Few things are as restorative as those first few hours in the garden in spring... I was headed over to work on the lakehouse when the garden beckoned me. Whispered my name, that minx! Today was that perfect late winter day when it's warm and dry and the buds have just barely started to swell. Splendid day to prune.
I snipped and snipped, cutting back bayberry, smoke bush, sage, and cleared away old stalks of giant allium. Last spring, none of this got done, so the garden was a riot of overgrown shrubs; messy and confusing. All year it was a reminder that my health had failed, preventing me from playing in the yard. To reclaim this spring rite is an act of defiance, a bold declaration that I am regaining my health this year.
Three barberry were 4-6 feet tall, leaping into the driveway. I spent a lot of time really looking at the stems, seeing where they want to bloom. Then cut everything back to about a foot, since the fresh growth is that light rose pink, contrasting with dark burgundy leaves on old wood. After all that precision, I was grateful that sage likes the ponytail cut. I gather the stems in a ponytail, and whack everything off the same length. No attention to joints, just cut across. Each year I do that, it flourishes, in a three-way mix of purple, green, and white.
Oh! And the most unexpected find: a native Oregon Grape is happily growing between the Mandarin Lights azalea and the hydrangea.
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