Flowering Now - April 2009

[WimB]

Now in flower here:

Androsace sarmentosa
Anemone trullifolia
Aquilegia akitensis
Epimedium grandiflorum var. higoense 'Saturn'
Gysophila cerastioides
Pinguicula grandiflora
Prunus
Ranunculus traunfellneri

[ranunculus]

Lovely shots, Wim ... your images are very 'fragile' and that is not a criticism in any way, it is an admirable quality.

[gote]

I tried to send this yesterday but got the message that I now have forgotten but meant that the "input box" was too full
I try again.
Since I have a REAL winter when everything is dead I am obsessed by early flowers be they tiny or not 
Here comes the tiniest of tiny.
#1: A generous person gave me a few small balls of Erigenia bulbosa = 'Harbinger of Spring' (Or 'Pepper and salt') This is the first year and I assume it will be somewhat larger next year. I is about 5 cm high now.
#2: I often loose them but Thlaspi stylosum is a favourite of mine.
#3: Not quite so small is Chrysosplenium alternifolium. It is supposed to signal that this is a good place to dig a well. It is literally called goldpowder in Swedish and Strindberg once wrote a (metallic) fairy tale about the copper-snake (Slow worm) and the gold powder at the iron spring under the silver linden.
#4: Japanese temple gardens seldom have many flowers but one can sometimes find the odd Heloniopsis orientalis (This is v. breviscapa).
None of these is very spectacular but they are nice and EARLY-
Göte
 

[Paul T]

Gote,

You may not think they're spectacular, but I'm quite taken by #1 and #4.  Both look rather intriguing.   I grew #3 at one point but didn't really think much of it (and it died, so it obviously didn't think much of me and my conditions either.  ).

[Maggi Young]

So many lovely plants  beginning in all our gardens... what a delight.
This is a collection, laid out on a 3ft  by 2ft ( approx 90 cm x 60cm) paving slab, of all the rhododendrons in flowers in my garden today. There are about 66 , I think!

[gote]

Gote,

You may not think they're spectacular, but I'm quite taken by #1 and #4.  Both look rather intriguing.   I grew #3 at one point but didn't really think much of it (and it died, so it obviously didn't think much of me and my conditions either.  ).

Thank you for your sympaty with the tiniest of tiny.
Australia is probably to hot/dry for #3 which as I tried to say is an indicator of high water table.
I am biased in its favour because of the "human interest". There is (slight) flavour of fairy tale to it - even without Strindberg.
Göte

[Otto Fauser]

So many lovely plants  beginning in all our gardens... what a delight.
This is a collection, laid out on a 3ft  by 2ft ( approx 90 cm x 60cm) paving slab, of all the rhododendrons in flowers in my garden today. There are about 66 , I think!

(Attachment Link)

Maggi , what a charming kaleidoscope of Rhododendrons , suitable for a postcard to send to your friends -we here have to wait till august for the first ones to flower -there must be
about 130 different ones in my garden - mostly species .

[Gunilla]

So many lovely plants  beginning in all our gardens... what a delight.
This is a collection, laid out on a 3ft  by 2ft ( approx 90 cm x 60cm) paving slab, of all the rhododendrons in flowers in my garden today. There are about 66 , I think!

Lovely. Like a painter's palette.  66 rhododendrons    how big is your garden, Maggi ?

[Maggi Young]

Looking at the photo on screen I see that the yellows  do not stand out well.... work needed there , I think, to show them all to better effect.

There are around 200  rhodos squeezed into our garden which is around 2/3rds of an acre total.......I have the metric area worked out somewhere! There used to be more than 300 but over the years some have been dug up and sent to the gardens of Friends.  They flower from January right through the year, with the summer and fall flowers coming from those plants generous enough to give "extra" blooms.
My main summer flowers will come in August....at least  I still hope so....eventually, ... from a R. auriculatum..... but I have waited these 24 or so years so far for the first one..... I intend to keep waiting!!

[ranunculus]

Not a windy day then, Maggi?   Super idea!  I suppose you got your head gardener to sweep them up?   

[Paul T]

Maggi,

Wow!!!!!  Stunning!!  So many Rhodos!!! 

Gote,

I bought #3 about 2 hours drive north of here where they grow it quite happily, but they are in a moister area than we are, plus they water way more than me because they are a wholesale nursery.  I wasn't aware of it's high water requirements, so if I try it again I will sit it in a pan of water.  I particularly like your #4, but haven't come across it before, and #1 because it is so tiny (which is very cool). 

[Maggi Young]

Not a windy day then, Maggi?   Super idea!  I suppose you got your head gardener to sweep them up?   

 It was a lovely still morning, Cliff, though getting duller and breezy now.
Head Gardener disporting himself in Northern Ireland at the AGS  Ulster Group 70th anniversary show, so any tidying had to be done by me, shock horror!

Here they are now.... all scooped into containers with water.... be good to see how long they look good 

[johnw]

Marvelllous rhodos Maggi, greatly enjoyed as we await the first which looks like it might be keiskei Yaku Fairy x pemakoense.

In bloom today, Shortia galacifolia after a long cool Spring - tough as an old boot and braves everything.

johnw

[Ragged Robin]

Wow Maggi, your Rhododendron blooms are a real picture and I am amazed at how many varieties you grow - your garden must look wonderful after the winter.  Sadly I can only grow rhododendrons in containers as I have never had a garden with acid soil but grew up with ones that were 50 years old or more in Perthshire, so seeing them in such splendour always bring back happy memories.....

[Rodger Whitlock]

Sanguinaria canadensis 'Multiplex'

This planting is about 20 years old and has slowly spread into an irregular circle a meter or so in diameter.

Growing in heavyish, damp soil mulched every autumn (if I don't forget) with oak leaves, plus a natural mulch of leaves of a Cercidiphyllum japonicum and an Acer circinnatum that grow overhead.