What's Blooming Today

Here is what is blooming in my Wisconsin garden on April 15, 2012.

Mid-spring BULBS, including tulips, midseason daffodils, and hyacinths.

Tulip 'Abba'

Yellow and Red NOID tulips (possibly Darwins?)

Narcissus 'Thalia' with male fern

Hyacinth 'Blue Jacket'

Also some flowering TREES: Canadian redbud and lilac (I know this last is technically a shrub, but mine is shaped like a tree, so I'm going to call it one!)

Cercis canadensis (Candian redbud)

Syringa vulgaris (Common lilac)

Not many PERENNIALS putting on much of a show just yet. Some phlox, dianthus, nepeta, and bergenia barely starting to open. But this lamium is already blooming profusely. I love this little guy - blooms all summer, has pretty foliage, and spreads quickly but not annoyingly.

Lamium maculatum 'Orchid Frost'

Carol of May Dreams Gardens hosts Garden Bloggers Bloom Day the fifteenth of every month. Check it out to see what's blooming around the world today!

Spring Flowering Trees

The spring flowering trees are all abloom here - and all at once! Here is my Amelanchier, covered in delicate white flowers. My neighbor has a wonderful tall pine which I think makes a great backdrop for the tree.

Amelanchier (Serviceberry) blooming

Here is a close up of the flowers. You can also see the wonderful felty gray leaves. The overall effect is delicate and ethereal - amelanchier is not as dense a plant as flowering crabapples, pears, or cherries.

Amelanchier (Serviceberry) flowers

Amelanchiers come in a variety of forms, from short and scrubby to medium shrubs to tall trees. Mine is a single-trunked tree form with an upright canopy. If anybody has any clue about which species this might be, let me know! I inherited it with the house, and I hate not knowing plants' names.

Amelanchier - upright form

My Canadian redbud (Cercis canadensis) is also blooming now. This picture is taken from underneath the tree, because there is a large play structure right up against it which totally obscures the view of it from the yard. Probably sounds awful but I am counting the days until my daughter outgrows the play structure, and I can finally open up this garden view!

Cercis canadensis (Canadian redbud) blooming

Crazily, even my lilac has buds on it already! This is a terrible pic, but just to prove to you that I am not totally lying here:

Lilac buds 3/28/12

Elsewhere about town (sadly, not in my own garden!), we currently have flowering pears:

Flowering pear (pyrus)

A variety of hardy northern magnolias:

Magnolia soulangiana (Saucer Magnolia)

Magnolia stellata (Star Magnolia)

... and even this crabapple! (To be fair, this guy is against a south-facing stone wall, so always blooms unusually early - but still! It's March for pete's sake!)

Crabapple blooming in Wisconsin March 28, 2012

Ordinarily, these trees would bloom here in sequence, over a 6 week period from April to May. It is just completely bizarre to see them all blooming at the same time. And what will there be to look at in May? Asters?

Early Spring Flowers

Hooray, early spring flowers are blooming! Miniature yellow daffodils are looking bright and cheery (as are the weeds... I've clearly got some work to do in there!). Tulips and tree peonies in the background promise to bloom sometime soon.

Narcissus 'Tete-A-Tete'

Siberian squill adds some rich blue under the maples. As you can see, these are very sparse still - they were planted just last fall. Hopefully they will eventually spread to form a spring carpet of blue. The vinca in the background also has a lot of ground to cover too - come on guys, let's get cracking!

Scilla siberica 'Spring Beauty'

Pale chionodoxa (Glory of the snow) is blooming gently against the dark backdrop of yew.

Chionodoxa 'Pink Giant'

Many trees are flowering or budding as well. My Amelanchier is a cloud of soft gray leaf and flower buds. I'm not sure what species or cultivar this is - we inherited it with the property. It produces sweet purple berries in summer that are appreciated equally by both the birds and my 5-year-old.

Amelanchier buds

Brilliant lavender-pink pearls adorn the Canadian redbud. I love how the color of the buds complements the silvery bark.

Cercis canadensis buds

Even the chartreuse flowers of the large shade maples look like heavenly froth at this time of year. Heralds of spring!

Maples flowering above thuja

Here are a few lessons I've learned so far this season:

1) I planted hellebores, bergenia, and hyacinth in what turned out to be the coldest, darkest corner of my new garden. D'oh! Everyone else's plants are blooming already, but mine are just barely making new growth... :-( Next year, I will know better.

2) The free wood chip mulch I got from my municipality is good for paths, but not for perennial beds. The young foliage has a hard time poking through and it just looks too coarse. My mulch budget is basically zero so I'm not sure where to find a free alternative. I am composting a large pile of fall leaves for leaf mold, but it will not be nearly enough...

3) Next year I need many MORE early spring bulbs, such as aconites, crocus, snowdrops, iris reticulata, and LARGER early daffodils (I love the minis, but they don't make much of a statement in the empty vastness of early spring). There are plenty of bare spots between perennials that could be doing some work right now!

Flowering Crabapples at the Arboretum

The University of Wisconsin-Madison Arboretum has a large and beautiful collection of flowering crabapples. I have never counted the trees but it seems they must have over 100 different cultivars. So many different colors and shapes! I have been there many times and still never managed to see them all. This May visit is like a pilgrimage - as close as we northerners can get to the flowering cherries of Japan. It is not May now - lots of cold, dreary February days to get through still. I will attempt to cheer myself up with some May flowers in this post...

Crabapple 'Indian Magic'

'Indian Magic' is one of my favorites for rich color, and it has a very attractive, spreading shape as you can see below. It is a smaller tree.

Crabapple 'Indian Magic'

Crabapple 'White Candle'

'White Candle' is very tall and stiff. Almost shrub-like (but large). A bit awkward perhaps, but interesting. Those large white flowers and pink buds make it look like it has been dipped in fondant.

Crabapple 'White Candle'

Crabapple 'Van Eseltine'

 'Van Eseltine' has double pink flowers which are stunning up close. The habit is upright and a bit awkward so far. The tree appears to be quite young (it is an area where they have newer plantings), so maybe it will improve its carriage when it matures. I'll keep my eye on it!

Crabapple 'Van Eseltine'

Crabapple 'White Angel'

 'White Angel' is a glorious sight in bloom. The white flowers with pale yellow centers complement the fresh green of the foliage perfectly (to the extent that you can actually see any foliage with all those flowers). The buds are essentially white (just barely tinged with pink), so the overall density of whiteness is not diluted at all from a distance.

Crabapple 'White Angel'

Crabapple 'Rousseau'

I especially love the darker pink/red cultivars. 'Rousseau' is one of my favorites. The reddish buds look like fruits hanging among the olive-green leaves. This is a rather large tree with an elegant, spreading habit. It has a real "presence" in the garden.

Crabapple 'Rousseau'

Crabapple 'Louisa'

'Louisa' is another one of my favorites. I make sure to visit her every year :-) The habit is weeping and full. The flowers are smaller than average, but make up for that with their abundance. The color is hard to describe and to capture on camera. It appears more pink in reality, but a very soft, grayish pink with pearly undertones. The tree seems to glow with a kind of inner softness. I put this one last because I always end my "pilgrimage" with a rest in front of 'Louisa'.

Crabapple 'Louisa'

I had originally planned to plant a crabapple in my own garden, but I decided to try a quince in that spot instead. The yard already has a mature lilac, an amelanchier, and a Canadian redbud (cercis canadensis), plus some large maples. Sunny spots are at a premium, and I want to plant some culinary apples, cherry, quince, and apricot. Flowering crabs are very common street trees here, so I suppose I'll just have to enjoy them in other people's yards!