All Grown Up! The Air of Spring, More Flowers and Insects

They grow up so fast! We waited so long, and finally there they were, turning up their cute little faces, so delicate and tiny and full of hope. We were so eager to see them grow, to become everything that they could be. Seems like only yesterday that they were beginning to blossom into their full potential (wait, it was just yesterday!) A little rain and a few hours of sunshine and all those baby plants have shot up to six times their cuteness, had sex, procreated and are now literally tossing their progeny to the winds. And just look at them! Violets a foot tall or more, crested with crowns of seed pods, daffodils two feet tall (or they would be if they hadn't gotten lazy and laid down all over their neighbors)

This was a problem last year, as some clumps have a hundred or more bulbs and cover quite an area with ripening leaves, so I experimented this spring to see if I could control this daffodil habit of sprawling and smothering everything else in the vicinity. I made cages for some of the clumps as they were coming up, using whatever I had on hand:  tomato cages cut in half and upended over emerging shoots, pieces of left-over fencing and 2x4 wire, made into circles and poked into the ground. This method helped a lot with the daffodils that were thus contained. They have mostly stayed upright and in check. As the wire I used was somewhat rusty, it is almost invisible under the foliage. Next year I am going to try to cage all the clumps that share beds with other plants!

If you look carefully at the lower part of this clump you can just see the wire tomato cage.

Lunaria is three feet tall, blooming wantonly all over the place, shoving its bed mates over without a thought. I nearly got bumped in the nose by a hesperis shooting up its buds while I was weeding near it. (OK, so I might have made that up.)

And those weeds! Where did those two foot tall wild lettuces come from all of a sudden, and isn't that poke over there in the middle of the hostas? And I do believe all that group of echinaceas are not really all echinaceas! What IS that big thing over there in the herb garden? It wasn't there yesterday. It might not even have been there this morning! I don't dare stand still too close to the honeysuckle, I think it might be aiming to wind me up in its waving tentacles. Tendrils. Whatever. My compost pile is so full, stuff is falling off and I have resorted to tossing clippings and weeds on top of the brush pile, and over the fence Out Beyond.

The garden is lush and beautiful, in spite of the weeds. This is an azalea, one of half a dozen that I got at $2 each from Lowe's early this spring. It is an unnamed variety, but gorgeous! I also have other varieties in white, peach, lavender and red.

False solomon's seal is finally blooming.

Just taking a breath outdoors is wonderful right now. The lilies of the valley are wafting perfume for yards around, a ferny euphorbia is honey-scented as I work near it, and there are still lilacs.. Out in the woods, deciduous holly is has a sweet, musky odor, woodland phlox is heavenly, and I just noticed today that honesty (lunaria) has a delicate aroma that you have to have your nose right into (but look out for bumble bees!) or you'll miss it. Black locust (robinia pseudoacacia)  dangles its white clusters over our heads with a tantalizing scent. The pale blue antique irises are beginning to open along the walk to the mailbox and are filling the air with the smell of Grape Nehi soda that takes me back to hot summer days and country stores of my childhood.

Grape Nehi iris.

Honey-scented euphorbia. No wonder the bees love this!

A patch of this wild camassia  found growing Out Beyond last year has more than doubled its size this spring. I've successfully transplanted a few of them into the woods and a colony of seedlings has started there.

Japanese roof iris (iris tectorum) is a beautiful spectacle in whites and blues.

Hardy orchid (bletilla) is beautiful! I see this one has been slightly chewed on a couple of petals by something, but who really expects perfection in a garden anyway!

Lamiastrum "Herman's Pride" is a glory in the spring garden, and well-behaved in clump form, unlike its similar but invasive cousin, "Yellow Archangel". Pretty with hostas, ferns and bleeding hearts in the shade garden.

The last daffodils of spring, a delicate white multiflora.

Here's a seedy fellow. On a rainy "bad hair day" a dandelion puff sports a spikey "do".

Looking equally as stylish is a pasque flower (anemone pulsatilla) seed head.

Another spikey fellow, this leopard moth caterpillar was hiding under a rotten log. It curled up into a stuborn ball and wouldn't look at me! It is a good 4 inches long and fat as my thumb. These caterpillars overwinter in rotten logs and under leaf litter and feed in the spring on cherry, dandelion, violets, oak, and plantains, among others. There should be plenty for it to eat around here!

And the last picture of the day, a pretty skipper visits Star of Bethlehem (ornithogalum).

"I was rich in flowers and trees,

Hummingbirds and honeybees."

--Whittier

Random Observations, a Matter of Perspective

Every time I walk though the garden I see things I've never noticed before. Each new day brings new perspective, and sometimes, brings things that never were before. I always learn something from Mother Nature if I just look.

Seedlings that look alike often seem to hide next to each other. This is bloodroot and wild ginger. Can you tell them apart?

The bloodroot leaves look slightly different in shape, a little thinner, and have a whitish back. But sometimes they look identical at first glance.

The tiniest flowers can have so much beauty if you look closely! These are orchid-like flowers of rosemary.

Look up! Way, way up! Wild cherry blooms 40' in the treetops!

 

This is why I grow Dutchman's pipe vine. Newly emerged pipevine swallowtail butterflies are so beautiful, and one good reason to watch the earth beneath your feet. They hatch out and rest on the gravel paths until they are ready to fly.

Hidden treasure under the leaves, morel mushrooms! So good, fried in butter.

Love them or hate them, dandelion seed puffs are gossamer spheres that catch the sun. Their seed dispersal system is a miracle of natural engineering.

Interesting little moth. I haven't looked to identify it yet but what a character! Very Stealth bomber styling!

Interesting markings this fly has. Such big red eyes!

This beautiful dwarf comfrey bloom has a curve like the Golden Spiral of the Nautilus seashell.

I thought for a second it was snowing todayI But it was only elm seeds drifting on the wind. They even fell in my coffee as I strolled the woods this morning. I can read the future like tea leaves in my cup; it means that in a few weeks I will be pulling elm seedlings out of every where!

Pretty foliage

Nasty attitude! Stinging nettle (Urtica dioica). See the tiny barbs on the stem? They are also under the leaves. Ouch! Merely touching this plant leaves you stinging and burning like fire for a long while afterwards! Nettles have many pharmaceutical benefits, and can be cooked and eaten as greens after soaking in water to remove the chemical compounds which cause them to sting. They are also an important food for many species of butterflies.

Sometimes you get a whole different perspective if you get down on your knees. I love the layers of the forest; ginger below, phlox and mayapple flowers under a canopy of big mayapple umbrella leaves.

Looking things right in the eye has you noticing things in a different way. You probably think this might be the flower clusters of some kind of a bush--but no, it's candytuft (iberis), only about 5 inches tall!

 

How does such a rough and tumble looking guy

Get a sleek, sophisticated looking lady like this?

Here's lookin' at you!

"Heart free, hand free,

Blue above, brown under.

All the world to me

Is a place of wonder."

                                          --William Stanley Braithwaite