Early spring, maybe not quite so early!

TPP is in St. Louis for a society meeting, the business end of botany.  Spring here is about 2 full weeks ahead of us 150 miles further north, and the star and tulip-flowered magnolias are in bloom here. But a huge front is pushing in from the north west, and lows are expected here in the low 20s (remember 32 is freezing in the crazy F temp scale).  In our area probably even a few degrees lower. Any plant with flowers out will likely get toasted. This is the problem with early springs in the great Midwest.  Our weather patterns are so big and so variable that late and even not so late freezes are more than likely, they are virtually certain.  Stoopid plants just don't know to wait.  TPP's stoopidist plant is certainly our star magnolia, so ours is planted in a cool, slightly shady location, and it flowers a week later than most others, and it this case this just might be enough to save its floral display from frost damage, or maybe not.  It's a wait and see game.  Been too busy to peek at the Missouri Botanical Gardens to see how advance their gardens are.  Even this morning while picking the newspaper up off the front stoop, TPP noticed that the potted pansies were pretty stiff, but they are quite tough plants and once you're frozen, you're frozen.  So we'll see.  Nothing much to worry about in any case, but magnolias are another matter entirely.

Friday Fabulous Flower - early Iris

A number of people have contacted TPP to  ask the obvious, "Are we having an early spring?"  Yes, and to answer the next question, this is weather, which is variable; it becomes climate when this weather pattern becomes regular and normal. On a world-wide basis we've had a series of some 6 or 7 warmest years on record in a row. The 2016-2017 winter has largely been a no-show here in the upper Midwest. Relatively little snow and not even much rain, so things are pretty dry. This is the 8th year that TTP has kept a record of first flowering dates for the 300 or so perennial flowering plants in our gardens. The other perennials don't flower (gymnosperms, ferns) at all.  Over such a short term the data shows quite a bit of variation year to year, but 2017 is looking very early.  Now once June comes along, things will have evened out.  The witch hazels have always flowered in mid to late Feb. or early March. Last year they flowered on the 17th and 27th of Feb.; this year they flowered on the 12th and 17th, so 5 and 10 days earlier, and they have flowered on the 17th, 18th, and 21st of Feb. before.  Same with the crocus and snowdrops.  The squill started flowering a week earlier than ever before, but the real shocker is today's FFF Iris reticulata. It started flowering on the 26th of Feb., a full 2 weeks earlier than ever before. That's a lot this time of year. TPP featured this Iris a couple of years ago.  It's really only doing well in one place in our gardens where the bulbs have multiplied quite nicely, and this is pretty cheerful early in the spring.  A couple of nights of below freezing temperatures have not done it any damage.

Spring sprung, sprang!

According to my data, the Phactors ususally have 5-6 plants that flower in March.  So far this year 35 plants have flowered in March, and there's still quite a few days left!  Unfortunately, the metabolisms of many early spring flowers are just not adapted for temperatures in the high 70s and low 80s, so at these temperatures, things do not last long.  Bloodroot popped up, flowered, and was done in 3 days.  Three days!  It's like watching regular spring flowering in super fast speed.  Wow!  Today was spent removing rabbit barrier fences and pruning some trees and shrubs.  Two dwarf apples, Nova spys (terrific new dwarf version of a great, superb, apple variety), and one is growing wonderfully, lots of spur shoots and flowering, the other is reaching for the sky, no spurs, no flowering.  The pruning will be severe.  After pounding on a dwarf pear for the last couple of years, it's beginning to shape up, and is going to flower for the first time.  Mrs. Phactor will be most pleased as the pear tree was for her.  But if the heat isn't turned down soon, the flowering timeline will really get things our of whack.  Fortunately, pollinators have been active too, and carpenter bees were busy at the bush cherry.