Exit, Pursued by a Bear

Hat tip to C.

What could be cuter than a sneezing baby panda?

Bulbs seen and unseen

Lots of things coming up, as you can see.

Bloomed:

• 25 Galanthus ELWESII
  
• 1 (ie. 50 bulbs) Galanthus NATURALIZING COLLECTION
  
• 50 Crocus ANCYRENSIS
  
• 25 Crocus ANCYRENSIS
  
• 25 Crocus vernus JOAN OF ARC
  
• 20 Eranthis HYEMALIS
  
• 25 Scilla BIFOLIA
  
• 25 Scilla SIBERICA

• 6 Allium SCHUBERTII
  
• 25 Allium PURPLE SENSATION
  
• 1 Allium GLOBEMASTER
  
• 3 Allium MOUNT EVEREST
  
• 25 Allium moly JEANNINE
  
• 20 Allium AZUREUM
  
• 20 Camassia QUAMASH
  
• 50 Chionodoxa SARDENSIS
  
• 1 Chionoscilla X ALLENII
  
• 1 Fritillaria imperialis LUTEA MAXIMA
  
• 6 Lilium species Lilium PUMILUM
  
• 10 Narcissus RIP VAN WINKLE
  
• 10 Narcissus MINNOW
  
• 25 Tulipa URUMIENSIS

Wuzzles!

Wuzzles!

Bulbs (3)

C. points this out on the BBC Web site, which may explain a certain amount about our success with winter aconites:

Dry tubers can be bought in the autumn, but they are generally not as successful as plants bought 'in the green' (in leaf) either during or just after flowering time, which will establish much more readily.

Bulbs (2)

We also have a few of these coming up in the back. I'd grown up calling them dogtooth violets, and was told that they were hard to establish, but (a) I think that ID is wrong, and (b) they seem to like us - maybe they took pity on us. Or maybe not - I see four out of an original 20 bulbs coming up.

They're strange little bulbs - they're shaped like little circular acorns, have to be soaked overnight before planting, and then planted the right side up, which is harder than it sounds, since up and down are hard to tell apart. I remember my father saying that if I was totally baffled, planting them sideways was better than nothing. But it is tricky, and perhaps that's the root of the problem.

There's a well-established clump of them in Jville, and last year I took a trowel and transplanted one or two clumps as they bloomed, which is not at all by the book, but both clumps are blooming again and seem quite happy. They're pretty definitely Eranthis hyemalis, or winter aconite.

Bulbs

Our bulbs have mostly been on hold with the blustery weather. The snowdrops bloomed, of course, then some little early crocuses which were yellow in the catalogue but orange here - I like the orange better. Then some of them flopped over during our last snowfall, and wait for warmer days, and nothing else has bloomed.

On the other hand, everything, more or less, has come up and is waiting, green, ready and expectant. I think that at some point soon there should be a spectacular display as the behind-schedule bulbs and on-schedule bulbs all go off together.


Most of these are in the front:

• 6 Allium SCHUBERTII
• 25 Allium PURPLE SENSATION
• 1 Allium GLOBEMASTER
• 3 Allium MOUNT EVEREST
• 25 Allium moly JEANNINE
• 20 Allium AZUREUM
• 20 Camassia QUAMASH
• 50 Chionodoxa SARDENSIS
• 1 Chionoscilla X ALLENII
• 50 Crocus ANCYRENSIS
• 25 Crocus ANCYRENSIS
• 25 Crocus vernus JOAN OF ARC
• 20 Eranthis HYEMALIS (Some of these were planted in the back, and are coming up. They seem happy with low-light conditions, something to file away.)
• 1 Fritillaria imperialis LUTEA MAXIMA
• 25 Galanthus ELWESII
• 1 (ie. 50 bulbs) Galanthus NATURALIZING COLLECTION
• 6 Lilium species Lilium PUMILUM
• 10 Narcissus RIP VAN WINKLE
• 10 Narcissus MINNOW
• 25 Scilla BIFOLIA
• 25 Scilla SIBERICA
• 25 Tulipa URUMIENSIS

On top of that, there was half a shopping bag of pheasant's eye narcissus from Jville.

Fireplaces, redux

Finished this morning -

Wuzzles!

Fireplaces, Mr. Bean!

Made some progress today on the fireplace, which we tiled last weekend. The fireplace has been somewhere on the unfinished list since the summer we moved in (it was inaugurated on the Wuzzle's due date). The old fireplace was made of dark red tile on a sort of concrete facade, which I didn't much like but was willing to be loyal to because it was original to the house.

Then a lot of it fell off (a contractor and I found ourselves holding an enormously heavy component of it as we poked at it and discussed the job - he didn't return calls after that), and the field opened.

The rebuilt fireplace was a different shape from the old one, which the old mantle was built for. The solution was a fairly straightforward piece of carpentry, which would have been more straightforward if I hadn't somehow wrecked my biscuit joiner. More importantly, the bricks had to be retiled, and C. and I, who have a similar enough aesthetic sense that we don't usually have to discuss a decision all that much, had a rare parting of minds about the tile.

Anyway, this ended in compromise (I found something I liked from her preferred source), and this is the result, sans mantle. It looks black in the picture, but it's more of a dark green.

Cast ne'er a clout till May be out -

This little orange crocus, new to me last fall, is Crocus ancyrensis, or Ankara crocus. Native in Turkey. They're very early, and got going about a week after our snowdrops. Apparently I planted 75 in the fall.

No sign of the winter aconites, though. There are mounds of them in Jville (which seems about a week ahead of us for reasons I don't totally understand, and may have to do with soil fertility, not climate). As well, we have a single brave one coming up beside the compost heap from two I planted last year, so the bought ones may have failed.

They're funny bulbs, like little discs with the texture of acorns, which had to be soaked overnight before planting. They may yet appear.