Looking For Winter Interest

The barren time has a firm grip high on the low spot of a North Carolina mountain top. The very first winter up here I knew I had to do something to mitigate that. I needed some winter interest for the barren time. Heck, I needed something, anything, that said garden for the six months of the year when all is dead and brown.

What I had was a vast expanse of herbaceous and deciduous. What I needed was evergreen and some structure.

I had something else that not many gardeners get with a new garden, an existing garden folly. It was a bit lost in the tangle when I arrived. Slowly it has been cleared around and new plantings added. In the barren time the entire folly is visible. During the time of vegetation, the foundation disappears.

It's on the list to one day maybe cut down the trees growing inside the folly and shore up the chimney's foundation. One day.

At the moment I am still a bit too busy with work to spend much time checking on all my baby winter interest. On a short stroll yesterday I got to see the holly berries. They don't often last long. Most years they get devoured by migrating birds who use the low spot to pass over the mountains.

I did plant some Chokeberry, Aronia sp. in my part of the garden. They are still small of course and a few years away from a good berry display.

Art makes good winter interest too.  I love the Blue Pot art project, but the background has never suited it well. It needs a blank wall or a dense evergreen hedge to really set it off.

The Posh Estate #2 got a nice piece of art, structure and winter interest today. The fountain for the entry garden arrived.

It has a pineapple on top.