Sunday, January 18, 2009

We're in deep today

We had six inches of snow last night. Here's what the buried gardens look like.

The view I get stepping out my door


The four-square garden and its boxwood hedge

The rock garden plants snug under blanket of snow


Toby does not look amused: he's bored when I take out the camera

© Yvonne Cunnington, Country Gardener

8 comments:

jodi said...

Toby DOESN'T look amused...but he's sure amusing. I glanced down quickly at his photo from watching the Inaugural festivities in our neighbour's land, and thought Toby was a polar bear! It's that darn bifocal problem...

Country Gardener said...

Hi Jodi: Toby's pet name is "Bear". Yes, he looks like polar bear, and he loves the snow because he's part husky.

Thanks for stopping by. Cheers, Yvonne

Country Gardener said...

Hi Salix: Like you, I'm always glad when we get good snow when the temperatures drop. I wonder what havoc all those voles and field mice are creating under that blanket of insulation.

Since we live not that far from each other, we really must make plans to meet in person in the spring.

Cheers/Yvonne

Country Gardener said...

Hope to see you this summer, Salix. Coffee or wine (depending on the time of day) is on us. -Cheers, Y

Salix said...

Thanks, Yvonne - looking forward to it.

Ninni said...

Hi Yvonne :) While blog surfingm I found your lovely blog and have added you on my bloglist. I really love your design and website! So many beautiful pictures, flower/grasses/hostas etc! I'll come bak and look for more summer pictures so I see how your garden look like when not coverede with snow. Courious on the gravel area! Ninni, garden nerd from Norway :)

Country Gardener said...

Thanks Ninni, and welcome. I don't know how close to Norway we are in climate. Here in southern Ontario we're not as far north as you are, and we get hot and humid summers. Do you?

Ninni said...

We live one hour south of Oslo and have pretty warm climate compared with the rest of the country. But it seems that your area is warmer and far more humid. The summer temparature mostly varies from 20-25C with some rainy days, but mostly sunny. I'm not so in to your ranging of climate zones, but in Norwagian standard we live in Hardiness zone 3 which is pretty mild climate here.

The American zones are basically based on minimum and maximum temperatures as far as I know. They don't regard other climate circumstances which are very important in Norway. Fx the stability of the snow cover (until january we had barefrost),the lenght of the day (the sun turns 21.12, at that time it's dark from 15.30 in the evening until 08.30 in the morning. Now the day is one hour longer than at the turning point), the amount of rain in the summer (the rain fall in the summers varies from 0 mm in june - august to over 100 mm). The biggest problem with the Norwegian winters is the alternation between minus and pluss degrees. So it's difficult to compare the two climate zones.

In the warmest part of my garden the micro climate is very good. Not windy as the rest of the garden. Here I plan to try a hardy palm :)

I saw your winter pictures with snow and became corious of the climate. Regarding your lovely ornamental grasses as well. They manage cold winters? Maybe it's wintermoist that is the biggest enemy? There are SO many beautiful grasses, but exotic grasses are mostely grown in containers here in Norway and moved in fx basements in the winter. Fx sorts of Festuga and Carex manage the winters without any problems. Could you be so kind to name some of the grasses that lives the winters through in your borders? Do you plant them in gravel?

Apologise my rather bad english...:)

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Thanks so much for visiting and taking the time to comment. I enjoy hearing from you, and will do my best to respond to your comment.

-Yvonne, aka Country Gardener