This is the journal of my endeavours to grow a range of fruit, veg and flowers from seed, grow organically, and my attempts to create a personal paradise with 1/2 acre of maintained gardens and 1/2 acre wild meadows. Northern Ireland's average daily high temperatures are 18 °C (64 °F) in July and 6 °C (43 °F) in January. Soil type: Clay

Wednesday 20 March 2013

1st Day of Spring

Happy Spring! (although it may not quite feel like Spring in many places).


Today is the first day of spring - known as the ‘Vernal Equinox’. The equinox occurs twice a year, once in March and once in September. On the equinox, night and day are nearly the exact same 12-hour length around the world.


Here's what Spring is looking like in my garden.... (no daffodils flowering yet)...
Once again... I'm snapping photos of Spring bulbs. There isn't much interest in the garden other than the crocus and snowdrops at the minute and they bring much appreciated splashes of colour in clumps and drifts. 
Above: Some spare crocus bulbs were stuck in an old chimney pot.
My favourite Spring quote:
"There are no rules in a cottage garden." (Alan Titchmarsh)
Just the way I like to garden!
Above: Drifts of snowdrops through a contorted witchhazel (also known as Harry Lauder's Walking Stick).
Irish Heather - Spring flowering shrubs look attractive when little else is flowering.
Spring is usually when I focus on projects around the garden like landscaping new areas, sowing seeds, preparing beds for growing vegetables, tidying up garden debris, moving plants, etc. There’s a lot to do and because it has been quite cold this month I’m behind schedule, but I'll get caught up with the better weather (hopefully arriving soon).



Copyright: All words and photos are property of Kelli's Northern Ireland Garden.

9 comments:

  1. Lovely cheerful photographs. I love seeing crocus in the garden.

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  2. Those Crocuses look smashing en masse like that! Hopefully the sheep were not in your garden..? (though I know you have occasionally had horses visiting you.)

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  3. We have miniature daffodils flowering but it is still far from springlike weather.

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  4. Thanks for the happy wishes, Kelli and hope your first day of Spring was happy, too. Your photos are so pretty and the crocus just make me smile they are so cheerful and colorful! I like the heather, too.

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  5. Happy Spring Kelli!! Your photos made me smile!

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  6. I also agree to the quote of Alan Titchmarsh and I also am far behind with gardening work, it is simply far too cold, we still have temperatures below zero, too bad. Your crocuses look lovely so there are signs of spring and yes, sheep get their lambs so spring is definitely coming.

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  7. Nothing much getting done here either Kelli - love that drift of crocus they look so much better when there a lot of them don't they.

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  8. Such a pretty spring garden, bursting with colour. So different from my spring garden at the moment which is white, covered with snow.

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  9. Lovely, crocus bulb Not Available in here.

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