Green mass of roses.


Lilacs are blooming!


So are many of the backyard shrubs.


Azalea Hill.


Backyard views.

its been a cold rainy sleet ridden day BUT I got all the roses trimmed

Rita your yard is glorious !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hurry for rose trimming. I did my spring rose prunning back in early mid March. I am already spraying the roses every two weeks to prevent blackspot. Can't stand blackspot.

Cropping was the only edit to the first photo.

Easy Does It


Wild Thing Shrub Rose

Love those colors on them both.

Hope everyone had a good Mother's day, whether you're a mom or not! I picked up some more plants... some at Lowes (clearance rack!! $1.75 for phlox!!) and 3 roses at Tagawa's (33% off!! Ended up being $24.99/ea) and I had a coupon to boot ($5 off a purchase of $50). So I picked up a Twilight Zone (no buds on it, but had a MASSIVE bud union), a Adobe Sunrise (http://www.helpmefind.com/gard... I don't care for Star Roses, but I love the color!), and a Bolero (http://www.helpmefind.com/rose...). I'd been wanting Bolero for a few years, but always went over that one with something else. Today was the day, though.

I have a Sonja in my yard. I've had it for years now (well, not THAT many years.. I think 2010 is when I got it). I find it to be one of my most prolific bloomers.. survives my zone VERY well, isn't too fussy about water, grows like a weed. Only 2 things I don't like about it: the color (not one for pink roses) and the scent. I find it to be almost offensive. It smells VERY heavily of pepper to me.. stinky stinky. I hate it. I don't even like trimming/dead heading it because I get the stench on my fingers & find it hard to wash off. I saw Sonja today at Tagawas and, just out of curiosity due to what HMF says, sniffed it. I found the one at the nursery to be a pleasant rose smell.. not stinky pepper. Any idea? Mine probably totally mismarked? Or do I just have a stinky one? Funny thing is that my coworker doesn't find it to be offensive.

Did no trimming today on winter kill (most of the roses I've trimmed are down to the dirt unfortunately), but rather planted & fed a little bit. Started work on my annual bed in the very front, pulled out a gazillion dandelions (how DO they grow SO fast?), planted creeping phlox, pulled dead off of agastaches. Anyone want some vinca? It's going wild in my yard!! Doesn't matter if it's full sun, partial sun, no sun.. this stuff is a WEED! Also pulled out a million bindweeds. Now THAT is a horrible plant! Have some kind of wild really ugly morning glory growing everywhere. I am pulling this up everywhere I see it.. the flowers are the tiniest things I've ever seen (about 1/16th of an inch) and this plant LOVES to strangle my roses. No idea where it came from, either. The Colorado Ag. Extension hadn't seen this particular weed before. Transplanted my Rose Marie Viaud from where it was next to the house to over on the fence line. I didn't think it was honestly that big. Last year I thought it was this teeny itsy bitsy plant about 2-3' across and was creeping along the ground. I thought the two HUGE 7' canes were from Orange Velvet (I had, in a row, Rose Marie Viaud (http://www.helpmefind.com/gard...), Orange Velvet (Rose (Rosa 'Orange Velvet')) and Charles de Mills (Gallica Rose (Rosa 'Charles de Mills'))). But when I did dig it up, it was actually all from Rose Marie Viaud. I probably won't get any blooms from her this year because I disturbed her so badly, but I didn't want her to get ruined when the painter paints my house this week or next week and she was in a place where she could get badly stepped on / painted on. I'll be moving Orange Velvet & Charles de Mills too, as soon as I figure out where. I want to wait until after CdM blooms as he's a one-trick pony & I love his blooms so much that is the only reason why I put up with his HORRIBLE HORRIBLE prickers/thorns. Not a single rose I have has as many thorns as my CdM.. and according to HMF, he's supposed to be nearly thornless. Ha! He's the worst of the lot! He could teach George Burns about thorns (Rose (Rosa 'George Burns')). Moving CdM is gonna be a painful process, I can just see it now! When I got dressed this morning, DH was trying to figure out why I was wearing heavy jeans. Then when he saw me digging around in the roses, then he understood. But my arms got pretty badly scratched up too.. and some thorns chew right through gloves!

Pretty tired, but a good kind of tired I think. Now I need sleep!

Productive day, Toni.

Took some pictures this morning. Compared to everyone else, my yard is so depressing. Almost makes you wanna get drunk to forget.

First, my annual bed. I just put in the pansies / petunias / marigolds, so they're not very full yet.


Got pictures of Adobe Sunrise.


My pond area. Please excuse the big mess... You can see the untrimmed roses.. haven't gotten to them yet.


With the last snow we had, I lost almost all the flowers on my trees / lilacs. I got one.. count it ONE flower on my Red Plum "Thunderchild"


I have a couple of wild plum bushes on my property. Every time I dig them up, doesn't matter because they sucker bad & within a year, I have another bush! But they do produce edible plums & their flowers smell GOOD. I have a few flowers on one of them.



My staghorn sumac is still completely dormant.


This is what happens when I get a freeze & I have flower buds on a lilac. I don't think I will get ANY lilacs at all this year... This is Mount Baker. All my lilacs are pretty much the same with burnt flower buds.


Only a few roses have more than 2-3 leaf stems on it. One of which is Camayeux that I got from Melva a few years ago.


Theresa Bugnet is another that has a lot of leaves, all things considering.


This here is about what almost 100% of all my roses look like. I don't even know who this is.. but you can see how far back I have to cut.


Pandemonia is also leafing out nicely compared to everyone else.


Only other thing other than dandelions / thistles growing like mad in my yard is the vinca. This past snow REALLY got it going! In this section, I believe there's 3 roses buried in the vinca.


So you can see why I want to cry when I see beautiful yards. Mine's pathetic.

The annual bed looks very pretty.

for the distress

thanks, but I know it looks like crap. what can I do? I can't control the weather... I just have to survive it.

oops

Just got an email notification. I had forgotten that I had put in an order with Santa Rosa Gardens! They're being shipped out right now.

1 Ceratostigma plumbaginoidessub http://www.santarosagardens.co...
3 Penstemon barbatus Riding Hood Blue http://www.santarosagardens.co...
3 Penstemon barbatus Riding Hood Red http://www.santarosagardens.co...

guess I get to watch the mail again!!

I would be very interested to know how the Penstemon progress.

I do well with penstemons.. one of the few things that doesn't blink an eye with our bad weather here or our altitude.

I liked the photo of both red and blue, so I might try them next year when budget permits.

potulacas


terraces


Left front yard and unfortunatly, the tulips are done in there.


Right front yard. This middle raised bed I call the plantwerbox needs a lot of work. TB is starting to bloom along the very front.


backyard views


Eggplants are a new veggie for me and planted in pots.


This veggie garden used to be a TB iris garden.


The back patio is a favorite hangout of mine.

Newyorkrita said:The back patio is a favorite hangout of mine.

Me too! I'd love to hang out in your back patio!! Gorgeous!!

thanks! It looks so pretty with the azaleas blooming.

Got this rose last year after admiring Zuzu's every time I saw it. This is Austin's 'Grace', just exploded into bloom.


Clematis 'Multi Blue' is winding it's way through Grace, a nice combo I think. (fighting the snails who love to chews the petals)


A wildly colored bud on Aloha Hawaii


Graham Thomas is growing next to the bench under the satellite pergola, large flowered clematis 'Ramona' is gradually reaching out to join GT.


Clematis bloom, Ristimagi, hanging out next to Buff Beauty rose


Vesper


Helen Hayes


Lady Emma Hamilton


Clematis 'Franziska Maria' is getting ready to open her first bloom and looking pretty cool already!


The morning sun is climbing and lighting up the garden a little at a time

Lots of beautiful flowers everywhere.. and lots of snow in the mountains here.

http://www.denverpost.com/brea...
ROCKY MOUNTAIN NATIONAL PARK — Crews are working to open Trail Ridge Road in advance of the summer tourism season.

Officials from Rocky Mountain National Park reported on the parks' Facebook page that as of Tuesday, there was 16 feet of snow at Upper Hidden Valley; 17.5 feet at Rainbow Curve and 18.5 feet just west of Rock Cut.

The 11-mile stretch is the highest continuous paved road in the United States. The road climbs to an elevation of 12,183 feet on the route from Estes Park and Grand Lake.

The scenic route is usually open by Memorial Day.