maple, I had put a chicken wire cage around it and then filled with leaves. It worked for 2 winters, but I think last fall when we had really cold temps with no snow, did it in. I always shovelled extra snow on top of it too, but if there's no snow what can you do.

For my smokebush, it's on the south side of the house, and it does get all the snow shovelled from the deck on top of it, so I'm sure that helps it too. There's new growth coming from about 2' and down along the branches, so it's got a good start this year.