Backyard Nature Wednesday: Waking up

Plants that looked entirely dead in the middle of January are now waking up and showing signs of life once again.

The old azalea didn't die back, of course, but it did lose some leaves. Now it is beginning its bloom cycle, which always starts at the bottom of the shrub and works its way to the top.

The split-leaf philodendrons that were a pile of black mush after our January freeze are now coming back, putting up new leaves.

The yellow cestrum lost all of its leaves, but now the new ones are coming on.

The lemon grass clumps all died back to the ground and I pruned off all the dead leaves with a hedge trimmer. Soon you won't be able to tell that it was "dead" in January.

Milkweed, slowly coming back. It can't be fast enough for the butterflies. I'm going to need to get some new plants from the nursery to fill in until my old plants can regain their growth and their blooms.

White mistflower, coming back strong, after losing all of its leaves to the frost.

Both my Satsuma and Mandarin orange trees are putting out new leaves, but I'm afraid the lemon trees are completely dead after blessing us with a bumper crop of fruit last year. Temperatures in the low 20s F were apparently just too much for them.

Hope is kindled as the garden wakes up and new life begins.

Almost Wordless Wednesday: Three signs of spring

Daffodils

Snowdrops

Loropetalum

Has spring sprung?

Maybe one daffodil doesn't make a spring. 

Or one "snowflake."

Maybe not even one camellia - even if it's a camellia that doesn't usually bloom until the first of April. 

But how about the first rose of the season?

Or the first redbud blossom? It's nearly three weeks until the calendar says it has arrived, but spring is definitely peeking over the windowsill. At least here in Southeast Texas.

April in the garden

March showers bring April flowers - is that how it goes? Well, maybe not, but it seems to be working that way in my garden.

Spring is, of course, prime time for wildflowers here, some of which bloom in my garden, like these bluebonnets.

 Among the blue is the occasional pink bonnet.

These dianthus plants were in bloom in early March and were weighed down by the ice storm we had them, but, even as it bent the plants, that didn't slow them down much. They are still blooming.

 April is when my camellia, 'Mabel Bryan' blooms.

Everywhere along the roadsides, the wild blackberries have been in full and glorious bloom this spring, promising a bumper harvest of berries later. Some of the wild plants grow as weeds in my garden along some of the fences. I mostly leave them alone - the birds enjoy the berries.

The white loropetalum is full of these fringy flowers just now. Its fuchsia-colored cousin bloomed a few weeks earlier.

Last Wednesday I showed you this allium with this butterfly, a Funereal Duskywing, but I couldn't get a dorsal view of the critter. Well, here it is back today - in fact there were two of them - and this time it was a bit more cooperative about posing.

The purple oxalis is beginning to send out its dainty little pink blossoms.

Azaleas in the area have really been putting on a show this spring. I believe they enjoyed and benefitted from the several extended cold spells that we had during winter.

 Now is the time of the redbud bloom. This tree with its pretty pink blossoms is a magnet for pollinators and birds of many kinds.

 This fuchsia lives in a hanging basket near my front door to welcome visitors.

Some winter blossoms just keep on going right into spring, like these sunny pansies which brighten my back porch.

After a long, gray winter, it is such a joy to see the garden coming to life again and putting on its colorful spring clothes.

Spring at last!

Spring arrived here right on schedule today at 11:57 A.M., Central Daylight Time, and it could hardly have been a more perfect first day of spring. Bright blue sky filled with golden sunshine, temperatures in the 70s F., a gentle breeze blowing - this was the day we have looked toward for the last three months.

And on this beautiful day, I saw my very first Giant Swallowtail butterfly of the year. This wasn't it - the picture was taken last summer - but it looked just like this.

I spent much of my day out weeding in the garden and I kept encountering these little guys.

Green anoles - one of my favorite garden critters. They were out basking in the sun today.

Just like the anoles, my plants, too, are waking up.

The old azalea in my backyard is just about to be full of blooms, but this is the first.

Nearby, the redbud will soon be full of these lovely blossoms.

And, in a bed next to the patio, this pretty little allium has joined the pink bloom parade. It voluntarily seeded itself in my garden a couple of years ago. When I happened to notice it, I liked it so much that I dug it and put it in a bed, where it has flourished, just one more of Nature's many gifts to me.

It isn't only plants, butterflies, and green anoles that are feeling the pull of spring. Migrating birds have been passing through my yard this week. Yesterday, I saw my first Black-and-white Warbler and Blue-gray Gnatcatcher of the year, and as I reported earlier, the first Ruby-throated Hummingbird of the year arrived this week. Some of our winter residents are still here, too, but they are moving out day by day now.

We may still have some cool days and nights, but they won't linger. Spring is on the march and it will vanquish winter. At last!

The springtime garden

Is it only me or has winter been going on way too long? It's almost enough to make me long for summer once again. Almost, but not quite.

A much better alternative is spring and this week it seems as though spring is returning to my garden. And not a moment too soon!

Nothing says "spring" quite like sweetly fragrant hyacinths. These bloom in a pot beside my front entry door.

Well, the little Leucojum snowflakes run the hyacinths a close second in the spring department. I do love these little bulbs. One of the things that I love best about them is that they are so easy to grow.

All around the garden, the shrubs and trees are beginning to put out green buds.

 New growth from a mahogany Esperanza planted last year.

Yellow cestrum bloomed right up until the mercury dipped to 20 degrees Fahrenheit in January. Then it lost all its leaves, but now it is putting on new growth. Soon it will be blooming again.

Likewise, the almond verbena was blooming until our first spell of really cold weather hit. Now it is coming back.

The pomegranate, too, is well on its way.

Some of the shrubs started early and are already blooming.

 The blueberries, for example.

 And the loropetalum is covered in its fuchsia blossoms.

I finished pruning the last of my roses today. Some of the plants that I pruned first - a couple of weeks ago - already have flower buds. Here, 'Darcy Bussell.'

 A pot of dianthus offers its cherry red blossoms from a pot on the patio.

 And on the back porch, this sunny yellow kalanchoe brightens things.

These pansies were the only blooms I had in the garden for several weeks. Now they have competition from other plants, but they continue to make me smile.

Even the birds know that spring is almost here. Many of our winter visitors have already flown, as I wrote yesterday, but their place is being taken by birds that wintered farther south.

The American Robins have arrived. I love listening to their songs.

And in the backyard, the female Eastern Bluebirds are investigating likely places for building their nests.

Yes, spring is coming. Even if all my weeding isn't done and all my plants haven't been pruned. Even if all the plants I had planned to move to new beds are still in their old beds. Inexorably, spring approaches and somehow everything that really needs to be done will finally get done. Fingers crossed.

Wordless Wednesday: Apple blossom time

Nature: Red oak awakening

Spring has come early to my yard this year. The oak trees are awakening, bringing promise of the season to come. After more than a year of extreme drought in Southeast Texas, we've had a very wet beginning to 2012. The trees that have survived the drought have drunk deep from all that water and restored themselves. It is a very hopeful thing to see.

Nature Sunday: The promise of spring

The blueberry blossoms may not be completely open yet, but they offer the promise that spring is finally on its way. It has been a long, relatively cold winter, even here near the semi-tropical southern coast of America, and we are more than ready to welcome spring. We take our hope where we can find it - even in the promise of a half-opened blossom.