GBFD Emerging from the snow

For a couple of weeks there hasn’t been much foliage visible in My Hesperides Garden; snow buried everything but now green is emerging from white and colour returns to the garden.

Prostrate rosemary, even more prostrate than usual

Snow can damage evergreen plants; pushing down the branches; the box were splayed open.  I wanted to brush the snow away and take the weight off the stems but the branches were also very brittle in the freezing temperatures and I didn’t want it to be me to cause the damage.

The beautiful early foliage of Cerinthe is more obvious than its flowers

There are new leaves on the evergreen Eleagnus

The evergreen shrubs I planted are now beginning to give the structure I wanted to the planting.  In summer with herbaceous plants flowering they tend to fade into the background but in winter with, or without, the snow they add form, mass and height to the borders.  I like the solid form of this Eleagnus  – it has formed this shape naturally, I haven’t pruned it to make it solid.  If possible I choose plants that will grow into a beautiful shape naturally as I’m not keen on plants that have been pruned to death!

Today the 21^st the sun is shining and the temperature has risen significantly, from hardly topping zero centigrade to today’s warm 10 or more in the sun degrees.

Euphorbia rigida is anything but rigid but coloured bracts are beginning to turn their faces to the sun and suddenly it feels that spring will be here soon.

Euphorbia rigida

Euphorbia misenites is growing already

Fresh new sedum foliage

There is new foliage emerging from under the dead stems of sedum, I will have to remove the old stems and I will lift and divide the plants that are very large to increase their numbers; I would like to mass-plant some Sedum onto the bank.

Libertii peligrins is at last bulking up

Green and glossy Acanthus leaves under the Mulberry

Now that the snow has nearly disappeared I have found some blooms that weren’t visible on GBBD but in February it isn’t the blooms that make the garden interesting or that tempt me outside on an icy morning it is the beauty of the foliage that attracts.  I admit that what pleases me most is that it is still light at 17.32 and will be for another half hour, and the beautifully marbled leaf of Huchera ‘Plum Pudding’

Huchera 'Plum Pudding'

What foliage is giving you pleasure at the moment?  Do leave a comment and link to your post on foliage this month.  It can be about just one plant or your whole garden, whatever you like.