Bang! Spring arrives early
GARDENING AT LARKSPUR HOLLOW — A relatively mild winter and this week’s record breaking temperatures have brought everything on in the garden in a rush. By Liz Knowles
Spring arrived with a bang this year.
By Liz Knowles
I have kept a garden journal with temperature records for 20 years now, and even though the “normal” for April 5th is 8C, the temperature rarely hits the mark. This past weekend it was 25C, three years ago the high was minus 3C, while last year we had eight inches of snow on April 6th.
Drifts of snowdrops punctuated by yellow winter aconite. Photo by Liz Knowles.
A relatively mild winter and last week’s record breaking temperatures have brought everything on in the garden in a rush: snowdrops in the hundreds of thousands, crocuses in a rainbow of colours, buttery yellow winter aconite (Eranthis hyemalis) and Iris reticulata have all come into bloom well ahead of their normal schedule.
One tip: try to locate bulbs in several different places in the garden so the bloom time can be staggered.
Iris Katherine Hodgkin in the grass garden. Photo by Liz Knowles.
Clumps of Iris Katherine Hodgkin started to bloom in the south facing grass garden on March 25th and are now almost over, whereas they are just now coming into bloom in the colder heather bed on the north side of the house.
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Liz Knowles gardens at Larkspur Hollow in the Hockley Valley.
