March 2022

[David Pilling]

Martin - power of the new feature I was able to visit the blue tulip on the wiki, something I would not have bothered with. Can you now do the reverse, link the wiki automatically to photos posted on the forum.

I have watched the Harry Potter clip on Mandragora for wiki work purposes. Yeah whatever.

Spring is definitely the best time of year for flowers.

Currently in a dry spell here - decent weather - I went outside in my shirt sleeves yesterday.

I like Anemone nemorosa - but I suspect mine are lost.

Arnold - nice photo - I see the wiki got there first (several photos by you already).

It would be amusing if the forum did image recognition on posted photos and gave its best guess for the species.

This WYSIWYG editor is a thing of wonder - just as long as posts don't end up looking like ransom notes.

[Martin Bohnet]

Martin - power of the new feature I was able to visit the blue tulip on the wiki, something I would not have bothered with. Can you now do the reverse, link the wiki automatically to photos posted on the forum.

Wouldn't go further than an auto-generated search link to the forum

It would be amusing if the forum did image recognition on posted photos and gave its best guess for the species.

we won't rival Inaturalist, I'd guess.

This WYSIWYG editor is a thing of wonder - just as long as posts don't end up looking like ransom notes.

not a fan, I turn it off for most of my posts - takes controll away

[Diane Whitehead]

I like Anemone nemorosa - but I suspect mine are lost.

How could one ever lose it?  I have many forms, but one is so vigorous I am trying to lose it. Every year I dig out a bucketful. Its stick-like rhizomes had covered the ground so thoroughly that Erythronium revolutum couldn't emerge.  

[David Pilling]

Diane - due to your comment, I sought out Anemone nemorosa in the big garden this afternoon, and I was very happy to find it flowering. Just the one flower, which looked nibbled, but quite a patch of leaves.

[David Pilling]

"But David", I hear you say, "You squandered your money on two packets of blue tulips", "How blue are the other ones, as blue as the ocean, as blue as the sky", "lay those blues on us". See below "double late blue spectacle".

[Martin Bohnet]

[nonsense]ah, there is the problem - it says "flowers April&May", so they can't be blue in March [/nonsense]

looks like they used the same amount of color correction...maybe you should try different times of the day? I have some Phlox which are almost blue in the morning but bright magenta in full sunlight - up to this day I haven't figured out if it's a temperature effect or just depends on the exact spectral range of the daylight.

Did I mention I love the "pop up" attitude of flowers on warm spring days (cold front is approaching.  I need the rain, so it's OK.) Ficaria verna

Height:	0-10 cm (0-3.9 inch)
Flower Colors:	yellow
Flower Season:	early spring to mid spring
Life form:	tuber
Climate:	USDA Zone 5-8

'copper knob' starts to spread like the wild yellows I have all around - no idea if it seeds around or if I've just spread the corms involuntarely. Pulsatilla is far more well behaved - the surrounding Muscari latifolium

not so much. Talking about Muscari, I adore the heavy, spicey fragrance of Muscari muscarimi

.
Last one is Rheum palmatum, third year from seed - let's see if that's big enough to flower this year. Already interesting when just starting out with the first leaf - I'd better not show my Veratrum nigrum. So people grow it for foliage? people without slugs may, I'd guess...

[David Pilling]

Looking at the photos I was going to say now is the time of "celandine" which grows wild here. Having looked it up, that is what photo #1 is of (lesser celandine). I like pulsatilla, grown that from seed, but lost it. Yours is a nice colour.

Below Tuesday 29th March, little blue jobs collection. These are all volunteers. Probably descended from bulbs once intentionally planted.

[Martin Bohnet]

One last set of the march flowers, and maybe the last set before disaster strikes - after nearly two weeks with 15-21°C in the afternoon we're heading towards snowfall and frosty nights - wet -1° could be OK, but some models predict down to -7°C by Monday, so kiss the cherries, plums and part of the apples goodbye for 2022 and hope for second shoots on the kiwis.

on the list we have another one of the special "lesser chelandine" Ficaria verna

Height:	0-10 cm (0-3.9 inch)
Flower Colors:	yellow
Flower Season:	early spring to mid spring
Life form:	tuber
Climate:	USDA Zone 5-8

- funny that the greater one isn't all that related. Both in order Ranunculales, that's all. No connection between those in German, by the way. Bellevalia cyanopoda

Height:	0-20 cm (0-7.9 inch)
Flower Colors:	blue, pink, white
Flower Season:	mid spring
Life form:	deciduous bulb

is more of a pink job than a blue job, while Corydalis fumariifolia

is an almost supernatural sky blue that photos hardly can transport - I don't get the name, by the way, as my annual Fumaria officinalis has completely different foliage. last one obviously shows the orange end of my Narcissus range.

[David Pilling]

Martin - interesting plants.
Cellandine can look effective when it grows in a mass, but does not beat eranthis hyemalis (Winter aconite), the latter is really good if it is established under stone chippings.
Your blue coyrdalis reminds me of one that Ian Young has.
It has been warm here, but has turned cold now, seems to have stayed just above 0C here on the coast. Sorry to hear about the blossom. Hope the damsons do OK - probably don't flower for a few weeks (damsons (plums) are a somewhat commercial crop here).