Pays My Ticket When I Speed
Spring is one of my favorite seasons (along with a few others I could name), as I suspect a check of posts here would confirm. You could search on "Skunk Cabbage," just for starters, one of my standard season-markers and a topic that I believe has triggered several seasonal posts.
But it has seemed a relatively unconventional Spring here in the Pacific NW, with more than usual swings between wintry and vernal conditions. Perhaps partly due to lack of some of the standard meteorologic signals, I have not yet visited my regular cabbage monitoring stations. I did have a fortuitous sighting out the bus window a week or so ago, confirming that those flaming yellow spathes are exposing themselves!
More than in some years I am noticing the genus Magnolia. I'm not sure it had before now fully registered with me that this is another intriguing botanical instrument for judging the seasonal transition, reading across the wide variety of M. species. Or it could be if you actually knew something about Magnolias. I'm scrambling to lessen my ignorance.
There are a few that are already in full bloom here now, and the Star, a personal favorite, is thrusting out elbows and hips all over town, though not generally yet in full bloom. Interesting, since Western Garden book notes "very early." More research needed on what those earlier-than-"very early" spp. might be! WG also notes some varieties of Star are fragrant. I thought that wonderful mild scent was diagnostic.
I've been twitching over yellow M.'s for a few years now, generally settling for a few savors of mild yellow "Butterflies" at Freeway Park until I can find some yellow cucumber trees within walking distance of the office. There must be some more intense yellows at the Arboretum, but I have not yet located them. That is a major expotition.as Pooh would have it from downtown, but I try to get there at least a couple times each Spring. I now have a new impetus. I am coming to understand the deeper yellows would tend to bloom later in the Spring.
But what really got me going on this topic tonight was another recent bus sighting of two shrub-sized M.'s in our neighborhood covered with dark purplish-red blossoms in nearly full bloom. Wow! I'm going to have to visit on foot this weekend, hopefully between showers and maybe with camera in hand. From a distance these are pretty fantastic, even if parking-strip setting leaves a lot to be desired. Unclear if they are infused with color or red-purple on outside and lighter inside, but we are going to find out.
In the meantime, a few Google-pic links may tantalize, here, here, here, and here. I did not see anything on skim that quite matched my "riding-by-on-a-bus" observation, but good golly are there some lovely specimens and an astounding variety of combinations of color, petal shape, and general flower form. Maybe I could have been a cowboy, but what about a horticulturalist! [Note to employer: engineering suits me just fine for now!]
Do you observe particular plant species as determinative of Spring where you live?
But it has seemed a relatively unconventional Spring here in the Pacific NW, with more than usual swings between wintry and vernal conditions. Perhaps partly due to lack of some of the standard meteorologic signals, I have not yet visited my regular cabbage monitoring stations. I did have a fortuitous sighting out the bus window a week or so ago, confirming that those flaming yellow spathes are exposing themselves!
More than in some years I am noticing the genus Magnolia. I'm not sure it had before now fully registered with me that this is another intriguing botanical instrument for judging the seasonal transition, reading across the wide variety of M. species. Or it could be if you actually knew something about Magnolias. I'm scrambling to lessen my ignorance.
There are a few that are already in full bloom here now, and the Star, a personal favorite, is thrusting out elbows and hips all over town, though not generally yet in full bloom. Interesting, since Western Garden book notes "very early." More research needed on what those earlier-than-"very early" spp. might be! WG also notes some varieties of Star are fragrant. I thought that wonderful mild scent was diagnostic.
I've been twitching over yellow M.'s for a few years now, generally settling for a few savors of mild yellow "Butterflies" at Freeway Park until I can find some yellow cucumber trees within walking distance of the office. There must be some more intense yellows at the Arboretum, but I have not yet located them. That is a major expotition.as Pooh would have it from downtown, but I try to get there at least a couple times each Spring. I now have a new impetus. I am coming to understand the deeper yellows would tend to bloom later in the Spring.
But what really got me going on this topic tonight was another recent bus sighting of two shrub-sized M.'s in our neighborhood covered with dark purplish-red blossoms in nearly full bloom. Wow! I'm going to have to visit on foot this weekend, hopefully between showers and maybe with camera in hand. From a distance these are pretty fantastic, even if parking-strip setting leaves a lot to be desired. Unclear if they are infused with color or red-purple on outside and lighter inside, but we are going to find out.
In the meantime, a few Google-pic links may tantalize, here, here, here, and here. I did not see anything on skim that quite matched my "riding-by-on-a-bus" observation, but good golly are there some lovely specimens and an astounding variety of combinations of color, petal shape, and general flower form. Maybe I could have been a cowboy, but what about a horticulturalist! [Note to employer: engineering suits me just fine for now!]
Do you observe particular plant species as determinative of Spring where you live?
posted by Sir Gumbo at 10:20 PM
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