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Just about every day something new is blooming in my garden

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Wow I’m BAD. I run the Green Thumb Sunday meme and I haven’t done one since last November. Yep, bad bad bad meme creator!

Ok it’s time to get back on track. This meme is still alive … barely, but I know some of our members are still posting Green Thumb Sunday posts regularly, at least more regularly than I have been lately.

I don’t have a good excuse for my absence. As usual I haven’t been feeling well thanks to my Crohn’s, but yes, I’ve still been gardening and so far this year I’m amazed with my garden. I just need to start posting about what I’m seeing and doing more often, now don’t I?

So … if you’ve been participating in Green Thumb Sunday or waiting around to see if it was going to start up again … come on, let’s see some Green Thumb Posts. (please).

As I said above I’ve been amazed with my garden this year. I think it started waking up in February … way way early! By March 15th I had my first Crocuses blooming. Usually they don’t bloom until near the end of March.

First crocus to bloom in my garden this year

This was the first crocus to bloom in my backyard this year. It bloomed on March 15th! Shortly thereafter more and more crocus popped up. They’re all done now though.

Years ago when I first started gardening I planted Snow Drops .. but I rarely ever saw them. Either they bloomed too early for me to notice or it warmed up to fast and they faded within days … unnoticed. It was obvious this year that they’ve been growing, multiplying and thriving as I had a few large clumps come up in March.

Finally caught some Snow Drops blooming

I even had a few tiny Dwarf Danfordia Irises come up too

Dwarf Irises near the end of their bloom

They’re a little faded in this photo as they were already wilting by the time I noticed them. They didn’t last long. We’ve had some warm weather in March and April which wasn’t all that good for making Spring flowers last.

Here’s a shot of my center garden bed … full of red and white Tulips, Heuchera, Astilbe, perennial Geranium, and tiny shoots of Phlox and Hostas and probably a few other plants that I’m forgetting … I took this picture on April 18th. I just wish that I’d pushed the hoop that I use to contain the Phlox when it grows down a bit before I took the photo!

Tulips, Heuchera and lots of other plants in the garden bed

This is a wide shot of my garden. It’s small, but for the middle of April there’s a heck of a lot of plants up. All of my roses have fully leafed out now and more and more plants are coming up each day. Right now I’ve got Daffodils and Hyacinths that are just about finished blooming and I think my Glories of the Snow are pretty much gone. I have a feeling that I’ll have roses about two weeks earlier than usual this year too.

Wide shot of my small garden - everythings coming up

And Finally this is my dog, Midnight, enjoying some sun in the garden. She’s growing and blooming too. She’s two and a half years old now and still very puppy like in a lot of ways … just thankfully not quite as hyper as she was a year or so ago! LOL

My Labrador Retriever enjoying some sun in the garden

How is your garden doing? What’s blooming? What’s growing?






Last look at some flowering spring beauties

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We’re currently in a heat wave here in Toronto and what was left of my tulips and other spring flowers are looking fairly pathetic right now!

Luckily the roses started blooming on Friday. Morden sunrise was the first rose to bloom as it has been the last three or four years running, however this year within an hour or two Yves Piaget had a rose bloom and then my Therese Bugnet Rose started blooming as well. Sounds like a race doesn’t it?

Other roses began blooming on Saturday. One spectacular rose that’s full of blooms is Jacques Cartier with it’s lovely perfumed pink blooms.

I did take some photos but I haven’t transferred them to my too full laptop hard drive yet.

However, in Mid May and up until a few days ago this lovely Trillium was blooming:

Trillium

As was this rather flamboyant tulip – Texas Flame:

Texas flame tulp

Isn’t that gorgeous? I must get more of these tulips for next year. I have far too few of these wild looking tulips.

I hope that everyone had a great weekend.

Thanks for your thoughts on my eye allergies. My eyes are a lot better today. I never knew eye allergies could be so painful! Let alone the difficulties it gave me with blurred vision and sensitivity to light.

Gardeners, Plant and Nature lovers can join in every Sunday, visit As the Garden Grows for more information. GTS participants remember to check in at As the Garden Grows each week so that we’ll know you made a new post!

Chinodoxa or Glory of the Snow

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It’s been a beautiful week here in Toronto. The plants in my garden have shown their appreciation of the warm weather by growing and growing and growing some more!

Chionodoxa

The Chionodoxa, Glory of the Snow, is blooming. One day the plants were just short little green leaves, the next a few tiny buds had appears and then the following day the Chionodoxa had grown several inches and were blooming. I’ve got white ones, bluish ones and pink ones blooming in several clumps throughout the back garden.

The Chionodoxa in the front garden beds aren’t blooming yet. That area only gets late afternoon sun so it will probably be another week before they begin to bloom. The tulips in the front beds have really grown in the last day or so though.

I don’t see many people talking about Chionodoxa or Glory of the Snow as they are more commonly called. I wonder if they aren’t a very popular spring flower in many areas? If they aren’t it’s a shame because they are very easy to grow and as you can see from the photo I’ve included above they produce lovely clumps of flowers in the spring garden.

Here’s a little more information about this lovely spring flower:

Latin Name: Chionodoxa luciliae, C. gigantea
Common Name: Glory of the Snow

The species originated in Asia Minor and propagates by offset bulblets. These spring flowering bulbs requires a warm (60 to 70F) – cool (20 to 30F) – warm (35 to 55F) annual thermoperiodic cycle.

Depending upon the area, these bulbs will bloom anywhere from February to April.

If you purchase bulbs for planting they should be 4/5 to 5 cm and up in circumference. Plant in the fall, one inch apart, at five inches in depth.

These flowers are hardy to USDA zone 3 with mulch, and zones 4 to 7 without mulch.

Requires – full sunlight AM or PM sunlight, 25% shade.

Tolerates – summer drought, but requires adequate moisture throughout the growing season.

Look for these bulbs in your local garden center or nursery when Fall bulbs are being sold.

I planted most of mine in 2002 and they’re still going strong so I’d say this is a long lived and or self- propagating plant for most gardens. Mine are growing at the edge of my flower beds as they are relatively short plants that only grow to at most 6 inches in height.

Glory of the Snow are perfect for rock gardens, beds, ground covers, lawns, and woodland gardens. Some companion that Chionodoxa goes well with are Chaenomeles japonica, Forsythia, Jasminum nudiflorum, Helleborus orientalis, Vinca minor, Hammamelis.

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