Friday 23 April 2010

I'm daffy too - at last

The whole blogosphere has been posting raptures to spring this last while, with gorgeous photos of spring flowers and flowering trees, lyrics to the sun and warmth, panegyrics to the spring.  Some of these posts have been up for over a month (you know who you are, down there in New Orleans!).  All of them have showed spring signs much more advanced than mine, even Anvilcloud, who lives north of me, for goodness sake.

Ten days ago, my bulb garden looked like this.  You can see its present glory up in the header.

The red maples have flowered and the tips of the leaves are now showing.  Even the buds on the oak, which is always late, are bulging.  The birds are singing their hearts out, all except the woodpecker who is doing his spring drumming on the metal chimney of a close neighbour.  Loud does not cover it.  In between the bouts of pounding I can sometimes hear a northern mockingbird, I think.  I haven't seen it but the string of borrowed song phrases is pretty certain.  I can see flower buds on the lilacs and when I look out across the woods,  I can see a haze of green everywhere.  Lovely!

And, of course, the blackflies are here. While the rest of you are celebrating the sunshine with sandals and shorts, think of me with heavy socks pulled over my gardening trousers and sweltering in my bug shirt.  Thank goodness we have a screened porch where I can enjoy the bird song without being attacked.

I will have to get the hummingbird feeders up - the little guys will be here very soon now. And plant the gladiolas. 

It's not just the birds that are delirious with spring business.  But I have no intention of banging on the chimney.

PS There is now something more in my garden.  My most creative neighbours have decided to celebrate my birthday by hiding garden gnomes around the place.  I found one in the daffodil bed to-night, and I have  notice that two others are around somewhere.  Hilarious!

6 comments:

  1. "Always a blackfly sticking my bones in North Ontario." They are a misery for sure. We will even get some in town here, but it's still livable. Panegyrics: fine word, new to me, but fine.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Welcome to spring! I was just gushing over the redbuds and tulip trees today as we were running an errand here in NEO. Even though those blooming trees are relatively short-lived, I don't care. If they only bloomed a day, it would be well worth it. So gorgeous!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Your header is lovely. I'm glad that spring has finally made it up your way. Too bad she brought the damn flies with her, though.

    ReplyDelete
  4. love your post--and the post title. If it makes you feel better our Spring has been slow coming and we are still freezing every other day :)

    ReplyDelete
  5. I can't believe that these are just coming up. I'm not 100% convinced that we're through frost, here. Makes me nervous planting stuff, but I'm just following my neighbours.

    ReplyDelete