I just discovered that a poky stand of purple flowers I’d admired earlier this spring in the backyard has turned into salmonberries! I ate one–kinda tart, but good. I understand that salmonberries were an important part of coastal Native Americans’ diets, and they played a big part in pemmican.

Another of my white plants has just started to blossom: the crimson rock rose. My white garden’s off to a beautiful start!

First, the most delightful thing of all: we just got a porch bench, and sitting there quietly, one can hear the almost constant soft buzzing of hummingbirds swooping from branch to branch. I didn’t realize how many there are, or how often they feed (hmm, is there a hummingbird Heisenberg principle?)–just today they took the full feeder down to the last drops.

Now for the abundance of buds: (abudnance?)

These will be Concords later on; all three grape plants are still in buckets, waiting for me to decide where to lodge them for good. They don’t seem to mind so far.

Did you know that’s what asparagus does if you don’t cut it? Rather pretty, I think.

And pea flowers, just because I’m so delighted that they finally decided to get on with it and bloom.

These second-year rhubarb crowns are doing quite well, considering the deer ate them down to nubbins last year, poor things.

And finally, the beautiful strawberries that rise triumphantly from the soil–these are not the strawberries I’ve grown in other gardens. Bred specifically for the Northwest (I’ll have to look up their name), they furl their oversized leaves early and bear their berries high. They’re my starberries, if you will.

Here’s the first bloom of a really healthy mystery plant.  I’m pretty sure it’s a camellia of some kind. 

My friend T.M. went to the Northwest Garden Show last week and came back with lots of ideas, particularly cement sculpture ideas. I thought I’d try making pressed cement plant labels (I got the letters from Michael’s) to try and keep track of all the Rhodys and other stuff I’m figuring out or planting myself.

That would be a kind of rhododendron; I’d otherwise never be able to rattle off the name. Just how do you pronounce that, I wonder?

The Tasha Tudor in me is burgeoning once again.  The past few days, I’ve been happily prepping the garden, pulling winter weeds, and putting in the first planting of spinach and peas.  Today in the bright sunshine it was warm enough for a T-shirt!

My best helper: digs great holes, picks up, examines and smells caterpillars, carries rocks for me.

A half-cleared garden bed, complete with holy glowing weed bucket.

And the crocuses in dainty full bloom.

We trimmed back the gargantuan clematis for winter, and look what we found hidden inside it:

The nest doesn’t seem inhabited, though I saw a couple of little birds (sparrows? finches?) resting on it today.

Also, thanks to our temperate climate (zone 7!) the roses are blooming yet again. Here’s a bud from the Princess of Wales rosebush: