Waiting for Spring

It is about 20 degrees outside and there is snow on the ground, so I have to look at photos from last year to keep my spirits up.  Although, there are a number of plants that look great right now including the yellow and red twig dogwoods, the grasses, and my beloved beech trees, but it's just so cold out there.  This is why you landscape in such a way that the views can be enjoyed from the inside of the house!

I do hear the winter birds gathered around the feeders whenever I let the cats in and out.   There are some very pretty songs going on out there.  Need to add "Install an outdoor microphone hooked to indoor speakers to hear the birds indoors" to my list of things for "him" to do.

Here is a lovely little clump of mosses I typically sees while walking down the path to the shelter house. It is a mix of reindeer moss from the woods around Dale Hollow Lake and some native moss.  The reindeer moss doesn't seem to want to establish here in my woods.  I collect a bit every once in awhile and bring it home.  It is such a nice texture and color in a woodsy setting.  I have a photo from several years ago of a hillside at Dale Hollow Lake that is just covered with it.  The effect is very fairytale-like.  You would expect to see tiny nymphs and gnomes in such a setting.

I mentioned the large witch hazel (Hamamelis virginiana) in the Jens Jensen landscape I worked on last summer in an earlier post.  Here is a photo of it from March 2009.  My six-foot tall son is standing next to it, so my estimate is that it is at least 30' x 30'.  I think Michael Dirr would find this one to be a contender for National Champion.  He lists one in Bedford, VA at 35' x 30' in his fifth edition of "Manual of Woody Landscape Plants". 

I need to go out and check my Hamamelis vernalis in the nursery for signs of blooming.  They bloom in late winter as opposed to  the H. virginiana which bloom in fall.  I found a large colony of witch hazel in the woods last summer, but did not think to check for bloom in the fall.  So I will check them this winter for signs of bloom and solve the mystery as to their species.  I will have to pull on the winter boots for that trek.