I'm especially glad to have rain in my garden! :) GaAlan, that is gorgeous! It must be especially welcome in a gray landscape like today's. The foliage on my thunbergias was for a few days a significantly less vibrant (but still very pretty) version. I do have to try some Sparkleberries where they can be seen from the house with sun behind them; I saw a picture yesterday of a well-tended pair that had me hyperventilating. Georgia Rose, I've planted some spring-blooming spireas that show no signs of being invasive--VanHoutte, Reeves, and thunbergia. Our neighbors across the street, however, do have a very upright bridalwreath-type one that does seed about pretty lavishly; I don't know what species. I love the ones I have, though. On strolling about the other day, I found another glad-to-have: a compact form of winter honeysuckle, Lonicera purpusii. It won't be blooming for another few weeks, but I'm glad now because, even thoug deciduous here, it's still green in a gray landscape (surprisingly with our drop to 8 degrees). Actually dots of green--a grader last August mistook my directions and scraped my nice clump away, burying the whole thing under a foot and a half of earth. I dug and dragged it back out (NOT easy!), hurriedly sawed the root ball apart into a number of pieces, and shoved them in shallow holes I scraped in baking soil. Today they're all alive, scrawny tattered relics of their former self, but this time next year the bigger ones should (almost) be handsome arching (green) mounds once again, getting ready to cover themselves with fragrant winter flowers.

Well, if there is a female left then I would be more interested in the female. My male shepherd, even after being fixed, pees on EVERYTHING!! My plants, our cars, even the neigbor's leg!! I love hime but that's the only reason I don't want another male. Susie, I don't know the dates yet that I will be there but definitely at least for Christmas weekend. I just talked to my mom who said she can't do much driving to go get a dog but if you do happen to go meet up with Tina and Maryanne, maybe you could pick up one for me and I could pick it up from you in Michigan? I know that's alot to ask...but it's a thought. If it's too much trouble, I TOTALLY and COMPLETELY understand! Where are you in Michigan again? My parents live in Linden. Theresa

No flowers here, but berries abound. The big old winterberry has finally lost its leaves and the fruit are more obvious. Here, as viewed from my kitchen window: Ilex opaca 'Goldie' has yellow berries. They don't show well from a distance but look good up close. The two American hollies on the left are about the same height as the winterberry.' That's a blue holly to the right that doesn't have much in the way of fruit - maybe a problem with the male pollinator elsewhere. Ilex crenata has black berries but you'd barely know it if you didn't peer at it. And this morning the sun came up with a bit of a flourish now that the oak and cherry leaves have dropped and no longer hide the bay. The bare branches still make it tricky to focus on the water so the wave motion isn't always in focus. The bay view photo and video are taken from inside the house (I wasn't about to go outside wearing nightclothes). Claire

In the March 2018 Show Us Your Gardens thread I posted about the damage caused by a late winter nor'easter that dumped heavy wet snow on everything in southeast MA. A major casualty was pitch pines which were snapped off with limbs and trunks landing all over the place. In my yard, large pieces of pine landed on an American holly and an osmanthus as well as other plants (pictures in the March thread linked above). The holly was bent over 90 degrees with the trunk snapped but not completely severed. After a lot of work I cleared the pieces of pine off the holly but left a major piece of trunk in place to act as a scaffold. I had to cut about 4 to 5 feet off the top of the holly before I could raise it up and lash it to the pine piece, hoping the splint would recover and feed the remaining holly. Many people offered encouragement and suggestions and I was asked to report back on the fate of the splinted holly. I'm happy to report substantial recovery! This is the other of two Ilex opaca 'Goldie' that I have in my yard. This one was a bit fuller than the damaged one and sustained minor damage with a few branches knocked off. Two pictures from today: 'Goldie' with minimal damage: Berries on the above holly. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ And here is the splinted section from the severely damaged holly with new growth coming up from the bottom.. As expected, the holly sprouted from basal buds. There's some leaf miner damage but I'm not worried about that. The holly also sprouted from below the top section that I had to lop off. Some of the remaining branches on the trunk above the splint survived and have good healthy leaves. And a few of these branches have berries! This holly is a long way from regaining the beauty it had before the nor'easter damage, but it's made a good start. The fallen pine pieces will remain in place for the foreseeable future and the other plants will just grow around them. Oh, and I had removed the other pine branches from the osmanthus and it bloomed this fall. Claire edit note: I just checked the March thread and I realized I had referred to the holly as 'Goldy', but it should have been 'Goldie'.