The Winter Garden
This has been the year for success in the winter garden.  Lettuce in all shapes and hues has been plentiful and shared with the neighbors.  Tasty dishes have been prepared with kale and chard.  The collard greens will soon be ready and garlic planted in October has sprouted and is being fed and watered, after all, the 2004 herb of the year is our versatile friend GARLIC!  The only disappointment is the continual devastation to spinach plants, they sprout and are quickly cut down before we can even anticipate a salad.  The culprit is unknown but it is clearly not our most common pest, the snail, as the leaves are left resting on the soil.  Perhaps the third time of planting will be a charm.

Flowers in the Garden
January usually brings bountiful blooms of crocus, paperwhites and white "cemetery iris".  This year the crocus and paperwhites are blooming throughout the yard but there are no iris blooms to be found.  Perhaps our drought is to blame.  Austin ended the year 2003 twelve inches behind our annual rainfall.  We have only had light frosts so there are a few rose blossoms around the yard, 'Mutabulis' being the most plentiful, as well as a few blooms on a 2003 planted Salvia involucrata and an old Salvia 'Indigo Spires'.  If our temperatures don't fall too low we are on schedule for a wonderful spring flowering of nasturtiums and sweet peas.  No flower buds seen yet but the plants are large and healthy looking.

Try a spectacular houseplant
Ann Marie purchased a Murraya paniculata plant from Logee's Greenhouse several years ago without knowing anything about it other than the catalog description.  What a wonderful purchase it has turned out to be!  One of the common names for this plant is "orange jasmine" but the scent of the flowers is even more heavenly than that name suggests.  With its glossy compound leaves it makes a nice potted plant for the shaded patio in the summer and indoors in winter.  The flowers are white and appear periodically year round.  Following blooming, green fruits appear which turn a deep red when mature, absolutely spectacular with the dark green foliage.  Native to China, Southeast Asia and the Malay Peninsula, it is not hardy in Austin.  According to the University of Florida  Extension Service web site it is a desirable plant for USDA zones 9b-11.    It is reported to grow to a height of 12 feet with a spread of 15 ft when grown in the ground, but growth has been slow in Austin and it is working well as a small windowsill plant for Ann Marie.  In addition to being used as a landscape plant in frost free areas, it is often frequently used as a bonsai specimen and must truly be charming when it is in bloom.

NEWS FLASH - Well known herbal expert Dr. Arthur Tucker will be the keynote speaker for the 2004 Herbal Forum in Round Top, Texas.  He is an exciting speaker and not to be missed!  Contact Festival Hill for more information.