By June Walsh

Winter in the Moss Family Temperate Woodland Garden at Humboldt Botanical Garden brings new colors and blooms after the exuberance of Spring and Summer. The deciduous trees, magnolias, maples, dogwoods, red bud, Styrax and Stewartia colo rtheir leaves yellows, browns, and brilliant reds before shedding them for winter to show their beautiful naked branches and trunks. 

The Rhododendron arboreum ‘Leonardslee’ will begin to relax its leaves to hang vertically, showing their silver backs. The leaves will continue in this relaxed mode until the flowers emerge in March.

The large leaves of Rhododendron falconeri ssp. eximium will be shedding their woolly coat of cinnamon indumentum through the rainy season. In early spring the new leaves will stand tall and cinnamon brown.

Winter blooms of Camellia sasanqua, Polyspora, Schima, Encore and Satsuki azaleas, 

EXTERNAL IMAGE

Rhododendron kiusianum and fragrant Luculia will brighten a cold and rainy day.

Rhododendron arboreum ‘Rubaiyat’, which is in the garden near the greenhouse, 

with its deep red flowers can be seen from across the garden through the winter gloom. The “big leaf” Rhododendron protistum, which is nearby, will show off its giant dark pink flower trusses beginning in January and continue through February.

Every day is a delight to visit the Garden, but winter holds a special charm. Information about Humboldt Botanical Garden can be found here.

All images courtesy of the author, June Walsh, UC Master Gardener of Humboldt and Del Norte Counties.