This week marks that magic moment when our days finally become longer than our nights.
While there is no guarantee that any of these days will actually have the sun shining, it is at least encouraging to know that the potential is there to experience, on the average, three more minutes of daylight every day from now until the summer solstice.
With the promise of more sun as we move into spring, I do what I can to appreciate each day as it unfolds.
One way I do this is by frequently taking inventory of what is blooming in my garden. I don’t go as far as keeping a journal, although at one time I made a New Year’s resolution to chart the progress.
The idea was that I would track when each plant in my garden came into bloom and for how long, so that after 12 months of note taking, I would have a gardening chart for future reference. (Like most New Year’s resolutions, however, this idea never quite came to fruition.)
Instead of perusing my own garden, this week, just for fun, I toured the nursery I own in Marysville to see what was blooming. I came away with an impressive list. Here is what I observed.
Bulbs: I found six different spring flowering bulbs in full bloom including daffodils, hyacinth, crocus, fritillaries, snow drops and pushkinia.
Trees: I observed four blooming trees including Cornelian cherry, flowering plum, an early blooming cherry and a weeping pussy willow.
Shrubs: I found 11 different shrubs in bloom, which included camellia, quince, pieris, daphne, winter hazel, forsythia, skimmia, stachyurus, viburnum “Dawn” and two early blooming rhodies.
Perennials: Believe it or not, I observed 18 different perennials in bloom, including primrose, hellebore, heather, wall flower, iceland poppy, euphorbia, English daisy, vinca, candy tuft, aubretia, arabis, saxifrage, veronica, pulmonaria, bleeding heart, cyclamen, brunnera and viola.
Now, the point here is not to make you feel inadequate for not having many of these plants growing in your garden (although I am not above shaming you into buying some) but rather to invite you to tour your favorite garden center and see for yourself what might be missing and worthy of incorporating into your little patch of heaven.
Obviously, most of us don’t have the luxury of planting all of the above plants simply because we have neither the room nor the energy to maintain them. But surely, one or two more shrubs, a handful of bulbs, and several perennials would go a long way to adding more interest to the garden. If you wait until April or May to do your shopping, you will miss these early bloomers entirely.
If it sounds like I am groveling for customers, I suppose there is some truth to that, but mostly I want you to be able to experience the same degree of pleasure that I receive having many of these precocious plants in my garden at a time of the year when we all could use a pick-me-up.
It’s amazing how one or two brightly colored flowers can lift our spirits on an otherwise cloudy and gloomy day. Go take inventory of what’s blooming in your garden and see if you don’t have room for a few new happy faces.
Steve Smith is owner of Sunnyside Nursery in Marysville and you can reach him at info@sunnysidenursery.net.
Spring lawn care
A free class on everything you want to know about taking care of your lawn in the spring is 10 a.m. March 25 at Sunnyside Nursery, 3915 Sunnyside Blvd., Marysville. For more information visit www.sunnysidenursery.net.
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