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Here it is May Day, and it seemed like it would never get here! Today, all over France, people are already celebrating the arrival of Spring (as well as Labor Day) with the Fête du muguet, when practically everyone gives someone they care for a nice bouquet of Muguet des bois, aka, Lily of the Valley. We're a bit behind here in Iowa (and regular readers know what a protracted winter we had this year!), so we don't have any just yet, but I'm sure it will be arriving soon in the odd spots around the house where it has always grown since we've been here. So, I'll offer you some other pretty tidbits and encouraging previews of flowers just arrived and more to come...
Remember when I posted this shot back in March after the snow finally melted in the Primrose Bed by the front steps?
Here's how it looked on this late April day (late afternoon when there was actually a bit of sun poking through) ... what a difference a month makes when the weather finally improves! After all the rains we've been having the past several days, the Primroses have been soaking it up and revving up to burst into bloom ... these blooms have just appeared within the last two days and there are many more yet to come. And the two rogue Tulips that I swear we never planted have emerged and are strutting their stuff proudly. The Snowdrops and Crocuses in this bed have finished their show for the year and only the foliage remains at this point, but there are other things preparing to take over the show ... the variegated Solomon's Seal is up (and multiplying) as well as the 'Gilt Edge' Toad Lily, Meadow Sage, Bee Balm and Lavender ...but for the moment, the Primroses will rule the roost for the next several weeks.
This tenacious little Muscari armeniacum has persevered for many years now, having been originally planted when there was still a bit of yard along the front steps before we dug it up and created the front boulder bed (back in 2003). We lost quite a few bulbs when we filled in the area, but a few have persisted (crocus and squill) and this little guy shows up in exactly the same spot every year, peeking out from under the rocks. This year it looks like he brought along a friend to keep him (and us) company, so welcome to the garden, little fellow!
Ah, consider the gentle little native wildflower that many consider the bane of their yards and garden ... but the humble Viola papillionacea is such a pretty flower that always reliably blooms for May Day (I used to put them in the May baskets I gave out as a child). At least it does have enough admirers that it was chosen (in a rather odd manner) as the Wisconsin State Flower. We love these little beauties but have to be a bit harsh with them in the garden after they are done blooming or we would have nothing but Violets remaining if we let them have their way. We do allow some to remain (come on, no one could ever really eradicate these!), but we dig as many as we can and dispatch them to the compost or to bare areas in the back yard, where they can perform a useful function without choking out our more prized plants....
Just a couple of weeks ago, our Dicentra spectabilis (Bleeding Heart) hadn't even broken ground, but look at our original plant today! It has just lept from the Woodland Garden and sprung immediately into bloom, and our others aren't far behind, so you'll be seeing lots more of them soon.
A couple of weeks ago I was fretting because I hadn't seen any signs of our Trilliums yet, but just in the past three or four days they have appeared magically and are gearing up to bloom. We originally planted three of them several years ago and last year we had five appear, so we know they are multiplying ... we've only seen five so far this year, but are hoping that more will join the party soon and start staking out their territory among the ferns in the Woodland Garden.
Fernymoss was thrilled to see these unfurling shoots today when he was out with the camera ... they're his favorite fern, the Maidenhair, and every spring we marvel at the many odd shapes they take before they fully develop into their mature fronds. Here you can see them surrounded by their neighbors, the Leatherwood ferns who have been steadily greening up in the past few weeks. Soon they will go vertical and abandon their prostrate ways of early spring and the Maidenhairs will take over the territory quickly for the rest of the summer.
Ok, for a bit of fun here, I'll leave it to you readers to guess what these emerging shoots are, although if you're familiar with the denizens of the Woodland Garden, these should be pretty easay to identify. Let me know in the comments what you think they are and we'll see who can ID these first!
For those familiar with the oddities of our garden, this last one should be really easy ... and it appears that it has successfully produced about five offshoots from last year's growth, so we are hoping for multiple blooms this year! We'll see if that happens, but this one has arrived quickly ... last weekend before the rains arrived, I was out looking for signs of this plant and found none ... so look at it now!
So happy May Day to all you fellow gardeners (and garden admirers) out there! I hope you're fêted with a lovely day to celebrate (looks to be another cloudy one here, alas) and that your gardens are springing back to life as vigorously as ours is currently doing! I've got lots more to post in the next few days, so do stop back for even more colorful flowers now taking their positions on the Spring Stage!
All photos taken on April 30, 2009. Courtesy of Fernymoss
I left today's selection of photos up to Fernymoss and he chose these enthusiastic and burgeoning Maidenhair Ferns.
As regular visitors already know, we're quite the fans of ferns in our Woodland Garden area and we've gradually increased our Maidenhair (Adiantum pedatum) population over the years, and they've been steady colonizers around these areas, sharing space with the Leatherwoods and Ostrich Plume and other varieties of ferns we have planted.
I asked Fernymoss what he'd want to say about these ferns and he recalled his memories of traveling and camping in the Boundary Waters of Northern Minnesota, where he was indelibly struck by the image of going by ditches positively filled with Maidenhairs and wild Lupines.
From his perspective, the image conjured up these ferns, seejmingly floating a foot above the ground ... which I thought was a really good description because they do appear to float above anything planted below them (in this case the ivy and ground ivy --a weedy mint that we let bloom before we go after it).
For such a delicate looking fern, Maidenhairs are incredibly hardy, from sub-arctic North America to the far South across a pretty wide swath of the US. As far as cultivation, they've been really easy for us, but that's due in large part, I think, to sheer positioning. Most ferns want fairly bright shade at some point of the day, but will not tolerate blazing direct sun, without quickly giving up the ghost. They also demand a fairly organically defined (peaty, loamy) and consistently moist soil, such as woodland situations provide. Fulfill those very basic needs and anyone should be able to succeed quickly with Maidenhairs.
In successive years, they'll spread gradually out from the parent plant(s) by offshoots, as well as some of the spores that tend to move around the garden. At this point, we have so many that it's impossible to determine which ones were the original plants. We just delight in their (and our) success in making themselves at home in our shady areas ...
Photos by Fernymoss, taken 22 May, 2008.
Planting a Woodland Garden was one of our first intentions when we started reclaiming the soil from the grass on our property.
We started tentatively, before we bought the house, but since then we have been working consistently on enlarging the area on the north --which coincidentally faces Woodland Avenue-- adding a few more plants each year. Though we didn't follow any defined plan (such as this one), but rather, let our inclinations run wild to reproduce a slice of woodland landscape with what native (and non) plants would fit the growing conditions we have at our disposition.
Ferns, of course, were a necessity, along with the various specimens of Dicentra (Bleeding Heart), Solomon's Seal (Polygonatum), Coral Bells (Heuchera sp.), Ragwort (Ligularia sp.), and of course Maidenhair Ferns, which have figured prominently here of late.
This is also the area where we have three Hollies (Ilex sp.) planted nearby, and though they were slow to get started, they have now reached a good size, despite one of them having lost an entire branch during one of the late winter ice storms we had in late February and early March. Those were the original plantings we started with, and since our expansion of the area in 2004, we've added a lot more plants, such as Hellebores, several Tricyrtis (Toad lily), more ferns and most recently, Trillium (planted in 2006). The whole area is bordered on the sidewalk with Daffodils, Tulips, Indian Hyacinth, Alliums and Alpine Blue Columbines. It's also the home of the currently featured Mystery Plant, which is on its way to blooming soon, but just taking its time since I posted a picture of it last week.
We've already purchased several new specimens to add to this area this year, though we haven't gotten them into the ground just yet, but they will be within the next week or so ... we got a new species of Ligularia, commonly referred to as "The Rocket," another Toad Lily, Lungwort, and if we're very lucky (the supplier has ordered five more of them for us), several more Trillium, a species I have yet to post here, but will be doing so in the near future. I expect there will be a few more ferns to call this area home this year, as well as some other new additions. We're already so taken with "The Rocket" that we want to get another one to work into the general area ....
A few notes on the photos ... the top shot is of course Maidenhair Ferns and primarily Bleeding Hearts in the area behind the two female Hollies.
The second is pretty much more of the same, though if you look carefully to the right, you'll see the red-leafed Ligularia in the background.
And finally, the third shot has a lot going on in it ... Maidenhairs, Ligularia, Polygonatum, Heuchera, and of course, just a bit of one of the female hollies. The center area (original planting) is, at this point, pretty much filled in and maturing nicely. What remains is to fill in the adjoining areas ... a work in progress, but one progressing quite nicely we think!
There are times when you just need to lose yourself in one of nature's wonders, and just shut out the rest of the world from your inner thoughts ... with the greater aim of trying to recapture that sense of awe at the complexity of one of our simpler plant denizens. Ferns ... simple in origin, yet complex in their architecture, allow me to do just that. I took this shot on a whim the other day and was pleased with how it turned out ... and the more I look at it, the more I find aspects at which I must marvel.
So, given the complex stew of thoughts currently bubbling in my mind, I decided to post this shot of some Maidenhair Ferns growing together in the Woodland Garden. There are more to come, with commentary, but for now, I'll just leave you with this luscious one as a teaser.
Here's how it looked on this late April day (late afternoon when there was actually a bit of sun poking through) ... what a difference a month makes when the weather finally improves! After all the rains we've been having the past several days, the Primroses have been soaking it up and revving up to burst into bloom ... these blooms have just appeared within the last two days and there are many more yet to come. And the two rogue Tulips that I swear we never planted have emerged and are strutting their stuff proudly. The Snowdrops and Crocuses in this bed have finished their show for the year and only the foliage remains at this point, but there are other things preparing to take over the show ... the variegated Solomon's Seal is up (and multiplying) as well as the 'Gilt Edge' Toad Lily, Meadow Sage, Bee Balm and Lavender ...but for the moment, the Primroses will rule the roost for the next several weeks.
This tenacious little Muscari armeniacum has persevered for many years now, having been originally planted when there was still a bit of yard along the front steps before we dug it up and created the front boulder bed (back in 2003). We lost quite a few bulbs when we filled in the area, but a few have persisted (crocus and squill) and this little guy shows up in exactly the same spot every year, peeking out from under the rocks. This year it looks like he brought along a friend to keep him (and us) company, so welcome to the garden, little fellow!
Ah, consider the gentle little native wildflower that many consider the bane of their yards and garden ... but the humble Viola papillionacea is such a pretty flower that always reliably blooms for May Day (I used to put them in the May baskets I gave out as a child). At least it does have enough admirers that it was chosen (in a rather odd manner) as the Wisconsin State Flower. We love these little beauties but have to be a bit harsh with them in the garden after they are done blooming or we would have nothing but Violets remaining if we let them have their way. We do allow some to remain (come on, no one could ever really eradicate these!), but we dig as many as we can and dispatch them to the compost or to bare areas in the back yard, where they can perform a useful function without choking out our more prized plants....
Just a couple of weeks ago, our Dicentra spectabilis (Bleeding Heart) hadn't even broken ground, but look at our original plant today! It has just lept from the Woodland Garden and sprung immediately into bloom, and our others aren't far behind, so you'll be seeing lots more of them soon.
A couple of weeks ago I was fretting because I hadn't seen any signs of our Trilliums yet, but just in the past three or four days they have appeared magically and are gearing up to bloom. We originally planted three of them several years ago and last year we had five appear, so we know they are multiplying ... we've only seen five so far this year, but are hoping that more will join the party soon and start staking out their territory among the ferns in the Woodland Garden.
Fernymoss was thrilled to see these unfurling shoots today when he was out with the camera ... they're his favorite fern, the Maidenhair, and every spring we marvel at the many odd shapes they take before they fully develop into their mature fronds. Here you can see them surrounded by their neighbors, the Leatherwood ferns who have been steadily greening up in the past few weeks. Soon they will go vertical and abandon their prostrate ways of early spring and the Maidenhairs will take over the territory quickly for the rest of the summer.
Ok, for a bit of fun here, I'll leave it to you readers to guess what these emerging shoots are, although if you're familiar with the denizens of the Woodland Garden, these should be pretty easay to identify. Let me know in the comments what you think they are and we'll see who can ID these first!
For those familiar with the oddities of our garden, this last one should be really easy ... and it appears that it has successfully produced about five offshoots from last year's growth, so we are hoping for multiple blooms this year! We'll see if that happens, but this one has arrived quickly ... last weekend before the rains arrived, I was out looking for signs of this plant and found none ... so look at it now!
So happy May Day to all you fellow gardeners (and garden admirers) out there! I hope you're fêted with a lovely day to celebrate (looks to be another cloudy one here, alas) and that your gardens are springing back to life as vigorously as ours is currently doing! I've got lots more to post in the next few days, so do stop back for even more colorful flowers now taking their positions on the Spring Stage!
