January Thoughts

Ahhh, January.  The month for skiing, relaxing and reflecting.  The holidays are over, the garden has been long wrapped up and it's still too early to do any real gardening. 
At least that's what you think. 
This is actually a time to be busy thinking about how your garden and landscape performed this past year and to make plans for this upcoming season.  Did your landscape provide you with good Spring, Summer and Fall interest?  Is it interesting in it's Winter state right now?  Do you want more color, texture, height or shade?  These are all great questions to think about and to help you create a more appealing landscape that you really want to spend time in. 
Right now when you can see the true "bones" or structure of your landscape, is a great time to consider what you might need to add, adjust or build in order to have an appealing Winter landscape.  Some of my favorites are personal art pieces be they sculptures or found junk.  These items add a real nice touch and a sense of "terroir" (sense of place) to individualize your garden and make it a true extension of your home. 

At Garden Fun they have a whimsical collection of garden art, stakes, bird feeders and more.  They have a lovely blue/green peacock sculpture that would really liven up any landscape.  Their site wouldn't let me copy the image so go here to see it.

Here are some other examples of fun and beautiful art for the landscape:

This Heron sculpture is from Big Bird Studios.

These pieces are from Craft Works Gallery.

Finally, don't limit yourself to 3D items, use the walls of your home to display art.  This image is from Inside Out Garden Art in the UK.  I love how this piece of art creates a room in this garden:

These are the kinds of things I think about in the winter as well as the plants that really help make a winter landscape more interesting. 
One of my all time favorite trees is the Mountain Ash.  I love the white umbrel shape of the flowers in the spring, the dense canopy for summer shade,  the orange, red blend of autumn foliage, and the red berries that persist into the winter adding natural holiday ornaments to the landscape. 

Along Simpson avenue here in Bend, between Columbia and Colorado, are stands of Mountain Ash trees.  They don't all still have their berries, usually the berries are perfectly ripe and soft by now and the birds swarm in to get a little winter fat.  I remember a couple of winters ago, we had a white Christmas and the Mountain Ash outside my dining room windows was full of red berries.  About mid January, for about two weeks, the tree was full of birds gorging themselves on the berries.  It added so much beauty and interest to my winter landscape that I try to put a Mountain Ash in every landscape if it is appropriate.  You can also get them in shrub form.  And guess what? They are native to Oregon!

There is also the favorite Red Twig Dogwood which provides the nice red branches to use for holiday decorations or outdoor viewing pleasure.  There is also the Yellow Twig, Mid Winter Fire and Arctic Fire which offer different colored branches.  Remember that the new branches are what provide the good coloring so you need to prune back the oldest canes in Spring.

Red Twig Dogwood:

 Yellow Twig Dogwood:

Mid Winter Fire Dogwood:

There there are also the trusty evergreens in tree or shrub form:


Hoopsii Blue Spruce:

Weeping Blue Atlas Cedar"

Golden Korean Fir:

The naturally sculptural Manzanita:

Blue Star Juniper:

Procumbens Blue Spruce:

 Pinus strobus 'Niagara Falls', a new introduction by Iseli Nursery out in Boring Oregon and was selected as the Collector's Conifer of the Year in 2009.  A very interesting variety of the Cascading White Pine:

Gold Strike Juniper, also a new introduction from Iseli Nursery.  The brilliant yellow needles take on coral tones later in the year.  What a great little landscape brightener!

If you have any questions about what plants might be most appropriate for your landscape or would like me to take a look to improve your winter landscape, please contact me at tanya@carlsengdesigns.com.

As always, enjoy!

Winter's really coming, what to do?!

It snowed, it froze and now the sun is coming back out.  Can't help but laugh and love the crazy weather we get here in Central Oregon.
Can't really tell if winter is coming early this year or if this was a fluke, but it sure woke me up to all the things I need to do to the garden.  Here are some things to make sure to do real soon (before we freeze again).

Lawn:

• Mow it short.  This will reduce the chance of your lawn developing "snow mold".
• Apply a Fall fertilizer
• Water deeply and less frequently (as usual) but less frequently than normal
• Change the watering time of your irrigation to water mid-morning instead of 6am, keep those walkways unfrozen.
• Call your local irrigation company to get on their schedule to have your irrigation system blown out.

        You can always turn your system off if it waters your sidewalks and pathways, they can turn into

        hazards and liability issues if they are icy.  (Funny enough, there is a lawyer's office downtown that

        always forgets to turn off their system once the weather stays below freezing, and the sidewalks

        surrounding their office are full of slick ice.  You'd think they would know better.)

    

Garden:

• Plant spring bulbs.  Remember, Tulips are deer candy, but Daffodils, Crocus, Snowdrop,              Fritillaria, Bluebells, Bearded Iris and Allium are all deer resistant.  They need well draining soil. 
• Great time to plant trees and shrubs!  Now that all the energy normally directed to flowering and leaves is over, that energy is going to the roots and there is good root development happening.  The plants you put in now will be ready to burst forth come spring.
• Shop for plants with autumn color.  Swedish Aspen (which don't sucker) have great orange color.
• Plant hardy mums and those lovely ornamental purple cabbage and put a couple of pumpkins out.
• Continue to water deeply but less often.  Even though it is cold, it is still dry.  Continue to water     when the ground is not frozen, bring a bucket out with you or hook up your hose.
• Rake up leaves from fruit trees and any diseased leaves.  There is a cycle of disease that can be broken if you remove the diseased leaves.
• Mulch your roses.
• Move your tender plants inside.
• Trim your perennials a little bit but not all the way.  Leave some plant material to protect the root crown from winter damage.  Do not trim your shrubs now, do this in spring after danger of hard frosts pass.
• Leave your grasses standing.  Ornamental grasses add interest to the winter garden as well as seed for local wildlife.  Trim these in spring.

(Sorry about the funny formatting, couldn't figure it out and honestly would rather play with my daughter than struggle with the computer...)

Winter Chores:

• Sharpen and clean your tools, remember to store them in a dry place.
• Read garden books, catalogs, magazines.
• Think of how well your garden did this year and start planning changes for next year.

Winter is a great time to plan.  As long as I can see the ground (i.e., it's not covered in feet of snow) I can create a landscape design.  And then, come springtime, you will be ready to go as soon as the ground is workable rather than having to wait until summer (like most of the fools who forget about their landscape until the bulbs start to come up) and you can have the best looking landscape in the neighborhood!

If you might be planning work that requires someone else to install it, remember that most good companies are booked a couple of months in advance once the good weather hits again.  Be ahead of the crowd, know what you want to do and get on the schedule to get it done in spring.

Some lovely winter images to get you all in the mood:

Here is another image that I desperately tried to post here but which is protected, follow this link to some lovely photos of winter gardens: Webshots Winter Garden Photos

I would love to design a landscape like this - let me know of any of you want it too!

Here are some books designed to help us all through this bleak season, but beware, most of the contents of books like this are for warmer climates.

Email me for personal advice on how to get your garden looking good through the winter.  tanya@carlsengdesigns.com and check out my website at www.carlsengdesigns.com