I love our tulips. I have planted white, orange and purple ones, and there were a lot of yellow and red ones already in the garden when we moved in.
The narcissi are superseding the daffodils, which are starting to look a bit sorry for themselves.
Time for a spot of exotic colour before the late spring flowers arrive.
The glorious rays of the sun has to be reflected in spring flowers, and no more so than in these examples.
Forsythia is full flower dominates the hedges, the dandelion faces our celestial star full on, and the gorse glows out from prickly dark green.
Such an intense colour truly shows what wealth we have in nature.
Last weekend’s sunshine brought out the best in the spring flowers, who were just as desperate to see it as we were.
Here’s some yellow and blue stars shining forth to greet that yellow orb in the sky.
Even though now it’s overcast and rainy again, at least the temperature has risen to something more familiar.
Two more flowering plants are noticeable in January, gorse and mahonia, which are extremely yellow and shine forth wonderfully out of the gloom at this time of year.
These are quite exotic compared to primroses, witch hazel and winter jasmine (and later on don’t forget daffodils, celandines and dandelions).
Yellow is a popular colour because it is attractive to insects in an attempt to entice them to visit and pollinate these flowers, but how many pollinating insects are there around in the beginning of January?
My father always said gorse only flowered in the kissing season, but it seems to me that gorse is always in flower… and we certainly kiss all year round!
Walking in the University campus I noticed daffodil spikes poking up between the dead leaves and some were even starting to show golden heads.
It’s usual at this time to see snowdrop spikes (as shown on the right), gradually getting taller as January wears on, but should daffodils be doing the same?
There is a threat of snow this weekend, and even though spring flowers have always bounced back after a freeze or fall of snow, I still feel sorry for them as they strive to recover.
It may halt their progression to get into full flower, but the delay will only put them back into the correct schedule with all the others.
Last year I remember seeing daffodils flowering in January and that felt really weird – they were positioned in a really protected area – and I’m sure it did them no good.
Watching nature while walking 