Signs of Life

The weather was slightly warmer this morning, and so far no new snow, although we have been warned to expect several new inches starting tomorrow thru Saturday. I walked out around my flower beds (in my robe again) and noticed my first signs of life. This first shot is some of my daffodils starting to show their face through some light remnants of the last snow.

I then checked on some cuttings I had prepared late in the fall. These were from my Flowering Crabapple Tree. These trees are beautiful in the Spring. My husband mentioned he would like some more of these. This morning I noticed they have some new growth buds on the branches in several spaces, so I am very optimistic these will take. Hardwood cuttings taken in the late fall or in winter are very easy to do. Just snip off some younger branches , dip in hormone, and stick in the ground. They wont do much of anything until weather starts warming some. In early Spring, and Fall/Winter are the best times for cuttings, then you dont have to worry so much about them drying out. Here are what the Crabapples look like this morning. Notice the arrows pointing to some of he new growth.

Here is another cutting I did late last year of a new plant I bought.It is Clethra ainifolia "Ruby Spice" Summersweet. During some wandering around a nursery in Ohio while touring on our motorcycle, we kept smelling this wonderfully sweet scent. We kept walking around until we found the culprit. Mind you, when we first started smelling this it was probably 20+ feet away. What we found was a variety of Summersweet. it wouldnt exactly fit on my motorcycle, so I went home empty handed. Later I found this variety in Lowes on a final clearnace of 90% off. It was supposed to be 75% off, but the manager thought it looked a little scraggily, and sold it "GAVE" it to me for 90% off. The only thing I seen was one twisted branch. The plant was nice and green. I took a few small cuttings of it right after planting. This is how one of them looked this morning. As with the Crabapples, it has a small bud.

With all this new growth, I hope Spring cant be far behind.