Violets

We're Blooming and Leafing

There is a lot going on right now.  And a lot of it is going on early.  Most people I talk to make some comment about how the weather is freaking them out.  My response is something along the lines of, it may be freaky, but we can't do anything about it, so let's enjoy it... because if you ignore the fact that its mid-March, it's perfect weather... not too hot for an early morning run, warm enough to read outside all afternoon, but not so warm that you get uncomfortable weeding, and then cool enough in the night time for sleeping under the covers with open windows.  

BUT... if you want to add more data to the freak-out part of it... I could include photos of about a hundred things, but no one would bother to scroll through them.  Here are some highlights. 

Violet

 Violets flowered today, which have previously been noted in early April...

Bloodroot

The bloodroot started to open... over a month earlier than last year (April 21 they looked like this), and a couple of weeks before 2010 bloom-time.

Hepatica

Hepatica isn't quite open but it's close, I mean, this flower will be open tomorrow.  Again, this is exactly how they looked on April 21 last year.  Same with the trillium and mayapples (Aprilapples, this year?), below.

Trillium

Mayapples poke through the soil.

Ginger leaves emerging from the earth.

Other things to report...

• A lot of surprising leaf-outs, including...
• Crab apples leafing out (3/16)
• Willows catkining and leafing out (3/17)
• Wasps extremely active (3/18)
• Currants leafing out (3/17) 
• Maple-leaf viburnum leafing out (3/18)
• And today, there were tons of millipedes undulating their way across the trail.  I was trying to avoid them, but it became too difficult, and eventually, I had to just decide that some myriapods are in the wrong place at the wrong time.
• Spice bushes flowering (since last week, but I liked this photo:) 

Everybody's Out...

...enjoying the beautiful weather. Yes, we finally got one of those days -- one of those weekends, better yet -- when you can sit outside, unmoving, and feel warm. When the temperature feels like summer although the colors are still early spring. A day that smells like sunscreen. One of those days when the slog through winter seems worthwhile, because we got to this, and it's marvelous because we waited so long for it.

And everyone is out enjoying it. We saw about 20 turtles, sitting on a log and soaking in the day. As we approached, they one by one plopped into the water, and then re-emerged, the sunbathing too enticing and the people too distracted by the little skull they found:

(About 3 inches long, non-rodent, not a lot of teeth... present or originally, for that matter).

Dragonflies were out, too... happy day!!! I first saw him as a flash, just that, that disappeared into the trees, but I knew that nothing else shimmers the same way in the sunshine. When we stood still and watched the pond, we were able to see several darting past, soaring and diving. They were male green darners and none alighted long enough for a photo op, but that's OK. We've got months of odonata watching ahead of us.

Snakes were out, although the only one I saw disappeared quickly into the grass. Frogs were out, also, calling loudly but there was also a froggy plop, animal unseen, as we approached the water.

The bugs were out, flies and gnats swarming... yesterday I saw my first wasp, and today I saw several more. First mosquito, too, although it is no more.

This tick (left) hitched a ride on my pants but didn't make it to my skin, thankfully. I also took a picture of this velvet mite, a much friendlier little arachnid, because the red dot caught my eye.

Spring ephemerals certainly aren't out in strength yet, but...

this hepatica decided to grace us with a bloom today, and violets are in full force. Others are just leaves yet, spring beauties looking like grass and trout lilies barely distinguishable from soil. But soon, soon... we're behind this year. Hepatica flowered on April 2 last year, and I still haven't seen even the leaves of mayapple or bloodroot poking through the soil (which were also noted on April 2 last year). I hope this isn't because mine are dead! But I feel like every year, I think they've died and every year they do eventually show up. Fingers crossed...

In the garden, carrots are planted now, and almost our entire front yard is covered in cardboard meant to smother the turf grass. We're putting in another native garden. Best, I still had time to sit outside and read lazily before the clouds rolled in and the winds became annoyingly strong a few minutes ago. I think I just heard thunder. Perhaps time to go close all the windows and doors? (I guess that's the beginning of the cold front, as today's 85 degree high is supposed to be followed by the 50's tomorrow.)

April Fool

I'm not sure what's up with me lately... the past few days have been perfectly lovely and I have been thoroughly enjoying them... but I haven't felt like blogging too much at all. I suppose it's natural for my excitement about things to wain. Anyhow, I felt obliged to go out and snap a shot of this flower -- name still unknown -- that I photographed on April 12, 2009. I noticed them blooming on Tuesday, so they bloomed over a week earlier this year.

I also wanted to get a shot of the scilla, (which I know I blogged about last year, too, but I can't find it...anyhow...) They actually just opened up in my yard, although I know that I've seen them open for days in other places. Not sure why mine are late bloomers. So out I went to take some pictures of these two purple blossoms, when I was thrilled and surprised to find...

VIOLETS! Which were definitely not open on Tuesday, or even close (yesterday I was in the city, far enough south that many things are a couple of days ahead, so can't say what happened then). Anyhow, I posted a sketch of these violets on April 11 last year, but that was not on their first day of flowering, so I can't say if they, too, are ahead of '09. So the violets motivated me a bit to blog, and to keep exploring.

This cultivated flower also opened up yesterday or this morning. It reminds me of bluebells, and was the inspiration for me planting some of those, which I have not noticed yet so I am hoping they do come back. Now, here are some more baby pictures that I can't resist posting:

Hepatica flower buds grow in the middle of a cluster of lobed leaves, which actually seem to grow under the snow. Their white fuzz seems to almost glow in the morning sun.

Baby bloodroot.

I noticed these geraniums on Tuesday, but then they were all curled up little pink blobs (as the one leaf in the middle of the photo still is). Their color was quite pretty and unique, but today the leaves have opened up and turned reddish.

And... look how close we are to daffodils!

It's supposed to be around 80 today, and sunny, and I am going to go enjoy it... I'm just wondering... will it snow next week or something to make up for this?

Yard Ramblings

My scanner adds a whole new dimension to blogging. Actually, I quite prefer carrying a sketch book and a pencil to carrying a camera... or, I guess I should say, I prefer sketching to taking pictures... but it is a lot slower, and surely less accurate as well.

Above is a sketch of the tiny white violets that are blooming in several locations of my yard. Despite being violets, they are not purple except for the very base of the bottom petal -- the part that cups the pistil and is, in my drawing, cupped under the stem at the right side. The reproductive parts, which I tried to show in the small sketch to the right, are orange and yellow, coming to a triangular point. They are almost enclosed in the soft petals; yet the way the petals fold back at the top makes the whole thing seem inviting. Come in, it says... and if you do, a faint sweet smell will greet you, almost sticky. I am also quite taken with the fringe that surrounds the pistil, making this ordinary lawn plant seem exotic and special. The delicate, irregular flowers grow in clumps, with several flowers and many basal leaves originating from the same place. The clumps themselves grow in clumps... To many, they are weeds, since they manage to grow in lawns among the grass. I take the opposite view, that grass is the interloper that doesn't belong here. That the yard would be better off if the wildflowers took back over.

So each year, a little bit more of my lawn becomes garden. This year, the new garden space is mostly in vegetables, but a few natives will find their way into the edges as well. And meanwhile, conflicted, I will continue to care for the turf grass that is so poorly adapted to this area that, unwatered, it turns yellow midsummer. (This is the fate of my lawn. We will mow and feed; I will stress out about bare patches and having a yard that doesn't look like a magazine picture. But I draw the line at watering that stuff.) One day, perhaps my whole yard will be a small island of native wilderness in the midst of an ordinary subdivision...

But that day will not come soon, because native plants can be expensive at first. In some places -- like my mom's yard -- native seeds remain under the soil and come up without prompting. If I were to leave my yard alone, the only native plants that would grow would be progeny of those I have nurtured over the last five years; and only those that were strong enough to fight through the multitudes of buckthorn and box elder seedlings.

Box elders. The "black" sheep of the maple family (tee-hee). Another yard-dweller about which I am firmly ambivalent. My yard, and my neighbor's, have several ginormous ones growing between them. Based on the number and size of the box elders and buckthorns growing in a line, I am fairly certain this was once a hedge row between two fields. Now, it is a pain. I removed the buckthorns from my yard before I even moved in. No ambivalence there -- those things had to go. The neighbors still have theirs, including the largest single buckthorn I have ever seen, poisoning the soil just two doors down. I spend a lot of time fighting with the seedlings, which sprout all over, planted by birds who think they have hit the jackpot but are actually getting a strong laxative which causes them to, um... plant the seeds before they can get much nutrition out of the berries. Anyhow...

I didn't remove the three huge box elders on the edge of my yard. They're not particularly desirable trees. Actually, I rather dislike them. Their little seedlings sprout everywhere. They grow fast and therefore aren't very strong, so they're a storm danger. Their fast growth also means I have to pay someone to trim them pretty often so they don't hurt the roof or other trees. On the other hand, they provide shade for my garden of lush ferns, which also has May apples, jack-in-the-pulpit, wild ginger, a shooting star that actually comes back, wild geranium and lilies of the valley (not native, I know, but they remind me of my grandmother and they smell so delicious). If I got rid of the box elders, these would probably all die of scorching. Even if I replanted something I wanted, it would take years to reach a size that shaded the area again. Not to mention how much this whole endeavor would cost.

So for now they're here, waiting to be trimmed again, but meanwhile starting to bloom. As the twig sketch above shows (or is trying to show), they're covered in clusters of burgundy stamen. They're still tightly packed together, but within a day or two they will spread out and start to make the million seeds that will go everywhere. Curled up and wrinkly, the compound leaves are also emerging, but are still teeny-tiny.

Why do so many of the plants I hate so much show up so early? (I could actually write paragraphs in answer to that, but right now it is meant more as a lament than a scientific question...) And why, if I claim to be a nature-lover, do I have such negative feelings toward so many of the organisms that share my yard with me?