Photos: House Yard

[ysabetwordsmith]

Today was unseasonably warm and sunny, so I took pictures around the yard. The first few are from indoors, then the rest are the house yard. (See the savanna.)


Several of my Christmas cacti are blooming. This one is hot pink.  It actually bloomed in winter already and is reblooming now.  I have another that is lighter pink and one that is white, also blooming, but those dropped their buds when I first bought them so this is their first actual bloom.  Buds on this type of cactus are super fussy, so moving the plant usually means the buds will fall off.




All my red curly willow cuttings are leafing out.  These things grow super fast!  I just got them March 2.




The ones in water are already starting to root. Last night these were just tiny white dots. Today they are little root bumps!

I got to thinking about why willows would root so fast and pour out rooting hormones.  Most are wetland plants.  During a flood, twigs are likely to break off.  If they can root, then they may establish where they wash ashore.  Pouring out extra hormone may help other wetland plants like cottonwood or sycamore sprout from loose twigs too, thus perpetuating a more complete ecosystem.




This is the view looking east over the house yard. The grass, which had held a bit of green all winter near the roots, is now much more green and has growing tips.




The barrel garden has many tulips and other flowers sprouting around the base.




The rain garden has many more crocuses blooming now.




The purple-and-white striped crocuses are blooming in the rain garden.




This flower isn't even fully open yet, but this honeybee is determined to squeeze inside.




Flies, native bees, and other tiny insects are pollinating these white crocuses.




The goddess garden also has lots of flowers.




This whole cluster of lavender crocuses is blooming.




The first orange crocus is blooming.




This is winter aconite.




More flowers are blooming along the front of the log garden.




These crocuses are pale yellow.

Comments

[kazzy_cee]

Crocuses come in such nice colours, don't they? I have some white ones this year and they are really bright.

Yes ...

[ysabetwordsmith]

I have white, lavender, purple, purple-and-white striped, yellow, and orange. A few are purple outside and white inside. I've had some that were sort of bronze outside and yellow inside.

Some of the fall-blooming crocuses are pink, but I haven't grown those.

[cmcmck]

Lovely to see some Spring colour.

Thursday here was 17c but yesterday just 7! Crazy or what?

Yes ...

[ysabetwordsmith]

It was 75F here today. The upstairs got to 79F. But tomorrow is supposed to be mid-60s.

[shirebound]

Lovely scenes, thank you! It'll be such a joy to see crocuses and daffodils and anything else colorful starting to bloom here.

You're welcome!

[ysabetwordsmith]

The daffodils only have buds thus far, but the miniature irises are blooming. :D

[bookscorpion]

What a lovely walk, thank you for taking us along!

[ranunculus]

Do you have a garden "book"? I got a blank book, have made sketches of the garden and have noted what I plant and where. Sometimes that means I have two or three sketches for the year, especially in the vegetable garden. It also means I remember what trees I planted, what the names of the irises are and so on; without leaving the tags in the ground. Sadly the book wasn't started until I moved to Ukiah, so I'm still looking up names of plants that are transplanted from Henry St!

Thoughts

[ysabetwordsmith]

I do not. I am terrible at recordkeeping. Also, I often plant wildflowers as mixes so the only way to tell what sprouts is if I recognize it.

[yourlibrarian]

Those purple crocuses are so pretty -- glad the bees are finding them!

Our Christmas cactus had a couple of blooms a month later. Historically they have been very much true to their name, blooming in December. This was unusual for ours.

Yes ...

[ysabetwordsmith]

Mine usually bloom in December too. Occasionally they rebloom closer to spring.