It’s late January and in southwestern Indiana, living through it is an exercise in patience; you know Spring is on its way, the daffodils popping up from under the leaf mulch is a sure and certain sign. But winter seems to last forever and ever!

At our place, about the only things that are green are the daffodil leaves and some of the evergreens. We’re particularly worried about our broadleaf evergreens: azaleas, rhododendrons, hollies and cherry laurels – especially the cherry laurels.
We’d discovered cherry laurels (Prunus laurocerasus)a few years back (see my blog “Skip and Otto”). We thought they were a dream come true: happy in shade, not bothered by many varmints, bugs or diseases, needing little care…Hot Dang! They resemble a Southern Magnolia with glossy dark green leaves which generally stay green all winter. Except when they don’t.

Looking Back

Back in 2018, we’d had a pretty harsh winter (at least for southwestern Indiana) with snow remaining on the ground for several days. The leaves on the southern side of the cherry laurels turned brown and fell off (see my blog “Winter Damage on Cherry Laurels”). New leaves popped out that spring and the shrubs looked just fine. (Whew!)

This winter was a little different; we got a cold spell right before Christmas, with temperatures remaining below freezing for about two weeks. For two or three nights, the temperatures dropped below zero. That’s not something that happens around here too often.

Mid-Winter Flower Effects

As a result, the hollies, azaleas and rhododendrons have dropped a lot of their leaves and look a bit naked. I think (hope) they will come back this spring. The Southern Magnolias don’t seem to be damaged, but every single cherry laurel has nothing but brown leaves and some of the leaves are beginning to fall off. Honestly, right now they look dead. We’re holding our breath and keeping our fingers crossed that they will survive.

As they’ve grown, they’ve become such an important part of our landscape and we were planning on adding more this year. But there’s not much point in adding more if our existing, established ones can’t make it during a harsher than normal winter. I’ll let you know what happens later this spring.

In the meantime, browse through your garden catalogs, plan your gardens and try not to go stir-crazy! Spring will arrive, just not as fast as we’d like it too!

Stay Green, Good Friends!

PS – the day after I wrote this, I spotted daffodils with buds!