The Last of the Tulips

 I do have more photos, but I think you'll have seen enough after today!  It was hard to get close-ups too, largely because I was sitting too far back in the chair.  But between us we got a few, and we certainly enjoyed it!

These white ones had shades of pink and yellow n them,].

Mrs. F.G. got the best of these.

The tractor was just a big ornament; they imported a bulb planting machine from the Netherlands.

Several people jumped up to play the piano while we were there.

And I don't think I shared this stunning deep pink colour.

You've seen this guy though!

More Tulips!

 As I said, I ended up with lots of pictures, so here you go.  I was initially attracted to the solid colour tulips, but I surprised myself becoming entranced with their mixed plantings.  I kept trying to think 'How did they do this?'  It still seems quite amazing!

You know me and bright colours!

There as even a windmill in the distance.  Note the pathways between the rows.  I found these fields totally accessible, and my chair did not sink in the sand at all.  It was very encouraging.

I enjoyed all the solid colour plantings, but then I started getting intrigued by their mixed colours.

How did they do these?  There was such an even distribution of the different colours all the way down the row.

There are some multi-coloured Tulips here, yellow and red, but there are also different coloured Tulips, white, red and yellow.

The ones with a strong mixture of yellow and purple particularly appealed to me.

That's all (for today) folks!

Tulip Fest!

We went off to a Tulip Fest today, held at Sandhill Creek Farm just west of Hepworth for you local folk.  You need a ticket, and they try to spread tickets over the day so it won't get too crowded.  The tulip blooming season is very short, only about 10 days and we were there for the peak bloom.  They could have hosted many more people in our opinion.

We've been to the famous tulip farms in the Skagit Valley, in Washington State, but we simply never expected to see tulip fields like this here in Ontario, and only an hour's drive away!

The colour combinations were remarkable, very carefully selected and very uniform.

I have lots more photos to share, and we'll certainly be returning every year in the future!

Magnolia Magnificence!

It's peak season for Magnolia trees around town, and they are spectacular!  Yesterday, riding downtown I saw at least six Magnolia out in full bloom.  Enjoy.

This is the largest one I pass, just a couple of blocks away.  Seeing it up close and personal always takes my breath away.

The blooms on this tree, which I think would be considered a Southern Magnolia, are huge and luxurious!

One of the other six trees I saw yesterday.

Our own Magnolia here at home looks pretty small and scrawny in comparison.  Mind you, it has suffered from pruning by our resident rabbit too often.

I believe this is what's known as a Star Magnolia, with much smaller petals on the blooms, but still very pretty.  Hope you enjoyed these.  And hope you're enjoying this time of year, which here at least, has finally turned warm!

These Aren't Leaves!

 I remember when I first took a close look at a Sugar Maple flower in spring.  I didn't know what I was looking at in spite of teaching students about identifying trees for 40 years!  Now I watch for the maple flowers to give the trees that yellowy-green look at this time of year every May.

So you might think these are leaves emerging on this tree, but they're not;  these are the tree's flowers, which come first.

As you get closer and closer you realize these do not look like leaves, though there are emerging leaves among them.  These are the flowers that will ultimately produce the seeds in the form of maple keys.

I had to go down the street to the next Sugar Maple to show you these up close.  You can see the tiny stamens protruding below the calyx of each flower, held on thin stems 2" long.

I think these are just the neatest things!

This branch waving against the sky is right here in our own back yard.  This is certainly not a close-up, but you can still see the dangling flower clusters.

Ditch Diving

On Sunday we went for a drive again, down south of here, turning off the main road to take a few sideroads through the swamps.  I'm calling it ditch diving, driving along swampy sideroads to see what spring flowers we can see in the ditches.  Mrs. F.G. has become quite fascinated with those swampy sideroads. 

Our first stop was at a spot we knew to see the Skunk Cabbage growing.  We're a little late this year, so we were mainly seeing their bright green leaves rather than the deep purple of the 'spathe', the first part of the plant above ground in the spring.  You can see remnants of the spathes of these two plants in the photos.

As it grows the bright leaves dominate, forming small fields of green, somewhat odiferous plants with very large leaves.

Last Sunday some plants were well developed, while some were little more than the purple spathes poking above water.

On we went and in front of a drier patch of upland forest we quickly found some Dogtooth Violets or Trout Lily.  The second photo here is drastically cropped, leaving it a little unclear.

Even the woods themselves were showing a sheen of green as the leaves started opening.  Did you notice the line of beehives?

We passed a small stream that used to mark one of my hideouts.  There's a beaver dam holding back a large wetland just a short distance upstream.  This is the headwaters of the remarkable Wodehouse Creek which I've written about before..

As we carried on the other bright spring flower we soon found was the Marsh Marigold.  It's remarkable to see these growing right out of the water.  Thus ended our ditch diving, a short but fascinating ride.  

May Day was a Big Day!

Well, I'm a few days behind since this actually happened on May 1st, May Day.  If you're a gardener I'm sure you'll recognize what you're seeing.  These seedlings were planted in mid-March, and on May 1st they were brought up from the basement and out into the garage to start the long slow process of 'hardening off'.  These are still Mrs. F.G.'s babies but they've graduated to sit outdoors.

Mrs. F.G. has a set of grow lights set up in the basement, large enough that a mysterious pink glow can be seen from the top of the stairs.  This is where she plants seeds to grow her vegetables, mainly tomatoes and peppers.  Then after the danger of frost is past, usually by June 1st in our location, she can plant them outside.  All of them will be planted in raised beds or big pots for the summer.

I persuaded her to wait until March to plant the seeds this year, and it looks like we were just about right.  Probably half of these will be given away, a large group to our daughter-in-law, who helps run a plant sale in favour of a pet charity.  And this is only about half of the plants to be brought up from the basement yet, the rest mainly peppers.

So you're looking at the foundation for a joyous summer of growing veggies in the garden!