Blooming Plants that Tolerate the Cold and Other Features in My Winter Garden

Hellebores may be my all-time favorite winter-blooming plant.Their flowers persist for months, sometimes beginning as early as December, and frost barely bothers them.While a winter storm created icy conditions and dumped snow onto a good portion of the South the past few days, we were enjoying cold rain—until yesterday. I woke up to temperatures 16 degrees below freezing and giant, fluffy snowflakes falling from the sky. Helena, Alabama's winter has been relatively mild this year, and gnats and other bugs have been hanging around. So I was grateful for the freezing temps that will help kill the pests, especially because I know the frigid weather will be short-lived. Within a few weeks spring will be waking up our world. Meanwhile, I wanted to see how my garden was responding to our shot of winter. So I bundled myself into heavy winter clothing and ventured into the garden.

I was happy to see a variety of hardy winter blooms that survived the freeze. Hellebores were hunkering down under the cold, but their blooms looked good. I am confident they will rapidly recover as soon as the weather improves.The yellow Edgeworthia flowers below were not completly open. They remained beautiful, although they were covered by a film of ice. There are many buds on the shrub. Prolonged hard frost will damage them, but they tolerate brief dips below freezing.Small photos above, clockwise from top left: Camellia bloom that has fallen to ground, beautiful to the end; Another camellia flower is not very happy with the frost, but hundreds of buds on the same shrub are undamaged; Daphne odoro 'Aureomarginata' produces late winter, waxy blooms.These buds were unharmed by the hard frost; Flowering quince produces blooms for several months from late January into spring. Open blooms will be injured by severe frost, but unopened buds are very tolerant of the icy temps.One camelia with unusually frost-tolerant blooms is Camellia japonica 'Crimson Candles.'  The temperature was about 20 degrees F when I took these photos:

If daffodils are in full bloom. their flowers are likely to be killed by frost. But if their buds have not opened, they can survive frigid weather.

As I walked around in the snow yesterday, I noted other features that added interest to my winter garden. I depend upon foliage to provide the backbone to my garden, especially evergreens that look great when many other plants are dormant:Clockwise from upper left:Hardy Japanese Holly Fern (Cyrtomium fortunei); Vaccinium corymbosum is a compact, native evergreen blueberry bush. The reddish foliage will become glaucous blue as warmer weather arrives; Variegated false holly (Osmanthus heterophyllus 'Goshiki'); Loropetalum 'Purple Pixie' is a truly dwarf loropetalum.

Pleopeltis polypodioides, also known as the resurrection fern, is an intersting evergreen plant. In dry weather it shrivels up to a grayish clump and looks dead, but as soon as it receives water it rapidly recovers and looks healthy and green again. It is native to the southeastern US, but can be found as far north as New York. This one is growing out of a crack in a large rock:

The fairies inside my Wheelbarrow Fairy Garden have taken themselves and all of their belongings inside for the winter, but their warm weather habitat inside the wheelbarrow is doing well:

Here are a couple of scenes from inside the woodland garden, taken from opposite ends of the main path that runs through the area:

Finally, here are some more features I noted inside the woodland garden:Clockwise from top left: A dried hydrangea bloom, leftover from last year; A stepping stone, decorated by nature; A shivering rhododendron that will perk up as soon as the temp rises. The curled leaves help protect the plant from very cold weather; Turkey-tail fungus and moss growing on an old stump.

By now I was freezing! It was time to head inside for something hot to drink and to curl up by the fire with a good book. Happy winter!

What I Have Been Doing During the Pandemic

December 2020, images taken in Deb's Garden2021 has come, and the COVID pandemic rages. My family, so far, has remained well. Although I know people who have had the disease, I don't personally know anyone who has died. Some of my friends cannot say the same. Alabama has not shut down as much as some other states—businesses and schools remain open at present—but most people are cautious. Social distancing and masks are standard everywhere. In October, I toured Gibbs Gardens in northern Georgia with a friend who lives near there and then traveled on to Tennessee to visit another friend. Other than that, I have rarely ventured out. When I do, I follow the rules. I keep masks and hand sanitizer in my car. I am glad COVID vaccines have been approved, and I plan to take one as soon as it becomes available to me.

Barred owls have lived in our garden for many years.I have taken a break from blogging to complete a book I started a while back. And now it's done! This is a tale about some interesting creatures, both common and odd characters, that enriched my life through the years. It is humorous, but a bit of a tear-jerker as well. It should appeal to a broad market of pet owners, family and nature lovers, but I am realizing that completing a book may be the easy part of the job. Finding an agent and publisher looks daunting for someone who has never been inside that business. I have been encouraged by a manuscript reader who has himself received many writing awards, so I am sending out queries. I am ever optimistic, and we will see what happens. Ideas for future books, including one about my garden experiences, are tumbling around inside my brain.

I haven't forgotten Deb's Garden! This is a recent photo of a section of the perennial/pollinator garden. Plants are dying back, and everything is buried under a sea of leaves.We had plenty of rain in 2020, and most plants have done well. The perennial/pollinator garden is two years old now and has begun to fill in. I have added a variety of plants to this newest garden, including some gorgeous day lilies hybridized by my friend in Georgia. I also planted some more native azaleas inside the woodland garden. I now have about two dozen whose colorful, sweet blooms will enliven the space from spring into summer. 

Beauty exists in the garden even as plants are going dormant and leaves are dying.

These Snowflake hydrangea leaves recently were still clinging to the shrub as they were backlit by low winter sun.

It is winter now and many plants are sleeping, but in subtropical Alabama the engines of the earth beneath the surface are hard at work. Multitudes of microbes are busy digesting mulch and other organic matter in the soil, transforming these into nutrients that will be available for plants when they wake up in the spring.

Earthworms aerate the soil as they prepare for hibernation. They dig tunnels for themselves and create burrows deep in the soil. Their bodies secrete a protective slime that helps them slip through the soil and keeps them warm. This worm slime is high in nitrogen and improves the fertility of the soil. It also is an excellent binding agent and improves soil texture.

Plant roots are busy, stretching out and becoming stronger so that they can supply plants with soil nutrients when the plant wakes up. Rhizomes are creeping, and bulbs are quietly growing and spreading their root systems. In my part of the world winter is a great time to plant dormant trees and shrubs because their root systems have time to establish themselves in the soil before the stress of hot summer arrives.

As the new year begins, our lawn is still mostly green, but the Zoysia grass soon will fade to beige.Thanks to all of you who have expressed concern and wondered what has happened to me! Like those plant roots, I am still alive and stretching myself. Best wishes to you all, and hoping for a very happy 2021!

Deb