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Related: Culture Forums, Support ForumsAs the trout illies and spring beauties peak, the red buds are just beginning to show color while
the backyard magnolia blossoms are spent for another year. The forsythias are dropping their yellow flowers onto the soggy ground and dogwoods, red buckeyes and lilacs are still "coming attractions".
In the part of the meadow we have claimed for our lawn, smaller even than the three inch tall spring beauties, are literally thousands of what I can only call "micro-blooms"---matchhead size four-petaled flowers that range from blue to pink to white. The temporary carpet colors the sod beneath blooming peach, cherry, plum and apricot trees.
The edge of the hardwoods teems with the regal trout lillies and the make-me-smile dutchman's breeches nodding under wild sloes in bloom.
Why am I pointing out all of this? It's my way of taking inventory of beauty that might go unseen or taken for granted as I prepare to spend the day outside where spring is taking place.
Later.
2naSalit
(86,862 posts)I am awaiting the spring blooms. Currently it has yet to be above freezing for more than a couple hours and there's still six inches of snow on the ground. We do our planting in May, sometimes June and much of that is started indoors in the coming weeks.
True Blue American
(17,995 posts)Last edited Sat Apr 16, 2022, 04:04 PM - Edit history (1)
And tulips blooming like crazy.
2naSalit
(86,862 posts)And usually get doused with snow within the first 48hrs!
Things are changing here, we're six weeks early on a lot of things and many plants that used to be large and healthy now look like desertification is coming fast. It's getting creepy.
True Blue American
(17,995 posts)May be light frost tonight.
Wicked Blue
(5,859 posts)If so, they are called bluets, or Quakerladies.
Atticus
(15,124 posts)they are tinier. They are literally the size of a match head.
TNNurse
(6,929 posts)they are smaller than Bluets and grow up in the grass. There are several names.
Atticus
(15,124 posts)pink or lavender and sometimes nearly white.
TNNurse
(6,929 posts)Botany
(70,616 posts)... when the Claytonia virginica is up and blooming. Our native plants work "lock and
key" with our native insects and so on. Gotta have the natives to support the ecology.
Thanx for posting.
Do you have any bloodroot, VA bluebells, or trillium?
Atticus
(15,124 posts)lands not far away, they are plentiful. They were Mom's favorite.
May apples are up, but no "Jack's-in-the- pulpit" yet.
Botany
(70,616 posts).... cut off the whole stock and put it into a paper bag and leave it in a sunny window for
2 weeks or so. Then just dump the contents of the bag on the uphill side of piece of firewood
or small log after you have raked some leaves and and or put some compost/planting mix
there. the log should be 90 degrees to the slope.
That was so beautiful I couldn't keep up. So many descriptions of so many colors... my mental movie screen couldn't pull all that together!
Thank you.
ggma
CommonHumanity
(246 posts)We have a similar bevy of beauties that emerge here in central NC. I too watch the emergence of the spring ephemerals. The very first things I notice in spring is the greening of the moss along the creek. My totally uninformed guess on why this appears first is that as the days grow longer, the moss is able to photosynthesize more and hence, the startling green amongst the brown leaves and banks.
I'd be an idiot to think the next things I notice are the next things that emerge. They are simply what my untrained eyes notices next and they are: First in show- daffodils and similar flowers that are smaller (don't now their names) in early January in a sheltered west- facing location next to my house. Then snow bells, the spring peepers and of course, the humble star of the forest in spring, the trout lilies. I have to digress a bit here: This year the spring peepers starting peeping much later. Don't know why. They are usually the first thing I notice. I know they breed in wet areas so maybe it had something to do with a dryish winter? No idea, but I usually notice them way sooner, say January. Didn't hear them until March this year.
Red buds here have already dropped there luscious purple flowers (I love how they emerge on the actual trunk of the tree, not just the branches) and the magnolias and forsynthia have bloomed and moved on too. Tulips came on fast and many are fading. Native azaleas now line the banks of the creek and tiny native iris are scattered on the woodland floor. The buckeye is leafed out and even the poison ivy has emerged (I know it is native and beneficial to the birds, but oh how it plagues me).
I grew up in NJ and then lived in Western Massachusetts. I still marvel that here there in the NC Piedmont something is in bloom every month of the year. The wild asters end in December and the daffodils and camellias grace us in January. Something else that astounds me, even after 25 years in the southeast, is that the ground stays soft and penetrable almost every day of the year. During winter in Massachusetts the ground was frozen as hard as concrete when not covered in snow. I remember reveling in the earth becoming soft some time in March and how good it felt under my feet.
As you've surmised, I too notice and take inventory in the reemergence of life each spring. I feel so fortunate to be in a place where I can see and become familiar with the earth's infinite wonders. I think of people in bleak urban settings and war zones who cannot witness this firsthand. It pains me truly, probably because I count on the beauty and evidence of life and goodness to renew my spirit and soothe my soul. I don't know where I'd be without it. The earth is my north star, so to speak.
True Blue American
(17,995 posts)Ally my perennials are coming forth now. I have a great big snowballs bus,( hydrangea) and am getting more colors in. Not sure why I havent before. My DIL planted a hydrangea tree. Pink and white.
A tiny primrose is just coming up. They are spreaders. My creeping moss is in full bloom. Hanging over a wall.
RainCaster
(10,930 posts)Of the beauty around us. We all need that on a daily basis.
Nictuku
(3,619 posts)... but only last week I was wishing for more rain. April Showers and all....
We didn't get a lot of rain over the winter here in California. Everything turned green back in November, but it was already starting to turn brown -- before Spring even officially began!
So I was wishing for Rain.
And we had some for a day.
Then a couple of days later another good day long soft rain (the best kind).
A day of windy sun and now last night/today, it is rather stormy.
As I write this post the sun came out!!
It will be clear for a couple days, and then ... more rain!
I couldn't be happier. My countryside is turning green again! So this will give us a few more weeks of Spring, and I couldn't be happier.
April Showers Bring May Flowers.
Ocelot II
(115,903 posts)except for the pile by the alley. Some of the trees show vague signs of budding. Maybe there will be flowers in another month or so.