Melissa - even though you are so far away, I think you and Christina and I live in similar Mediterranean climates - your stories sound so familiar! We had a LOT of rain here in the North San Francisco Bay area in Nov/Dec, then practically none until a week ago. In the last 6 days we got almost 6 inches of rain! Now they tell us we are back up to our "normal to date" amount of rain for this date. The garden is sodden, of course, but it has been showing signs of Spring for weeks already. After years of having all of my daffodils lying on the ground because of our not uncommon strong Jan/Feb rain storms, I learned to only buy short sturdy types (and ones that don't need winter freeze to repeat). So, we actually have clumps of daffodils that have bloomed all through the storms, and are still upright - it is such a lovely sight. I wish more people grew hellebores! I agree with both of you - they are so fresh and lovely at this time of year. I have two very shady areas where they grow - every year I try to plant more. This year for whatever reason I did not take off last year's leaves, or feed them, or weed around them, and to my surprise they didn't care at all, and are all blooming madly (and have been for at least 3 weeks) and look lovely, shining out from their shadows. All of the fruit trees are blooming now, and the acacia, which are all over the hills and in every vacant lot around here. The acacia start first in Jan, and then are joined by the pink or white fruit blossoms - they look lovely together. In my garden we have lots of volunteer plum trees blooming. Also an ancient flowering crab apple, which has put out leaves and is covered with flower buds - I can't wait for it to bloom. The camellias (four huge old plants) are blooming now. Two of them are in a bed which used to be underneath a 5 story tall 40 foot across eugenie tree we just had taken out last month. They had been unhappy as the tree got bigger and denser over the last few years - after they stop blooming I am going to cut them back, feed them, and see what happens this summer when it gets really hot and sunny - I hope they are able to survive. We left the tree stump 2 feet high, and have plans to put a half wine barrel on top of it (it is at least 5 feet in diameter) and plant trailing flowers in it. Our local flowering "weeds" are also in full bloom - everyone's garden (especially mine) is full of our common yellow oxalis - it turns vast areas yellow with its pretty flowers, although it has to be pulled up so as not to smother everything! Another Mediterranean plant which has naturalized here is valerian - all three colors of it - the white, darker raspberry pink, and the redder pink. It covers hillsides at the side of the freeways and roads, and at the coast along the cliffs next to the beaches, and comes up uninvited in everyone's garden. I just cut it back to about 4 inches high every Fall/Winter and enjoy it (after a campaign to dig it all up and get rid of it failed miserably one year). Our old antique iris are all up & blooming - they are mid sized bearded, and the most velvety dark purple color. Every year they bloom from Jan through almost the entire summer. The iris foetida are also blooming right now, although their small greenish flowers are not showy. In the Fall they make up for it by covering themselves with seed pods that burst open like flowers and show their red seeds. Of course, the old tea and china roses never stop blooming, and I am still (when it is not pouring) able to cut enough to make nice arrangements for the table. Some of them are actually starting their Spring bloom already - Madame Alfred Carriere has burst into bloom 25 feet up an old plum tree. Our banksie lutea, which was cut back about 70 percent last year so we could paint the house, has put out all sorts of new canes, and is covered with buds. Happy Spring! Jackie

As is often the case, I'm in total accord with Anne. This is the best rose season I've had for as long as I can remember. As Sheri put it: "Forget the roses that fail here and find the ones that don't!!" The roses I grow, are loving the wetter, cooler summer we've had in the Northeast part of the continent. I've not watered once, not sprayed either and have no blackspot. Happy roses, seem to be healthy roses. I have been ruthless in shovel pruning non-performers for the past three years. Poor health, lack of vigour, failing to boom and they're gone. I replace them with roses that I've researched and believe might become good performers based on that research. Most of my roses are established. I have learned that roses in a cold climate take three to four years before they have the root system needed to perform at their peak after being pruned to near the ground each winter. I also have roses that are vigorous enough and healthy enough (in my conditions), so that they are growing and blooming exhuberantly in this cooler wetter summer. I now have a list of roses that impress me every single year, my failsafe roses, so to speak. For my climate and my conditions the fail safe roses are: Folksinger, Redoute, Lillian Austin, Prairie Sunrise, John Davis, Northern Encore, Lilian Gibson, Hawkeye Belle, Prairie Harvest and the Crocus Rose. All standouts, all peak performers year after year. This summer, possibly because of the apparently ideal growing conditions, and also perhaps because this is their third season, some others have also begun to stand out as well: Evelyn, Charles Darwin, Teasing Georgia and Abbe de Cluny are all, healthy, happy and booming exuberantly. They are also sprouting new growth and new canes and obviously planning to put on another major show soon. Some new varieties I have planted this year, based on much research and mulling are: Geoff Hamilton, Caramel Antique, Christopher Marlow and Antique Fairy Tale. Based on their first year results, health vigour and rebloom are all very impressive. We'll have to wait to see how they do after a Northeastern winter though. I already have five or six under achievers on the shovel prune list for next spring and have decided to trial some more of the Brownell roses, based on the results of the two I already grow, Break O' Day and Orange Ruffles. Wishing you all a rosey summer. Cheers, Rideau Rose Lad - aka - Rick

Jim, what is the date of the GE fall trade? The Seattle Tree Fruit Society has a show November 1st I want to attend (I have an apple I need to ID). If the dates don't conflice, I probably have some cedar seedlings and seeds for yellow Zucchini (gold rush) and green zucchini as well. I'd be interested in your Ligularia dentate and the Chinese lantern flowers...no dahlias available until Spring. Christine

Posted by poisondartfrog 7a (My Page) on Thu, Oct 17, 13 at 7:37 I agree, Meta Givens is the absolute best! Totally,...and another thing, we have the movie "Superman Returns" starring Brandon Routh, with Eva Marie Saint as Martha Kent. At the start of the flick, when Supes "returns" from space after having been gone for 5 years, searching hopefully for possible survivors of his home planet's untimely demise, his crystalline spacecraft comes streaking in over the Kent farm, causing quake-like tremors before it crashes in a field. --"Yo, Cryptid, get to the freakin' point already!"-- Anyway, as the camera pans around Martha Kent's dining and kitchen area, clearly visible, next to her radio, are Meta Givens' volumes of her "Modern Encyclopedia of Cooking." - Signifying what? Nothing, really, just something I picked-up on is all. :) - One of Roy's super fave movies that he likes to watch over, and over, and over, and over, and over,...--sigh-- This post was edited by cryptid on Fri, Oct 25, 13 at 0:04