Signs of spring

Although it hasn’t been a snowy winter it was pretty wet, cold and windy.  However, January and February flew by, and now it’s March and Spring is springing.  In my garden the snowdrops flowered and now the daffies are opening.  I brought a bunch of them indoors today so am now enjoying the beautiful scent that’s wafting around the living room.   Aren’t they beautiful!

A week or so ago, Morag, Mike and I paid a visit to Kailzie Gardens to see the snowdrops – drifts of them through the woodlands, and by the

 

river.

 

 

 

 

They were growing around the tree roots, and just everywhere really. and this is all thanks to Lady Angela, owner of the gardens, who plants more and more snowdrops, filling spaces where the bulbs haven’t naturalised and spread by themselves.  We came across one little area where plugs of earth had been removed in readiness for a few more snowdrops to be planted.  No doubt after the rain had stopped Lady Angela  would be back with some new plants to fill the holes.

I wonder if this rogue crocus was in a pot of snowdrops recently planted.  It was the only one in the whole garden! 

Along the Major’s Walk another of the early flowers was blooming in profusion – the aconite – their yellow heads  closed up against the raindrops. 

 

 

This is the Major’s Walk and the summer house where I imagine the Major came to read his newspaper on a warm summer morning, his two labrador dogs sitting patiently by his feet.  Not that I knew the Major of course.  The “big house” was demolished getting on for 60 years ago now as you may have read in previous posts I have written, and the Major is long gone.

  Just in front of the summer house is a small rhododendron bush, surprisingly boasting some blooms already – in March?  I would expect to see these in flower about May or June!  Nice to see them all the same.

So the snowdrops gave way to the daffodils, as I discovered today on a visit to the Petanque piste for a practice.

They are not all out in bloom yet, but it won’t be long.

and they too will be a beautiful sight in due course.  So, the wind getting cooler, and rain again threatening, it seemed time to go home. We finished our game, and

 

set off back to the carpark, passing the ornamental cherry tree in bloom alongside the burn.

Even back at home, in the neighbours’ gardens there were more signs of Spring – the pussy willows in Duart and Carol’s garden – and buds well

 

swollen and ready to burst open in Heather’s.

It’s a lovely time of year when all the new growth starts, oh and on the way to Lanark on Sunday I saw some of the first lambs of the season, and these lovely catkins in the garden centre near Lanark.

Another week or two and things will be different again – probably white with snow!  Who knows!  but once the leaves start to open on the lime trees outside my windows I will feel Spring has really sprung!

Talk again soon.