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Winter blooms -Jasmine nudiflorum and Pieris Japonica 

2/5/2014

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Pieris Japonica is one of my all-time favorite evergreen shrubs.  Although I can't get heathers go grow successfully, this member of the heath family (Ericacceae) thrives in my garden.  It prefers similar conditions to its' rhododendron cousins including some shade from midday sun.  This one is outside our bedroom window, growing in a small bed between the house and the patio.  It is never watered but thrives, the top branches are at least 15' high, the lower branches are hung with multiple candelabras we light in the sumer months.  It must have been planted when the stone patio was installed in the late 1930s.  The pink buds look great with the dusting of snow.

Despite the snow some other other winter stalwarts are blooming.  It's sunny today and a joy to walk around the garden.  

It's a challenge to have something in the garden in bloom at all times.  So far we’ve achieved this, most of the winter blooming plants are clustered outside windows or on well travelled paths from the mail box to the back door and besides the steps from the street to the front door so they can be enjoyed with little effort.

Jasminum nudiflorum is an heirloom shrub that was introduced from China in the mid nineteenth century.  Its long flexible green stems spill over low walls and down steep banks or can be espaliered along horizontal wires or trained up a trellis.  Ours covers a stucco wall outside our kitchen door and has been blooming sporadically since the end of December, seemingly indifferent to the freezing temperatures.  The flowers are bright yellow, unfortunately they are not fragrant (although I prefer to view them through our sliding glass door) and their full display will be in a month or so when the whole wall will blaze with color.  It was awarded the Royal Horticultural Society's prestigious "Award of Garden Merit"

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