More Spring Flowers
April 1, 2020 by New Hampshire Garden Solutions

Daffodils have finally arrived so it must really be spring. And spring, at least as it is spoken by flowers, is early. I went back to previous posts and this appears to be the first daffodil to show itself in March since I’ve been doing this blog. Most have appeared in mid-April.

There were more daffodils. Lots more.

I was also surprised to see hyacinths blooming. They’re also very early this year.

Crocuses get more beautiful each time I see them. I loved the color combination seen in this one.

Inside a crocus the central style branches into three feathery stigmas, which are its female pollen accepting organs. Below these and unseen in this photo are three anthers, which are its pollen producing organs. You can see how the pollen has fallen onto the petals. Many people don’t realize that the garden crocus is a very toxic plant which can kill through respiratory failure. The only crocus with edible parts is the saffron crocus (Crocus sativus,) which is unknown in the wild. Human cultivation of saffron crocus and the use of saffron has gone on for more than 3,500 years.

Crocus buds have an upside down tear-drop shape formed by six petals in two whorls of three. The outer whorl’s petals are slightly larger than the inner whorl’s. But I forget all that when I see their beauty. I chose this one as the most beautiful I saw on this day. Pastel, quiet, and understated it easily loses itself in a bed full of cousins, but my eye was drawn right to it.

Last week I saw two or three grape hyacinths. This week there were more than I wanted to count.

I love the beautiful cobalt blue of the flowers with their little insect guiding white fringe around the opening.

The snowdrops have opened enough to show their little green spots on their inner petals. Snowdrops aren’t common here so I see very few of them. I have seen them blooming while surrounded by snow though, so they live up to their name. I read once that the plant is in the amaryllis family, which was a surprise.

The Cornelian cherries (Cornus mas) are finally blooming. The buds have been showing color for over a month but they refused to bloom until they were sure it was warm enough, and that was probably wise. This shrub is in the dogwood family and gets its common name from its red fruit. In northern Greece early Neolithic people left behind remains of meals that included cornelian cherry fruit. Man has had a relationship with this now little known shrub for about 7000 years. Cornelian cherry often blooms at just about the same time as forsythias do. Its yellow flowers are very small but there are enough of them to put on a good show.

This year the Cornelian cherries have beaten the Forsythias into bloom, but it won’t be long.

Aquatics are just starting to show and they were beautiful to see coming up in this little pond. It’s rare to see very much real cold weather once they start to appear. The trees, the sunlight and blue of the sky reflected in nature’s mirror made me want to just sit and enjoy this scene.

I thought for sure that I’d find seed pods (samaras) of the red maples (Acer rubrum) but I didn’t see a single one. It was a cool week so that might have held them back a bit. After a very warm February March has been a bit anti-climactic, as far as spring goes.

There is a very old tree by a highway, standing all by itself. It’s an oddity because of how it was left standing when all of the trees around it were cut down when the highway was built. I like to think it was left because of the beautiful flowers it is positively loaded with each spring. They are male flowers and come into bloom slightly later than the red maples, and I think it must be a silver maple (Acer saccharinum.) I keep forgetting to go back and look at its leaves in the summer but this year I’ve written myself a note. I did notice when I took this photo that its bark looks different than a red maple, so we’ll see.

There is little that catches the eye like the catkins of the American hazelnut (Corylus americana) hanging golden in the low evening sunlight. It is one of the first signs of spring I look for each year.

Each male flower on the catkin consists of a pair of tiny bracts and 4 stamens but they’re almost impossible to see under the horseshoe crab shaped bud scales. You can see the golden colored flower buds at the very top of this catkin though. The male staminate flowers will bloom from the top down.

The female hazelnut flowers have been blooming for weeks, waiting for a dose of pollen. I’m not sure why they would open so far ahead of the male flowers. For those who don’t know, the bud that the scarlet stigmas come out of is usually about the same diameter as a piece of cooked spaghetti.

Poplar catkins have limbered up and lengthened and they will continue to do so for a while. A tree full of the gray, 3 or 4 inch long, fuzzy catkins is impressive.

If you look closely you can see, in this case, the reddish brown male anthers. Once pollinated the flowers will release their cottony seeds into the air and they will settle on everything. If you leave your car windows open near one you’ll have a fuzzy surprise inside.

Our willows are in full bloom now. I wish I could tell you this one’s name but I don’t know it. It doesn’t matter; you don’t need to know its name to appreciate its beauty. They’re so welcome in early spring when there are so few flowers to see.

It’s hard to explain what happens when I see the first spring beauty of the season but I go away for a while. I go to that joyous place you go when you are lost inside a painting or a beautiful piece of music, or when you lose yourself in your work. It’s a special place and while I’m there I wouldn’t even know if a parade passed me. I hope you also have such a place where you can go now and then.
Who would have thought it possible that a tiny little flower could preoccupy a person so completely that there simply wasn’t room for any other thought? ~Sophie Scholl
Thanks for coming by. Stay safe and be well and if you can, think of creative ways to help one another. I’d guess that your abilities are far beyond what you believe them to be.
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Posted in Nature, Wildflowers | Tagged American Hazelnut Catkins, American Hazelnut Flowers, Canon EOS Rebel T6, Cornelian Cherry Flowers, Crocus Blossoms, Daffodils, Early Spring Plants, Forsythia Buds, Grape Hyacinths, Hyacinths, Keene, Native Plants, Nature, New Hampshire, NH, Olympus Stylus TG-870, Poplar Catkins, Poplar Flowers, Red Maple Flowers, Snowdrops, Spring, Spring Beauties, Swanzey New Hampshire, Willow Flowers | 24 Comments
Poplars are very fluffy! There are some black poplars growing fairly near us and the lane is carpeted with fluff each year! I am glad your Spring Beauties have bloomed! Take care, Allen.
Thank you Clare. I can imagine the poplar fluff you see. Soon it will be flying everywhere here too.
The spring beauties are always the first real sign that spring is here to stay.
I hope you and the family are all well!
Thank you, Allen – yes, we are all well, though I have lost all sense of time!
That might not be a bad thing!
Lovely, as ever. That willow appeared to have given birth to a hedgehog. 😀
Thank you Ben, I know what you mean!
😀
Joyous sights.
Plenty more on the way!
Red maple blooms are among my favorites from back east. I’ve watched gray squirrels eat them. Nature is a great healer of many ills.
Thank you Lavinia. Squirrels also eat sugar maple buds and gnaw the bark with their teeth so they can lick up the sap.
Nature does heal, I know that for certain!
Good morning, Allen. What a lovely post of joyous spring blossoms! Daffs I associate with mid to late April are well advanced and, in fact, I’ve started deadheading many that are already finished up. Grass is gorgeous green and my neighbor mowed 3x in March! Me? I’m letting mine wait a bit, even though it looks a bit ‘scrappy’. Ahhh! Spring! Be safe!
It’s afternoon now Ginny, and I hope you had a good day. It sounds like you’re spring is still slightly ahead of ours. We’re not deadheading yet and there’s some green grass but not a lot yet. Wildflowers are coming along though and before long they’ll be everywhere.
Take care!
I suspect your late blooming roadside maple is still a red. Here in NJ the silvers bloom roughly a week and a half before the reds, and their twigs are almost never a rich chestnut brown as in your photo (more gray instead).
Thank you Sara. Most, if not all of the trees I see here have red / brown at the branch ends. I really don’t think we have many silver maples here but if I ever do find one I’m going to watch it closely to see the difference.
I had grape hyacinths growing in my lawn in Texas. They were pretty, but they seemed like they didn’t belong there.
Those willows are tough to identify. You need to look at all their traits, not only the catkins, but the shape of the tree or shrub, its leaves, its bark, and its “bite.” Hee hee!
On Wed, Apr 1, 2020, 5:09 AM New Hampshire Garden Solutions New Hampshire Garden Solutions posted: ” Daffodils have finally arrived so > it must really be spring. And spring, at least as it is spoken by flowers, > is early. I went back to previous posts and this appears to be the first > daffodil to show itself in March since I’ve been doing this blog. Most ” >
Thanks for the laugh Ron! I’ll be watching the willows!
During a walk yesterday I misidentified the hyacinth above as Siberian Squill. Is there an easy way to tell the difference?
I have a couple of photos of the ones I saw if that helps.
for me the fastest way to tell them apart is the width of the flower stalk. Hyacinth will always be significantly wider than a strand of spaghetti, and squill will always be significantly narrower than spaghetti. Also squill usually has at most three flowers on a single stalk, hyacinth usually has more.
Thank you!
In addition to what Sara said Squill or scilla are much shorter than hyacinths; barely half as tall, and the flowers usually appear at the tip of the stem rather than along it as you see with hyacinths.
What a feast of Spring beauty, thank you so much for sharing it.
You’re welcome Susan, there will be a lot more to come!