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Technicolor Winter

© Carol Wallace

Stacks of interesting catalogs should be winging their way to your home as you read this. Some of them may be in your mailbox now. And if so, you may want to go get them, sit down and do a bit of serious thinking about ordering some plants that you can still get into the ground this fall. Gardening season may be winding down, but that shouldn't mean the end of a beautiful garden. Even for people in the frozen north there are plants that can add interest in winter. And fall is a great time for planting.

Everyone thinks of evergreens when we talk about winter color. But why settle for green? The old, old pines in our yard are so dark against the winter sky that they may as well be black. And winter has enough black and grey as it is. I'm talking about adding real color!

If you must have evergreens, why not try gold? Goldthread chamaecyparis pisifera 'filifera aurea' is like having a spot of sunlight in the winter garden. Many so-called evergreens come in golds that turn bronze in the winter. Thuja "Rheingold" turns a brownish bronze that cause many to falsely conclude that it is dead. But it moves too softly in the breeze to be dead, and is actually a bright russet that adds life to the landscape.

I always hated yellow and gold in the garden until I planted the goldthread chaemi. But looking out the kitchen window at this golden spot silhouetted against the old dark pines never fails to give pleasure -- so much so that I decided to play up that kitchen view by ordering still more things that bring life to the winter landscape. There were many other conifers to choose from. I was entranced with the columnar juniper, Juniperus scopulorum 'Moonglow" , which is not green but a silvery, intense blue. Picea pungens 'Compacta' is more of a powdery, icy blue. Chamaecyparis pisifera 'Boulevard" is almost silver (and soft as a teddy bear!) Andorrah juniper turns lavender-plum in the cold. All are a pleasant alternative to green. And it's not too late to order and plant them now. Check the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens on the best way to grow these gems!

But all of these, other than the golds, are perhaps a bit cold of hue, too icy to lift our spirits in the gloom of winter. We want fire, and brightness! What better than firethorn (pyracantha)to light up our view? This is not something you want to put near a path, as it really is thorny. But it is also as fiery red as its name implies -- a warming sight on a cold, snowy day.

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