My post would be very boring. My garden is so tiny the tour IS the view from the window! Most people on this site probably have living rooms as big as my entire garden. I like all my plants and don't have a favourite. I haven't bought anything from a nursery for years, except a couple of things for the window boxes. There's no room for any more plants.

PM2, great idea! Although looks like mine will have to be late May lol. I really have nothing interesting going on at the moment, other than things finally starting to green up! But I'll try to take photos to hold on to till a bit later to post for the month.

floral you garden is never boring! It's lovely and I for one always love seeing it!

:)

Dee

OK. Here it is two minutes ago. Complete with drying hiking boots, vegetable seedlings occupying the table and wild garlic taking over.

The shed will soon be submerged under the Rambling Rector. It's smothered in buds.

Floral, I love your garden! I remember thinking with some of your past photos that it was like a little 'jewel box'. A small garden can be so much more than a larger garden. Better designed. You can distill it down to just what you love, which seems to be what you are saying, you love ALL your plants! :-) And hiking boots and vegetable seedlings are exactly showing the flavor of your gardening life. I love to vegetable garden but no vegetable garden this year for various reasons. I really only have one 15x20ft bed that is finished and looks pretty good most of the time. Everything else is always a work in progress.

You have an allotment too? You could add a tour of that as well? Do you grow houseplants too?

And you said that the shed is going to be covered in flowers because there are so many buds. That is your shed at the back of your garden, right? I LOVE sheds and yours is an excellent example of a romantic shed. Not just something utilitarian. Makes me think that we could keep this thread going through the whole 2026 season and keep adding the highlights all along the way. You could post a close up of the buds and come back when the flowers are just opening and then when it is in full bloom. So instead of just a snapshot of the garden at one point in time, you can share what you experience through the season that are the reasons you love your garden.

Dee, I am in the same boat. We barely have cleaned up yet. We were half cleaned for 3 weeks and then DH spent 5 hrs one Saturday getting the remainder of the grasses cut back etc. But i still have not raked out the bed or put down new mulch as i usually do. And now most of the bulbs have gone by. After the bulbs there's not a lot doing until later.

Things haven't fully revved up here yet, not a whole lot to show. The fothergilla are just starting, some of the trees are 50-75% leafed out, others are barely showing green yet.

Floral -- your garden is charming! Because it's so filled in it looks more expansive than it is. Show a pic when the R.R. is in full bloom -- that's got to be stunning!

I was just thinking, this might not be the right year to do this thread. [g] I don't know about anyone else, but this has been an unusually difficult winter followed by an inhospitable spring for my garden. But.... it could be all of a sudden things will change direction, so, any time this season anyone finds their garden is cooperating and is moved to give a photo tour, have at it. :-)

Yes, PM2, it has been a rough season so far! A few absolutely beautiful days scattered amongst rain, constant winds, extreme cold (scraping my windshield on a late-April morning), and extreme heat (it seems to be getting normal to have a couple of 90-degree days in April now). The poor plants don't know what to do! They wait, wait, wait because it's so cold, pop open on the first seasonable day, any early blooms are fried in 4 days due to excessive heat, and then new leaf growth is blackened by an unexpected freeze. Yikes.

But as every gardener knows, hope springs eternal in a garden, and I'm sure some of us will have some gorgeous pics to share. And honestly, if we are doing this as a "garden tour" type of thread, we should include the good with the bad. It's what one would see if they were really touring our garden, and also I think we can all learn - or at least commiserate lol! - from the bad.

:)

Dee

Dee - You have summed it up in a nutshell, Dee. It is actually amazing that the plants put up with all of it and keep coming back.

As for sharing the good with the bad....I was going to point that out and then thought....well, from past experience on GW...most of us hate sharing anything but the best views of our garden....lol. I'm keeping my expectations in that regard, low. [g]

My June is your May, I think... but I'll start my tour , and add to it via editing if that's the right format? Or , in mid-June if Ive managed some weed-free areas I can give more of a full tour of that season, which is the best - July is a jungle and August is a bit tattered already, although that's more due to my sloppy deadheading and general maintenance.

First signs of my purple meconopsis that I grew from seed (3rd years but not much bloom last year - ignore the peanut left by one of our neighborhood stellar jays although it gives a size perspective )

And, to give you a idea how slow our springs are, the crocus just now showing up

lat62, Yes, you are late if you are just getting crocus now! Do you know what growing zone you are? So you have a short growing season. Yes, just add to your post with editing, all along the season, that would be great.

I couldn't have picked a worse year to tour my garden, and I will wait until i get it a little more under control.

I call it zone 4/5 but I need to re-check it officially ... here in Anchorage, Alaska, we don't get as cold in the winter these days, but our summers are remaining cool and cloudy so that's a limiting factor. This year was a big snow year so it took until the end of April to significantly melt out - yes, short but very sweet growing season ! Good thing I love snow and winter (although growing older has been a wake-up call - need to travel more to warmer places like I did this year - I had an amazing trip to Hawaii and New Zealand to 'sit out' our breakup in April)

Lat62 - Short season and cool and cloudy on top of it?! Not fun. Good thing you enjoy winter and snow. I also enjoy it. The only person I know that enjoys shoveling...lol. Me. But at my age, I can no longer do anything fun in the winter. I bundle up in a puffer coat down below my knees and a wool hat and gloves and get out and walk, but that's about it. And even here, it's getting to be a 6 month wait for spring! Too long. Traveling to a warm place sounds like a great way to adapt. :-)

That looks like a picture out of a fairy tale to me, floral - thank you. I googled rambling rector and it's fragrance sounds divine, if only ! We can grow Rosa rugosa and it has a very nice fragrance . Our native prickly rose pops up all over the place and I adore its fragrance when the moose don't devour it all.

Take care in the heatwave - I'd love to take about 15 degrees F off of your hands.

Currently my gardening consists of plucking horsetail - must be done each spring.

In late June I hope to be able to share a photo tour - in the meantime, I have my primula cheering me up :

Floral, you can not even SEE the shed....lol. That's a lovely vista out your window!

Pretty primrose, Lat!

Cats Pajamas....

Kodiak Fresh Diervilla's

Coreopsis 'Daybreak' in front...Just planted Kodiak Jet Black Diervilla in the rear....

OSO Easy Double Red rose & two Kodiak Black Diervillas...

OSO Easy Double Red Rose....

Work in progress... Roses & Kodiak Diervilla Freshes....

Jim your diervillas are gorgeous! I have a couple - I think Kodiak Red and Orange - but yours have nicer, brighter color.

I'm working on getting photos to post to this thread. And working on finding more time to post lol!

:)

Dee

diggerdee zone 6 CT , My Diervillas in the front & at the side of house get about 5-6 hours of sun... Two Kodiak Fresh out back get more sun...

Today, after so much needed and adored sunshine and warmth , it's a high overcast and the lighting is nice - I feel like the color came into my garden overnight... while not a full tour, here are a few, and by next week the garden will be at its best - I have 3/4 acre and a large portion is native with a forest of spruce, birch, cottonwood, devil's club, elderberry, native grass and assorted other 'weeds' - a small croquet-sized and badminton area of lawn remains, mostly dandelions at the moment but later clover and very healthy grass.

To begin my 'tour', here is a pic from the roof showing the layout of the main area from last week. Years ago, I made the paths with gravel and woodchips, now my husband mows them... the end of the X pathways marks where I give up trying to weed out the equisetum and other things... the bare dirt areas are where I am redoing beds that were overcome with weeds... with my husband's help, we are able to revamp some areas. I have primrose, lupin, goatsbeard, and blue poppy seedlings waiting in the wings.

My iphone photos are not showing up on my laptop yet, so more to come :)

A couple more for now

Lat - What I want to know, is what you were doing up on the roof?! LOL Great view though. I like the way you have sectioned off your beds with an X pathway. And that blue poppy is amazing! Such a saturated blue! Glad you are finally getting good weather and looking forward to more photos.

Haha, it's a flat roof - I grow herbs and tomatoes up there and have a small table and chairs, there's even a door out to it :))

I love the sound of that. I'd love to have a roof garden with tomatoes and herbs!! lol

Updated photos... ....

jim1961 - thanks, your garden looks so tidy and lovely !

My roof garden is nice, but nothing fancy - it's warmer up there... this year it's not ready for prime time due to such a cool spring and my being away during April for seed-starting.... I'll miss my marjoram and oregano that I dry for winter use. I overwintered rosemary in a too-crowded pot, and thyme... In the interest of a garden tour, I'll photograph the area tomorrow- it's basic :))

jim1961, very nice Diervilla. Is it straight Diervilla sessilifolia or a cultiver like "Butterflies or Kodiak Series? I grow the northeastern version Diervilla lonicera. After a couple years of growing it, I was shocked to see it's aggresive spread, but now it doesn't grow fast enough for me.

Jim, your Oso Easy Red Rose has really taken off? It's so cute and everything is so well cared for. I like the color combination of the Diervilla and the red rose. And I meant to say how much I like your Cat's Pajamas.

Lat...this spring was so cool and rainy and then we got unexpectedly busy, and just about the time I was going to start tomato and peppers and herbs, I was out of commission. So this is the first time in a couple of decades at least, that I have no tomato or pepper plants in the garden. Or Basil or Rosemary. Luckily I do have a creeping oregano along the edge of some stepping stones that come back every year, and plenty of thyme that always comes back, but that's it. And nothing else is ready for prime time either.

I'm glad to see others posting photos of their garden and hope you continue.

Jay 6a Chicago , mine are all Kodiak series.... I have Kodiak Black, Kodiak JET BLACK, and Kodial Fresh....

Young Kodiak JET BLACK...

Two Kodiak Fresh