Every year one or more forms or varieties of the many spring flowering plants—crocus, snowdrops, daffodils, tulips, hyacinths—capture my imagination. One year it was lily-form tulips, another year it was the splendid pink-cupped daffodil, ‘Mrs. R.O. Backhouse’, still another season found me enthusing endlessly about a particularly vivid blue chionodoxa or “glory of the snow”. … Read more
The gardening season at my house is ending as it began, with bright blue and white crocuses dotting the beds. As in the spring, they are poking bravely through the garden rubble that I haven’t yet had time to clean up. People who see them think that climate change has fooled the spring crocuses into … Read more
If you haven’t thought about it yet, now is a good time to plant your daffodils and other spring bulbs. The ones I ordered still await my tender ministrations and I hope to get them all into the ground this coming weekend. Of course, first I have to rake up the mountain of leaves, obligingly … Read more
I was uncommonly late planting my bulbs this year and, in fact, have one small bag of antique-variety tulip bulbs left in the garage. If they were sentient, they would be wondering if they had been forgotten. Of course, if they were sentient, they would also know that guilt moves me like nothing else. I … Read more
Every year at this time I take great joy in paging through the paper bulb catalogs and perusing the websites so that I can overspend on spring bulbs in the most discerning and intelligent way. One of my longtime favorite catalogs is Old House Gardens, which describes itself as “Heirloom Bulbs—So Much More Than … Read more
