My husba nd was sick for 4 years before he passed away in 2016 so we didn't do much in the way of house maintenance. Our energies were focused on him. ZOur eaves-troughs leaked like a sieve. The only benefit was plants around the house got watered. :Last year I had the eaves-troughs changed, got busy and didn't tend my plants as I should have. No excuse just facts.

I had a Hosta in my shady front flower bed. It came from a friend so I don't know the variety. It was a smaller plant with smaller leaves in white with a green border. All in all a lovely Hosta that gave a nice background to my impatiens. Through all that drought it persevered but when I did get around to checking things it was eaten to the nubs by either slugs or earwigs. I thought for sure it would never make it through the winter.

The other day I decided to move that bed out where it would catch the rain and mulch the back so I dug out the grass and edged it. As I was scraping the good soil down into the new bed I came across a clump and wondered what it was. I looked closely and there were 4 or 5 sprouts on each end of the clump but the center was dead. My word one of my Hostas I exclaimed and it's alive! I broke off the ends and planted them with plenty of water and a bit of fertilizer. I couldn't believe any plant could survive the winter and a dry spring and all the abuse it got last year but this Hosta did.