That was sure some interesting weather we had over the holidays wasn't it? But it's over now, at least till the next time. But for now the sun is shining, it's a warm afternoon and all the plants are waking up for spring.

This daphne is just a few days or a week or so away from popping out and the roses are starting to push out new growth. It will not be long before that glorious scent of spring, daphne, drifts ac cross the landscape.

It's always a bit worrying to see this kind of growth on roses this soon in the year. There is still time for a hard freeze to hit in late January and if it does this new grow nth would freeze right off. Which is why I always try to wait to do the spring trimming of roses until Valentines day in February. And the cold December winds did in fact kill some of the top growth on the roses. But we had planned on that and had left lots of cane to trim back in spring.

Usually my first harbinger of spring are the snow drops. Which from the picture below you can see are still quite a ways from popping out. Maybe by the end of the month they will be out and swinging in the breeze. The other harbinger of spring is the sight of the groundskeepers here at Rose Villa walking along behind a fertilizer spreader. And sure enough just this morning I saw one walk past my office window pushing a spreader with lawn fertilizer in it. And what that means to an old gardener like me is that it's time to get the lawn mowers out of storage and make sure they still run.

Update, the snow drop by my office is blooming! Hurray!