A New Year 2016

BY SKEETER

 It has been a long time since I last posted on this blog. A tragic turn of events for my family and I lost the desire to write about my beautiful GEORGIA GARDENS.

After recently walking my gardens, I have now found the desire to jump back into blogging for the New Year!

Life is full of surprises, some good some not so good. The same goes for life in nature in the form of our gardens. The above photo of my happy Fringe Bush is such a happy welcome being full of blooms for January. I am taking this to be a good sign for a wonderful year to come.

 We have been experiencing some strange weather with an early Fall that seemed more like winter and now a Winter which feels more like Spring or even Summer at times. Such one time, Christmas Day. We experienced a record high of 80 degrees! The Asparagus Fern remains happy with mild temps.  

 This Geranium is currently forming blooms! 

 Ruellia is not blooming but has yet to go dormant for the winter.

 Boston Ferns are still hanging around. The small plant to the left is one of 4 Camellia bushes we took down to the ground. They were taking space from the Japanese Maple trees and since they have priority, the camellias we taken down to the ground. But soon, they started to return. I shall keep them trimmed back and not allow them to grow so large again. Even after cutting them down last summer, they gave me some blooms this fall.

 Along with volunteer green Wandering Jew plant. I removed this plant some time ago but apparently left a few roots and now look at this sight. I have decided to allow it to go rampant in this planter since it seems to be happy.

 Vinca is blooming in January!

 Hyacinth are popping up from below the earth.

 Spring bloomers are opening up which are nice to see but gives me an uneasy feeling about their survival with cold temps on the way.

 Creeping Phlox is confused as myself.

 Elephant Ears which should be long gone are still giving new leaves!

 Iris is blooming.

 There are many buds ready to open.

 Swamp Jessamine vines are full of buds and blooms starting to open. 

 Honeysuckle never stopped blooming since last spring!

 Lily went dormant with the early Fall winter type weather. But it is popping up with Spring winter type weather.

 These are Bloom'N-again Azaleas but they have bloomed twice last year. Now they are giving more blooms. Are these late Fall blooms or early Spring blooms? So confusing.

 Daffodils are popping up all over the gardens. So far, no blooms but if the mild temps continue, I may see them before too long. 

 The one remaining Butterfly Bush (the others were lost to disease) has yet to loose any green foliage.

Canna went dormant but are returning way too soon!

The squirrels have scattered corn from the Deer Corn Bucket. And now we have corn popping up all over the woods! 

I worry about the garden and how all this crazy weather will affect its life. But as I have learned this past year, nothing is ever certain. I will
"Believe" and "Smile" as I "Love Life" and have "Faith" that all will work out. In other words, Life for me will go on. Cheers to A HAPPY NEW YEAR, In the Garden...

Words and Photos Property of In the Garden Blog Team, In the Garden

Some of my flowers

Posted by: Dawn



The weather in New England can only be described as hot, hot, and hot. In fact two years ago we had such a weather pattern my area had a "micro burst" across the lake that snapped telephone poles off. Last year we had a swath of circular laid trees...broken and demolished, unconfirmed tornado (I admit it is very unusual in Maine). BUT! This year we had two confirmed funnel clouds in one storm. I'm not sure if it's related to the long term 90 degree weather or acceptance of such a phenomena up here, but it was wayyyy different to see the TV stay on a state of emergency. Everyone is alright and that's all that matters.

Anyway, I have some current blooms in my yard and went on a picture snapping trip on 7/17, I thought I'd post about them. Pink Delphinium and a purple coleus flower in the background.

My mailbox planter, red, pink and white geranium. (blooms are wiped out from the storm)

Fireweed.

My Pee gee hydrangea is starting to show, by the middle of August it will be full.

A new addition, my daughter and I planted some hybrid lilies.

This one also!

My transplanted hosta.

A rose from my mother I consider to be a seven sister. She always flowers for me very late and very nicely.

Pink spirea, so delicate.

A faithful daylily that has flowered every year,

but the companion pass-a-long finally made a show. *sigh* How pretty.

A blackish viola I planted so I could have them all over the place next year, just cause.

My Joe Pye Weed budding out.

And the transplanted blazing star is doing superbly.

Pumpkin,

cuke,

and zucchini.

Who doesn't love a pea flower?

And finally, my lush string beans.

Time to get ready for picking. In the Garden.

Words and Photos Property of In the Garden Blog Team,

In the Garden

Lightening Struck Tree

By Skeeter
I left my Georgia Garden for a second trip to Tennessee to assist my parents after their house flooded in May. Things there are moving slowly but they now have walls.Hopefully, this week the AC/Heat Unit and duct work will be installed as well as some tile work taking place. My parents spirits are up but they so want to be back in their home.
One evening while leaving their neighborhood, I spotted this turkey taking a stroll along a lily filled driveway. That put a smile on my face....
Before we took off to Tennessee, we had a really bad storm with lightening hitting a Willow Oak tree in our yard.
I was amazed to see what a strike of lightening can do to a tree.
It blew this birdhouse right off the tree and it was secured with screws! Luckily, no birds were calling this house home at the time. Our Cable TV was also damaged as well as one television inside the house. The Cable was repaired and the TV will be discarded at the recycle center.
Look at that beautiful Oak wood inside this tree. In time the tree will die and it is too close to the house so she must come down, Sigh. On Thursday, I will show you the rest of the story of this LIGHTENING STRUCK TREE, In the Garden...

Words and Photos Property of In the Garden Blog Team,In the Garden

The Aftermath of THE Ice Storm

Mr. Fix-it and I own a little house in southern Indiana; which was right in the line of one of the worst ice storms ever. On a recent trip up there I thought I'd snap some pictures of the damage done by the ice storm. The damage is quite severe and it is a big mess in all the states affected by this ice storm. Many homes were without electricity for several days. I want to tell everyone affected by the storm how my heart goes out to you dealing with this big mess. So now let's look at some pictures of the damage.

The above homeowner had a tree fall on the house. Fortunately there does not appear to be any damage to the house.

Most folks were very busy cleaning up their yards and removing debris. The state, city, and county workers were on the job. The heavy equipment was out to clear the roads and restore power to all affected people. The air literally hummed with the whine of numerous chainsaws.

I noticed mature maples were most affected with limb breakage during this storm. I would've thought the evergreens would take it worse due to their leaves catching the ice, but not so. The evergreens seemed to be more willing to bend without snapping, though several are still leaning. All of my evergreens have bounced back and I lost only one limb from my pine. Shockingly. Here I show you a mature maple snapped just like it was a toothpick. The sights were surreal to me, though the Jimster was not impressed. Even entire forests topped by the ice did not impress the Jimster. He does not realize those trees will have a hard time recovering from the loss of their primary trunk.
The Country Club and its surrounding fence suffered severe damage. Homeowners insurance carriers will be busy with claims to fix the fences and property damaged in this storm.
More splintered wood. The hardwoods just seemed to not be so resilient and broke quite jaggedly with all the extra weight of the ice. These trees will need some serious pruning in order to recover. Sadly, I suspect many will not be pruned. This may bring unwelcomed consequences further down the road in the form of the tree becoming diseased and ultimately dying.
Our grand magnolias were also affected, though not as severely as the deciduous trees. Generally speaking, the magnolias I saw only lost some lower branches; which is not always a bad thing if the homeowner wants his or her tree limbed up.

The area also received a good bit of snow along with the ice. It is funny how the storm dumped tons of snow further north where several of our blogging friends live, but that snow did not cause the same damage as the ice. Snow and ice are two very different things that can cause all sorts of problems in their own way. The weather is a bit discriminative in its course, and decided to take a big punch at the southern Indiana, Kentucky, Missouri, Arkansas and northern Tennessee area during this storm. But it is okay, life goes on and I am very glad the majority of folks have gotten their power back now. P.S. Our home suffered no damage other than losing power for two days.

For more ice pictures see The Garden Sanctuary. There are some excellent pictures of the ice on that blog showing just how thick the ice was on all it encased.

in the garden....

Hi all. I just wanted to give everyone a head's up on this blog. I still have my very full blogroll, but I have chosen to only display the 25 most recent posters. It rotates so everyone will be displayed as they post. I will do my very best to visit each and every new post, but time is becoming a bit more limited so I might not be as diligent as I'd like to be. If you are not listed on the Blogroll, don't worry-there is an excellent chance I have you on my blogroll at Blotanical. I use both sources equally to visit a great number of blogs. I hope you understand that with gardening season coming up and family commitments I may be in the garden a bit more, or doing the dreaded housecleaning thingy so I may not be around as often.

Additionally, with all of these wonderful, wonderful comments and the daily conversations we have, I find I spend way more time on here than I should. I will always respond to comments, but it may be on your blog if time is limited and I cannot respond on here. I know you totally understand. If you are one of my very earliest commenters and do not have a blog (you know who you are!), I will respond on here but it may be a bit more general.

Posting will still continue as always-once per day. It was always my goal to do it this way (thanks to my good blogging mentor who gave me great advice a very long time ago-and you know who you are!) and also a big thanks to my co-posters for helping me out and doing a super good job on the blog.

Again, I appreciate everyone who either reads here or comments here and that will never change....

in the garden....

I just read of the tornadoes that hit Texas and Oklahoma. Best wishes for a speedy recovery to all affected.