Raleigh Bloomsday

It’s the ides of January, and for the first time, I’ll be looking outside for blooms on the day designated by Carol at May Dreams for a monthly posting.

Her own inspiration is the Raleigh garden writer, Elizabeth Lawrence, and this location does seem like the place to fulfill that dream of year-round bloom.

What a gentle, sweet luxury it is to have a blooming planter in January, to be able to photograph the delicate tracery of spider webs on an ordinary viola.

Though the white blooms on an inherited camellia sasanqua, cultivar unknown, are tinged with brown, I can’t complain.

I have flowers outside in January.

Still in the pot and only in bud is new upright flowering hellebore x ericsmithii ‘Winter’s Bliss.’

Hellebore ancestry is a bewildering subject, and as usual Tony Avent explains it thoroughly and well. Suffice it to say this hybrid of hybrids (h.niger x h. sternii) produces lovely white flowers that can be photographed without laying down. You can see how this caulescent/acaulescent cross’s flower stem emerges directly from the ground.

Another caulescent (stemmed) variety that will keep the pine needles out of your hair is this h. foetidus.

It’s possible these faded, papery pink blooms are actually bracts rather than flowers on abelia ‘Francis Mason.’

Finally, a baby camellia sasanqua ‘Yuletide’ holds onto one last bloom into January. Look at all that pollen spilling around.

Carol hosts Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day the 15th each month and is well worth a visit anytime.

Advertisement