Lovely white hellebore. Looks as if you're about 8 weeks behind us here. I'd find it hard to wait so long for signs of spring.

Regarding your shrubs. Did you water them during winter? I believe the unknown one is a hydrangea. And I'd leave the holly with a hole alone for a couple of seasons. It may well fill in on its own.

Hi floral. I always forget about that white hellebore! That was one of my first gardens and now it's an overgrown mess. It's always on my list to redo and I never get to it. That hellebore sure is tough though - it's been there over 20 years and still going despite my neglect!

I did not water the shrubs, but we had a wet winter. It rained/snowed at least once a week here all winter, with snow cover for weeks if not months at a time. Should I have supplemented?

Spring has seemed to take it's time this year! Some snow in the forecast for St. Patrick's Day (perhaps it will be green snow?) and then fingers crossed, that's it! I'm so done with winter!

:)

Dee

Cut out the dead branch on the Pieris.

I doubt the hollies are going to recover -- once the leaves are dessicated like that they're not going to rengenerate. You might get new growth but it probably just won't ever look like well-shaped, attractive bushes. I'd remove them and plant something that isn't a broadleaf evergreen.

I know you're not going to like reading this but here goes. I don't recall the specific conditions of the bed you planted all this in, but I do question the wisdom planting broadleaf evergreens down by the road in what I'm assuming is an exposed location. Broadleafs are best planted in wind-protected areas in our climates, and you just found out why. If you want evergreens, get some that aren't broadleafs and can take the conditions you're planting in.

I'd just cut out the small browned branch on the Chamaecyparis.

I heard the peepers last week, too! Such a cheerful sound in the late evening. I don't have anything trying to bloom yet except one hellebore (I'm down to only one -- I took the rest out), though I do have some tulips and daffs that are just breaking ground. Crocus always the last week of March for me (now watch -- this will be the year the don't just because I said it LOL!), but the show doesn't really start here around mid-April; it's just one-offs until then. But April will be here soon!

Hmm, thanks porkchop. I sit here with my brow furrowed in consternation, though. One, I never knew hollies were considered broad-leaf evergreens. Lol their leaves don't seem very broad to me. Secondly, my street is absolutely lined with hollies - and rhodies! and pieris! - at the edges of the road, and they all do quite well. Some are monsters. I wonder if it depends on the cultivar...

Or... it could just be the situation I've been faced with all my life. I must just suck as a gardener hahaha! Honestly, I've often complained here that the gas station and hardware store have better looking gardens than I do! And I also don't get how many of my neighbors, coworkers, strangers I talk to in the line at the grocery store, have absolutely no idea what they are doing, and get spectacular results. I'm talking people who don't know what a hosta is, the ones that see "something pretty" at home depot, buy it, plop it, neglect it, and it's awesome. Me? I research, study, compare, analyze, and buy what I think is the best plant for a spot, take care of it as research shows to do, and it dies. It's very discouraging. And expensive.

Geez it took me a year to get this area planned and planted. Back to the drawing board....

:/

Dee

P.S. I just realized - I have two hollies about 10-15 feet away along this same street, and they are doing fine! WTH? They are not Arrow Point - can't think of the name off the top of my head - but they have been there a couple of years and are thriving. Hmmm

Plants can't use ice. So there isn't a difference between frozen ground and dry ground. Larger plants can have root systems that extend below the frost line.

MG, can you clarify? Are you saying that snow cover is the same as dry ground? That I should have gone out through the snow to water these? I could see this in a winter that had only snow, but we also had lots of rain (while there was no snow cover and with snow cover) so I don't believe the ground was overly dry.

Also, just did a quick search for "wind resistant evergreens" and got many hits for hollies. I give up

:)

Dee

Seeing plants growing in your area is a big clue that they will do well, but microclimate makes a big difference. Maybe it's not the exposure/wind but something else they don't like in THAT location, or maybe you just planted them too late and they didn't have time to establish. But I do recall you mentioning a large area got cleared, so I suspect wind exposure. Are the hollies you see growing elsewhere around you under a canopy of trees and hence the trunks buffer the winds or on the leeward side of large evergreens which act as buffers?

Frozen ground is full of ice, not water. So watering when it's cold out doesn't necessarily get you anywhere if the plants can't take up the water before it freezes solid. Larger evergreens can get around this problem by having roots below the frost line.

Given the unusually long stretches below freezing we had this winter, I'm guessing that you had the same.

edited to add: I'm currently waiting to dig and transplant a good percentage of a rose garden. The gardeners connected with the current location kept talking about the difficulties they had when they planted the roses a few years ago. They kept hitting something that felt like concrete digging the holes. Then they realized they were hitting frozen ground.

Dee, this was a tough winter for even established shrubs. I had a couple warm days followed by arctic blasts and high winds that caused a couple 15-year old rhododendron and inkberry that are subject to north winds to show leaf damage similar to yours.

I would trim the browned chamaecyparis branch back. You may want to wait a bit to trim anything else to see how it recovers. You are going to see a lot of leaf drop. Ignore the ugly until you see what survives.

Thank you for sharing some spring CT photos! Here are mine (also CT) that I can see from my front door/steps.

Snow drops:

Hellebores from the ’Wedding Party” series:

Mixed white daffodils and narcissus:

Last year I used perennials in a couple front pots including heuchera and hellebores for spring. I transplanted the hellebores but tucked the pots with the heuchera between some bushes. Looks like they survived!

Hi Dee, As for your Hollies...Arrow Point? I wonder if it is not the cultivar? What are the cultivars of Holly you see in your neighborhood? I have Blue Hollies. Never have more than a couple of small branches that are damaged over winter. They seem fine this year too. The front male has dropped a few leaves and they will definitely benefit from some sun and warm temperatures, but nothing like the damage you have. I have them in 4 different locations. One facing East with the house behind it. Two - Blue Princess and a male in a corner surrounded by taxus and branches of a tree above them. They seem to do the best. I have two more with exposure in a sort of wind tunnel along the edge of the property and even they do pretty well. Not as vigorous as the others, but, still not the kind of damage you're looking at. Believe it or not, I had the native hollies once and they had more damage and were less vigorous than these blue hollies.

As for watering in the winter....up until whenever the spigots have to be turned off for the winter, I try to keep watering to make sure they go into the winter hydrated, but no, no way to attempt to water when the temperatures are consistently keeping the ground frozen. In previous winters, we've had days here and there and sometimes a week at a time where it warmed up enough to try to head out with a watering can of water for a couple of plants, but not this winter, that' for sure.

Pretty Hellebore and cheerful snow drops!

I'm sure you are discouraged by the look of your newly planted area this spring. I hope you will take more photos in June, it's going to look so much better. If you bought the Arrow Point hollies from a nursery, I'd take photos and ask them, what the problem was?

MGallica - how exciting to getting ready to transplant roses!

DFan - great photos....looks like spring there, any day! You're going to have a slew of daffs.

No sooner did the snow recede than the snow drops were just waiting to spring up. Daff foliage i showing, but on the whole, it's that time of year when everything looks dead and still fairly ugly. Lots of branches on the ground. Too much work waiting for me. [g] But...in a couple of weeks, I should have some blooms to give me some enthusiasm. 😁

Lots of daffs on their way....

Always the first daff....up against the foundation facing West.

These were just planted last fall....

Any evergreen that isn't a conifer is a broad leafed evergreen. Its not a reference to leaf size but just means they don't have needles.

It's an expression I didn't know until coming to these US based fora. Most of the evergreens used in gardens here are not conifers so if you say 'evergreen' ble is assumed.

Design fan, thanks! You must be slightly south of me. I'm between Bpt and New Haven but at a high elevation, so even on my drive to work I see the difference in bloom times, etc. Heck, sometimes it's snowing at my house and raining (if even) 5 miles away (downhill) at my workplace! Nice to see those blooms! I planted some purple-leafed heucheras in my daughter's garden and (from the window at least lol) they all look like they came through the winter quite well.

Hey PM2, how's it going? :) LOL I have no idea what kind of hollies are in the neighborhood. I am not good at identifying most shrubs. I need a bloom to be able to identify stuff, or at least a unique foliage! I did look at blue hollies but if I recall I think they got too big for this area. I need to consider height due to overhead wires, and I am trying to keep things narrow so I have more room to plant other things.

I'm really pretty sure this issue is not a watering issue. We had such a wet fall and winter - and as I mentioned above, not just snow, but lots of rain as well. And before that I kept them adequately watered after planting. I suppose it could be a wind issue. Very frustrating to have such wind damage, when all the research you did beforehand said hollies are wind-resistant.

Thanks floral. I was not aware of that so now I know! :)

PM2, don't you just hate all those little branches? Such a pain in the neck. It can be easier to rake than walk around picking them up, but then they get stuck in the tines of the rake. LOL I wonder if I can make it into a game for my granddaughters to pick up sticks?

:)

Dee

Hey Dee, hanging in there. Lol Looong winter! I can’t remember the last winter I spent so much time indoors. Especially the past 5 years, I was out the door almost every day. Not this year.

I can see why you’d wonder about the blue hollies. One of my male blue hollies is huge and vigorous. I prune it almost every other year. It’s higher than my gutters in the front of my cape and is very wide even with pruning. None of my other hollies have done that though. But I have 'Blue Princess' Holly and that one is not too large and it does consistently berry better than a couple of my other hollies.

https://www.monrovia.com/blue-princess-holly.html

Described as moderate grower reaching 8-10ft and 6-8ft wide. Also reported as rabbit resistant. Z5-9 Full/part sun. Is that too tall for you?

And….who can tell one cultivar from the next in your neighborhood? [g] I’d say take a photo of the hollies people are growing that look like the right size you need and either take it to your favorite nursery person to identify or post on GW to see if someone knows what they are.

Sticks...yes lots of those but also big branches too. A few years ago, we had a storm that brought down a lot of branches of all sizes and I tried using them to fill in the bottom of a long vegetable bed to compost them. I never did cover them with enough material and now it still looks like a bed of branches. [g] We have a lot of Silver maples and they are notorious for falling brances. Usually, It's just a spring job. Raking is a pretty good idea. I'll have to try it with a metal rake.

Last winter (January of 2025) we had a tree company come in and trim a good dozen of our trees (mostly oaks). I would have liked to have done more of them but it was very expensive and so we did the ones closest to the house). I'm hoping that it reduces some of the stick/branch drop for a few years!

Design Fan I forgot to mention that Wednesday night I came home around 9 pm and there on my back steps was a teeny toad/frog. Barely an inch long. I almost stepped on him, he was so tiny and blended with the stone steps! That was the night the temps dropped and we had snow the next day, so I hope he found a warm place to snuggle!

:)

Dee

Dee, yes I am a bit south of you and in a coastal town so a bit milder here. The toads and frogs here are very resourceful when finding places to tuck in. When we had our roof redone 15 years ago, the roofers were finding them tucked in soffits, gutters, etc.!

Second year that the two rhododendrons I mentioned are so wind/winter-burned (and it looks like the flower buds are impacted) as they are catching northern gusts. I am going to spray them next year with an anti-desiccant and maybe even put up a burlap wind stop. You might consider those steps too until your bushes get more established.