At last...some April bloom!

I got the seed for this several years from NARGS, labelled simply as
"draba ssp" and its just a wonderful performer.

Please share your April blooms!

The season seems to be underway. Love the Draba Tammy. I'll start things off with a little Townsendia nuttallii that is blooming now. It unfurls its petals during the day...

and curls them back up for the evening.

Here is a pink flowered Pulsatilla vulgaris(I think) that is blooming in the garden.

And here is the purple one.....

Tammy,
It's especially happy to have flowers from seed, isn't it? Wonderful job!

Ally,
I love Pulsatilla but I don't have pink flowers like yours. It's a lovery!
Let me post a few pictures from my garden today.

"Anemone nemorosa Bracteata Plena"




This message was edited Apr 7, 2008 9:48 AM

closeup

Veronica peduncularis 'Oxford Blue'

I love that townsendia Ally! The curling up flowers reminds
me of Anacyclus depressus.

Thank you Goldenfish. Starting from seed does add a layer of
pleasure when the plant survives and thrives. I had a few
anemone nemorsa from seed but didn't get them planted 'til
late in the season last year. I hope at least one survived. Your's
is lovely, such a bright white bloom & tight foliage.

Great pics! How I long for the snow to melt.....this will be my latest spring yet...still 4 feet of snow over the rockery; normally my crocus are out by now. Maybe blooms by the end of May! I can see buds in my one kabschia saxifrage trough that has melted out!

Its been the coolest & wettest spring I can remember here. We will
all relish your blooms when the snow finally does reveal their beauty
Todd.

One of my favorite flower in this season.
Anemonella thalictroides

This is Mukdenia rossii.
You can enjoy the beautiful foliage even the flowers finished...

That Anemonella is so delicate! never heard of Mukdenia...I like it!

Goldenfish - I bought an anemonella thalictroides for way more than I
should have a few years ago. I just love them. Mine hasn't even started
poking its nose out yet.

And I'm with Todd - Mukdenia is new to me but its lovely! I'd love to see
a shot with more of its folliage.

Lovely photos, everyone!
Well, my Draba spp. grown from seed last year were just about to flower last week when they had all their flower stems munched off by a jack rabbit... at least I got to see that one would have been white and other yellow (two species, the yellow one with hairy leaves, the white one without). Said bunny or one of its kin is now doing the same to Draba aizoides, dang! (And this, after earlier nipping off my Achillea aleppica spp. zederbaueri... how much can even an animal-lover be expected to take? LOL!)

I grew Mukdenia rossii from seed in 2004 and have been tickled to find that they are hardy here... but mine haven't bloomed yet in the deep shade they're in. Do they prefer a sunnier spot? Part shade, perhaps? (I started more last year too and put them in mostly sun, so I guess I'll find out eventually what they prefer here.)

Hepatica transylvanica is starting to bloom, despite its position in deep shade. What a trooper!




This message was edited Apr 9, 2008 7:10 PM

Hi
Mukdenia rossii's leaves come out after the flowers bloom, so I'll post
its folliage photo anytime soon. I plant it under the camellia hedge so part shade would be suited.
The Hepatica transylvanica is beautifl blue. It shines brilliantly in the deep shade.

These are native Japanese violets.
"Viola mandshurika var. ikedaeana"

Viola chaerophylloides var. sieboldiana.

I've been admiring everyone's lovely pics, and waiting and waiting for the snow to melt. Finally, Iris danfordiae appeared. Last year, it bloomed from March 28 to April 21. This year, the flowers appeared on April 6 and the deer ate all of them on April 8. Sigh!

I too have been perusing the great photos, and waiting for spring to come here. After a brief dry out and bare ground, it's snowing again - 5-8 inches this time around they say. A few days ago I had uncovered my potted materials to find some good things for our Arboretum plant society fair this Saturday. They're covered back up now with plastic to keep the wet snow out. An interesting survivor peaking in the garden this year so far: Lycoris radiata, in zone 4. No mulch, and it didn't snow until early December 2007.

Well maybe it's not an alpine, but its in my rock garden..the first flower of 2008...Crocus chrysanthus 'Gyspy Girl'. Most of the garden is still under several feet of snow but the one bed near my house always melts out first.. That white in the background is a 5 foot snow bank!

In that same bed are some Viola corsica..they bloom from spring till fall. One plant managed to open a bloom today. I used a black piece of cardboard to hide the snow!

Ahhhhh...spring. But poor Altagardner... losing your early blooms to a
rabbit!

That violet is lovely goldenfish.

Todd - glad to see you are getting to join in the early spring jewels! Those
are terrific photos.

Thank you for the sympathy, LOL! Oh well, other than that, I've got a young Adonis amurensis 'Fukujukai' in bloom, plus the Euphorbia myrsinites that seeded themselves along the house foundation, a couple of crocuses, the earliest Scilla siberica, and a bunch of puschkinias to tide me over for a bit. After an apparently unexpected 8" or so of snow today(!! ... "30% chance of precipitation", ha!), it's supposed to hit 20 deg C on the weekend; if so, all the bulbs will take off! There is a bunch of big Dutch crocuses ready to roll, and the earliest Pulsatilla vulgaris....

This message was edited Apr 10, 2008 7:58 PM

20C! Goodness!

Do you suppose Bugs Bunny is a jack rabbit?

A question for everyone: for who are crocus an increasing perennial?

Yeah, I think Bugs is a white-tailed jack rabbit... the long, lanky frame and cocky attitude cinch it.

Crocuses do well for me here, Leftwood (I think, anyway)... chrysanthus, vernus, tommasinianus, sieberi seem to multiply nicely. I have heard, though, that some people do not have the same experience for whatever reason.
I have been much less successful at establishing fall-blooming crocus though (in part, because they seem extremely tasty to squirrels)... and they tend to bloom too late anyway - this year, I only saw the spent freeze-dried flowers in spring.

Crocus self-seed in my garden...they are popping up the lawn everywhere and I didn't plan to naturalize them..looks nice! Primarily its the tommassinianus and chrysanthus that spread the most, but the Dutch do so also, just slower.

I now have the bulb book Buried Treasures, by Jānis Rukšāns. It's the spur for that question. Talking about crocus in grass, for him, he says, "all my attempts of growing C. chrysanthus have failed. The crocuses flowered nicely in one, two, or mostly three years, and then disappeared. The turf of my Latvian lawn was simply too dense for them. Only two species demonstrate a capacity to survive . . . C. heuffelianus and C. tommasinianus."

I have never been enamored by corcus, and have hardly even ever planted them. As with so many species, I don't plant them because I know little about them. But maybe now . . .

My lawn is mostly clover...not dense like most lawns I've seen in the prairies....obviously loose enough that the crocus spread fine!

No lawn here... just perennials. It seems here that crocuses/small bulbs planted in an urban lawn wouldn't work too well because the lawn would need to be cut long before the crocus foliage had died back.. so I never tried it.

EDIT: Or rather, "public opinion might hold that the lawn would need to be cut", if you know what I mean...

This message was edited Apr 11, 2008 7:25 PM

Well - I've got a rural lawn and I leave one hillside unmowed til midMay. Its three
feet tall some years. First the muscari bloom, then the buttercups. I've planted it
up with daffodils and may add in some other bulbs. Crocus do perennialize in
garden beds for me but I haven't tried them in the lawn at my current property.
My old (tiny city) lawn was too dense for the crocus to last long year to year.

First blooms on an aubretia

To give you some appreciation why I'm so anxious for spring. this is my garden today!

and another shot

In the thawed section are several crocus chrysanthus in bloom along with my first C. tommassinianus....self-seeded into the lawn.

and the first flowers are opening in the Erica

and my first true alpines are budding...lots of Kabschia saxs starting to bud now.

Todd,

We have had light snowfall in these years because of global warming in here. I'm also anxious about that.
Anyway, I took a picture of Mukdenia rossii's leaves and a few another plants.

Mukdenia rossii's leaves

Anemone flaccida

Pulsatilla cernua

Goldenfish - the echo of red on the epimedium leaves in the background
is quite beautiful with the pulsatilla cernua

Todd - I have a hard time feeling sorry for you with that glorious sax ready
to pop. I have not yet mastered them.