Spring Pleasures

Wishing everyone a splendid Spring holiday, happy planting!
An unusual dwarf double Daffodil, not RipVan Winkle...more green and delicate..
click any photo to enlarge...
Honey Bees feeding on a Japanese variegated Butterbur bloom...
The Memorial Tree for Marie Thompson Morley, my mother. Planting the bulbs with her ashes was my idea, but my mom always wanted to be buried with a nut tree to feed wildlife and foster a healthy environment. I just added the bulbs as a reminder and a tribute to an amazing woman, her pursuit of knowledge never left her, nor did her reflection of the world through poetry and the written word.She loved maps, languages, travel...her dogs, and those that understood her.This spectacular Burr Oak is at least two hundred years old, most likely older. It's sited at the highest point at Hiddenfield farm.
The Memorial Tree for Dorothy Donovan Lusk, my amazing Godmother.It's taken a few years for the bulbs to multiply, and I've added more as well. I love to think of her ashes nourishing the living world, and being part of it. This is a magnificent Chinkapin Oak, one of our most beautiful native Oaks...they have a graceful, atmospheric character. The living ring of flowers is about thirty feet across, and will get thicker every year.
Since my last post, we've had two major snow storms blanket the area. I love snow, and we never get enough to give a good cover for the garden...but this year has been amazing! I wonder if it's over, we often get late freak storms...and this year will be a doozy, I'm sure of that. I had just sheared my Boxwood at the front of my house when the weather started to change. When I woke up, everything was iced and perfect.

This has been one of the busiest times I can remember...I feel pulled in so many directions, but I always have my head in the garden! How can it all get done?, I'm still cleaning up from one of the worst winters we've had here in the Midwest, and I think we had it good, compared to everyone else! The chicken coop has been scraped clean, putting every bit all over the vegetable garden, as well as the more ornamental areas. I never clean up the majority of the garden until Spring, I like to give lots of foraging possibilities around for wildlife, as well as over Wintering sites for butterflies and other insects, like Praying Mantis.