Scented spirit lifters for the chilly season

Winter jasmine, Jasminum nudiflorum - a bit worn down by the ice storm, but still spreading its sunny fragrance in the cold. 

Despite being lucky with not loosing power or having any other accidents due the snow and ice storms last week, I do feel a bit worn down by the weather... so to cheer me up, I decided to write a list of my favorite plants for the dark, chilly season.

I love scented plants, which shows in my list below. If choosing between two otherwise equally suited plants for a situation, I almost always pick the fragrant one of them. With their perfume, scented plants add dimension by offering pleasure for one more of our senses. Often, they conjure memories and feelings from days past. Sometimes, scents can be healing, like the heady, fresh smell of lavenders that has scientifically been proved to be calming (one of my favorites...). I mostly think of flowers when considering scented plants, but of course even whole plants can be aromatic, from the tiny herbs we use for cooking to the huge cedars and firs of the northern hemisphere and towering Eucalyptus trees of the southern.

Luckily, the gardening year of the Pacific Northwest is never without something fragrant in season, even if the leaden skies and slushy snow of mid winter can otherwise be quite oppressing to one's mood. As a remedy, here are some of my favorite, scented "spirit lifters" for the season, all amazing plants to be included in any garden at the colder latitudes. 

Winter honeysuckle, Lonicera standishii from China, has the same kind of fresh honey scent as its summer flowering relatives.

**

Have I worn down you with my witch-hazels yet? Hamamelis x intermedia 'Winter beauty' is gently lemon scented with deep apricot glow.
*

Sarcococcas have such modest, little flowers, but their perfume carries far with the winter winds. They flower from December to February, and are excellent near entrances with their fragrance and glossy evergreen leaves.

The delicate scent of snowdrops... do I need to say more?
*

Viburnum x bodnantense 'Dawn'; I love it in theory, but in practice its pink flowers often become mottled with brown after the slightest touch of snow, which always looks dull. Their heady perfume lingers around from the darkest November to late February.
**

Many cyclamen are slightly scented, but you need to go down on your knees to detect it. Lovely combination here with the cinnamon bark of a Stewartia monadelpha.
*

The waxy flowers of Chimonanthus praecox have a strong, spicy scent that reminds me of some of the Actaeas. Describing scents is such an undeveloped area, the only tool available seems to be comparing them to something that is more well-known... 

*

Daphnes are well-known for their highly scented winter flowers, but they are sensitive to cold and snow. Mine have turned yellow after the ice storm and will probably loose their leaves in the coming weeks. Luckily, they usually recover, but look pretty shaggy until the new leaves develop.

*

Spanish lavender in my front yard, now

...and the bees are busy.

A scented escape

Chimonanthus praecox, also called Japanese allspice or fragrant wintersweet tree; its waxy, white flowers with burgundy eyes emit a spicy perfume.*

I've been chasing a story that seems to escape every time I think I'm getting nearer. Instead of pressing myself in front of the white screen, I fled to the Washington Park Arboretum, hoping to find an opening or at least some fresh inspiration. Instead, I captured portraits of some fragrant, winter-flowering shrubs that were generously spreading around their uplifting scent of spring. So I'm happy, even if still no closer to my teasingly evasive story...

*
The evergreen Himalayan Sarcococca, Sarcococca hookeriana var. 'Humilis'; taking in just one twig fills the room with its wonderful fragrance.
*
Winter honeysuckle, Lonicera standishii, originates from China. Like most honeysuckles, it is highly perfumed, but flowers in mid-winter. This photo does its own tricks; the twig should be horizontal with the flowers hanging...
*
Winter jasmine, Jasminum nudiflorum, opens its sunny, bright flowers before its leaves emerge, just as its Latin name indicates. Also highly scented, it is hardy and tolerates pretty much any type of soil.
*
An unidentified witch hazel, Hamamelis x intermedia, is one of my favorites. I love its soft scent that I think is a mixture of honey and lemon.

Winter hazel, Corylopsis spicata, comes from the woodlands of Japan and is related to the witch hazels. Its hanging, greenish yellow flowers emerge from bare branches in early February and continue to bloom until late April, forming an excellent background to small spring bulbs, Hellebores and other early bulbs and perennials. It has a very delicate, honey-like scent.

*

Fragrant raw material for making Washi

The furry, soft buds of Edgeworthia chrysantha, just opening to reveal its bright, yellow flowers.

**

Given the mild climate of the Pacific Northwest, gardeners here are spoiled with a wide choice of plants to enliven their gardens through the rainy, foggy winters. As a result, I've been been acquainted with a completely new palette of shrubs and other plants that would never survive either the cold Scandinavian winters or the hot Australian summers; some of them attractive for their scent, some for the flowers, and a few lucky for both.

The nodding buds lift up their heads, eventually forming a globe of yellow flowers.

Paper bush, Edgeworthia chrysantha, is one of these happy new discoveries. For the moment, an old specimen is starting to flower at the Bellevue Botanical Gardens nearby, so ventured there to get a closer look. It wasn't quite open yet, so I couldn't detect any scent, but it is described as beautiful, Edgeworthia being part of the family of Daphnes so well-known for their heavy fragrance. It has a similar form too, as the new stems reach out in 45 degree angles from the older branches. Ultimately, it becomes a bush of about 5 ft by 5 ft, but it can also be grown as a single stemmed, little tree. Edgeworthia is very picky of its growing conditions and requires heavy loam and a sheltered location with no major frosts to thrive. Its flowers are quite insignificant, yellow tubular ones growing in tight clusters, but they are really wonderful when still in bud, covered by a silky, silvery hair, soft like rabbits ears if you touch them.

Trying to get a glimpse of the reluctant buds...

*

I've always loved Japanese paper, those light-weight, translucent sheets that reveal a fine structure if held against light, which can be found in good art supply stores. So I was quite intrigued to find out that Edgeworthia, or Mitsumata in Japanese, is actually one of the three most common raw materials for making Washi, a Japanese paper used for calligraphy and printmaking. The Grove Encyclopedia of materials and techniques in art tells that the Japanese farmers have since the 10th century cultivated Mitsumata to make paper during the cold winter months; low temperature discourages mold growth and tightens the fibres to produce crisper sheets. The fibre from the inner bark is washed and beaten by hand and foot in the clear running winter streams (I shiver even at the thought of this), then cooked with wood ash and washed again several times before it is set in bamboo and silk screens and processed further to become sheets of smooth, glossy, insect-resistant paper.

*

The Japanese tea house at the Bellevue Botanical Garden; traditionally, Washi was used to make screens and windows for Japanese houses.

Edgeworthia is still used to make Washi paper today, even if I suspect that only few farmers produce it with the ancient method described above. And even if yellow is not my favorite color in the spring garden (besides Hamamelis, I usually find white flowers from Narcissus to tulips a bit more attractive, even if I'm not fully consistent on this...), I think Edgeworthia with its wonderful scent and interesting history would definitely be worth a try in a garden with the right conditions.

*

Witch-hazels against mid-winter gloom

Hamamelis x intermedia 'Orange Beauty' in full bloom at the Witt Winter Garden.
*

The witch-hazels are out again, spreading their spicy honey-scent around in the winter-wet gardens of Seattle. Two years ago, I wrote about witch-hazels and other midwinter wonders in the Witt Winter Garden at the Washington Arboretum, and yesterday, I decided to check out how they were doing this year. Wonderfully, as my pictures can tell.

*

Hamamelis x intermedia 'Winter Beauty' with burnt orange stamens that darken towards the maroon flowers.

** *

I'd always thought that the name 'witch-hazel' had something to do with the plant's many medicinal qualities - it has been traditionally used as an astringent and to prevent hemorrhages - but Vita Sackville-West tells otherwise in her Garden book. She writes that the early settlers of North America took the characteristically forked twigs of the native Hamamelis virginiana and used them for water-divining, as they had used hazel-twigs back in England. The plant got its name from this as any twig that would twitch in the hand had something to do with a witch or a wizard in the old days, at least according to Vita.

*A Hamamelis x intermedia cultivar with a bit darker orange ribbons... it looks a lot like 'Jelena', but I couldn't find a name tag to confirm my thoughts.

* *

Besides the three native North American species, Hamamelis virginiana, H. ovalis och H. vernalis, the most beautiful witch-hazels come from China and Japan, as so many other distinct garden plants. Hamamelis x intermedia, a hybrid of Chinese H. mollis and Japanese H. japonica, has produced many garden-worthy species. Their flowers are like tiny fireworks, cascades of them exploding with both colour and scent from the twisted branches. As a picked flowers, witch-hazels are long-lasting and capable of filling a whole room with their fresh, spicy scent.

Hamamelis x intermedia 'Fire charm' has pinkish red stamens with delicate, white edging.
*

Sometimes I entertain myself by making mental lists of plants that I would like to have in my garden in Saltsjöbaden. Witch-hazel always comes up there within the top ten or twenty, and luckily, there are several cultivars I could plant even in the cold climate of Sweden. As Vita says, they are tough and will grow in any soil and any aspect, though the better they are treated, the better they will do (she adds that this applies to most people too...). I think a little grove of them would make cheery sight together with the thousands of snowdrops that already thrive under the big oaks, brightening up dreary mid-winter days. As it seems now, I still have some time to decide which cultivar to choose from the all tempting alternatives...

I think I'll go for the 'Orange Beauty' - its lucious, citrusy colour scheme can truly chase away the gloom on a dark winter day.
*

Giant Himalayan lilies

The Giant Himalayan lily, Cardiocrinum giganteum, in full bloom beside a velvety Hydrangea aspera at the Bloedel Reserve gardens. I'm sorry for the poor photo quality; it was difficult to catch the lily in the bright sunlight...

**

A real photographer never takes pictures in full sun, I read somewhere; he or she only works on over-cast days, during the tentative light of the early morning, or in the warm, soft glow of the evening. But I rather accept the less than ideal conditions than leave things undocumented... Like on last Saturday, when my dear, non-gardening friend Tina was on a brief visit from Berkeley. I just had to show her the Bloedel Reserve, one of the greatest gardens in North America, and despite the relentless high noon sun, I tried to catch a picture of the Giant Himalayan lily, Cardiocrinum giganteum, that was in full bloom, towering almost 10 feet above the soft, humus-scented ground of the gardens.

*

I first met these huge, regal lilies in Marian's garden last year, and have been fascinated by them ever since. Originating from the lush and fertile mountains of the Yunnan province in China, they were discovered (to the eyes of the Western gardeners...) by Scottish plant explorer Robert Fortune in mid-19th century. Giant Himalayan lilies can be cultivated at least in Danish gardens, but I had never seen as far up as in Stockholm; I would be very interested to know if anyone there has grown them. They are quite expensive to buy as bulbs, but as they do not like transplanting, they are safer to grow from seed. Their journey from seed to a flowering plant takes five to seven years, so they are definitely not something for gardeners expecting instant effects; therefore, they remained a collector's plant even in climates well-suited for cultivating them.

*

A tuft of leathery, glossy leaves of young Himalayan lilies, not yet ready to flower.

*

During the first five to seven years, the lilies only make large tufts of glossy, leathery leaves. Then, when the bulb is mature, a tall shoot emerges from the centre carrying narrow, jade-green flower buds. In the middle of summer, the buds start to open one after another, from the bottom of the raceme and upwards, revealing the large, white bell-shaped flowers with a touch of burgundy in the throat. The flowers emit a heady fragrance during the night-time; only one lily plant is enough to scent a whole garden. After two weeks the Giant Himalayan lilies finish their flowering and if left in place, the dry, soaring stems will fill the air with sparkling, translucent seed. Exhausted by their magnificent performance, the mother bulbs die after flowering, leaving their offspring in the soil, ready to start the long cycle of life again.

*

Browsing through some gardening literature, I found some quite eccentric advice on how to plant Giant Himalayan lilies. Miss Gertrud Jekyll, for instance, advised on digging a hole of one cubic yard, filling it with compost and manure, and tossing in a rabbit before planting the bulbs. Major George Sheriff, a Scottish plant hunter and botanist who visited the Himalayas, went further and recommended digging a far larger hole, as according to him only a dead yak will do being a native to the same area as the Cardiocrinums.

*

I guess the rabbit would be the most realistic option for a home gardener like me, and even then I would be quite concerned about the local dogs getting wild about my gardening methods... But given how long time it takes for the lilies to flower, I won't be growing them any time soon as I don't know how long I will be tending my present garden; it would be too sad to leave them before they flowered. So I guess I just have to be content with admiring them at a distance.

Blooming in the midwinter mist

An old, unidentified Camellia sasanqua variety flowering in my garden.

For the moment, Washington state seems to be one of the few places in North America saved from the hard winter storms, experiencing milder than average weather. Rain, fog, and again rain... In Scandinavia, winters are a time of complete calm and rest in the garden, all mistakes of the last year covered by snow and the next season existing only in dreams. Here, the garden year continues through all seasons, with no forced breaks to relief the tired gardener. Every month and week, there is something flowering or otherwise in season; so many possibilities to add to your enjoyment and to the beauty of your garden.

K

I was just looking at my post about Witchhazels and other midwinter wonders from January 2009, and found that it could have been written now. Actually, I think that post was so much more beautiful than this (being a mere list of plants in bloom), but I still want to document some of the flowers out in gardens this January. Maybe next year will be a lot colder, and then it will be interesting to come back and see the difference...?

K

The gracefully arching Sarcococcas are in full bloom; kneeling amongst the bushes at the Washington Arboretum I tried to find a label that would tell which species I was admiring, but there was none to be found. Could this be S. confusa?

And Witchhazels, one of the first out again; the Chinese species Hamamelis mollis with its bright yellow stamens reaching the sun in the wet, cold weather.

Mahonias seem to have many enemies; earlier I also thought them to be quite unattractive and coarse in appearance. But lately, I've started to appreciate how their flowerheads burst out like fireworks in the midwinter sun. Here Mahonia x media 'Arthur Menzies' finding its way to the sun through a thicket of Witchhazel bushes.

Lonicera stadishii, Standish's honeysuckle, comes originally from China, and grows up to large bush, ca 6 feet tall. It seems to be semi-evergreen here in Washington, and the fragrant, white flowers open up in the middle of the cold of winter.

Viburnum tinus, the Laurustinus, is a Mediterranian native and the last plant on my list today. It was a great favourite in the Victorian shrubberies, and I've always thought there is something prudish about its neat and proper appearance (nothing luscious or extravagant here...!). It has dark green leaves and pink buds that open to clusters of tiny white flowers and turn into black-blue berries in late summer. It is very resilient and tolerates even drought during summers, and therefore still very popular in gardens in temperate zones. A common and not very exciting plant, really, but one that still earns its place in many gardens as a hardworking performer.

Witch hazels and other midwinter wonders

It is only my first winter in Seattle, but I already disagree with all reports of a rainy and dull place that would better be avoided. Instead, I have fallen in love with these foggy and cold winter days; just look what I enjoyed this morning in the Washington Park Arboretum, only a couple of minutes drive across the lake. So many beauties flowering in the middle of January, gently wrapped in the fog, giving themselves off by their delicate scents! I first went to see the witch hazel collection in the Southern end of the Arboretum, but surprisingly none of the plants there were flowering. But then, I fortunately had better luck in the Witt Winter Garden, near the visitors centre.

K

Most of the witch hazels at the Arboretum are of the Chinese species Hamamelis mollis or Hamamelis x intermedia, which is a hybrid between the Japanese witch hazel Hamamelis x japonica and H. x mollis. Especially lovely is the excellent, strongly scented cultivar of H. X intermedia 'Pallida', here in full bloom, looking like clusters of lemon zest are hanging from its branches.

Another beautiful, but less scented cultivar is Hamamelis x intermedia 'Winter beauty', with much darker orange petals. I just love the way the damp climate here makes mosses and lichens to grow so well and to cover many of the woody plants, often looking like green flowers themselves hanging to the branches.

The stinking helleborus, Helleborus foetida, with its pale green flowers in full bloom complements well the witch hazels.
K
The European hazel, Corylus avellana, is quite common in the wild in Sweden, and my garden in Sweden had many of these large shrubs growing around it and producing small, dry nuts late in the autumn. Commercially cultivated hazels are called filberts. They are most often hybrids between Corylus avellana and Corylus maxima, the giant filbert, which achieves thirty feet and produces large, edible nuts. Corylus maxima 'Atropurpurea Superba', seen here with its large, purple catkins, is a beautiful and unusual relative of these cultivated hazels.

A new find was the fragrant wintersweet, Chimonanthus praecox, which flowers for the moment with a strong and sweet, hyacinth-like scent. It seems otherwise to be quite an unattractive shrub, a bit like the more common forsythias, but in the right place, where it can hide behind showy perennials during the summer months, it definitely earns its place in a garden for its scent.

Another "friend" from my time in Melbourne, Australia is the silk-tassel bush, Garrya elliptica that I used to admire when it was flowering in the middle of the mild Australian winter. This genus was actually named for Nicholas Garry, a Secretary of the Hudson’s Bay Company who assisted David Douglas in his explorations of the Pacific North-West in the 1820s. It is both an evergreen and a drought tolerant plant, and native to woodlands in Western USA, Central America and the West Indies. The male catkins are the most attractive, just like for so many other early flowering plants as hazels and birches. An especially attractive cultivar with extra long tassels is Garrya x issaquahensis (pictured above), cross that was found in a private garden in Issaqua near Seattle for some years ago.

And just one more picture - I just loved this bird's nest up in a large Magnolia, full of silky buds. What a beautiful place for the small baby birds to start their lives in when they hatch in the spring!

Quote of the Day

In my nostrils still live the breath of flowers that perished twenty years ago.

- Mark Twain -

... or more than twenty; I just thought about my late grandfather, who asked me to smell a twig of Philadelphus flowers when I was 5 or 6 years old. He was almost blind, but he had been an avid gardener all of his life, growing day lilies, dahlias and agapanthus in Finland for more than a half century ago (he would have been 112 now if he still had lived). I still remember my surprise as he recognized the plant without barely seeing it. First later I realized how natural it would have been for him to orientate himself in the garden with the help of the most fragrant plants. He died when I was too little to really know him, but at least I know where my gardening genes come from.