Dogwisteria

In the center of my back yard, is a tree I call the dogwisteria. It's a big old dogwood with an enormous wisteria vine threaded through it. During the spring there are a scattering of white dogwood blossom's followed by summer's lavender clumps of grape-like flowers. In the autumn, the wisteria leaves turn yellow as the last of the reddened dogwood leaves are falling.

The English ivy vines which also wind their way through the tree become a little more visible when the branches are winter-bare. That's when the brown furry wisteria seed pods, which look like hanging mice, can also be seen. At the tag end of winter, a small forsythia growing out of a rotted bit of trunk at the base of the tree has a spray of bright yellow flowers.

I love the dogwisteria best in the summer, though, when it is an unruly mass of leaves and vines. The squirrels eat the corn I hang from it and birds splash in the birdbath under its shade. It's a constant battle to keep the invasive wisteria from sending its runners into the yard in an attempt to send up new plants, but I wouldn't trade this mysterious dogwood/wisteria/ivy/forsythia for anything.