Usually, I don’t comment on the weather. By the time you read this, it might be dark and stormy. But today, the sky is blue, the daffodils are sporting sunny yellow faces and the flowering plums are bursting with color.

The flowering trees and shrubs of tropical Maui are behind me, and I’m back in our temperate rain forest of redwood trees and all things green. Sure, a few early blooming shrubs are flowering this time of year and are a welcome sight, but I look for color in other places. If you’re looking around your garden now and see mostly green, here are a few suggestions to brighten things up.

Steelhead are referred to as the fish of a thousand casts. That statement may be true if you’re lucky!