yowza. bloodroot, frog song, TRILLIUM…

This is from a walk in the woods in town, not where we live. Tis bloodroot (Sanguinaria canadensis)! Check out those leaves. So very modest. Don’t look! Don’t look!

Back at home, I visited the lone hyacinth, last seen here on March 22nd. It’s opened up a bit, eh?

The lawn is dotted with eastern blue-eyed grass (Sisyrinchium atlanticum).

Let the records show that our feral forsythia has finally started in – earlier than last year, to be sure, but later than the highly southern latitudes just a couple of miles from here.
When you’re lying in the leaf litter taking pictures, sometimes you come across unexpected riches, like…

…a whole stash of bonus hyacinth in the beginnings of the woods.
Have you ever wondered just exactly what an almost-open daffodil looks like? I know I have.

Not Yet.

Alllmost…

Check this out, it can’t decide if it’s white, or yellow. Sweet.
We’ve got some coltsfoot (Tussilago farfara) – normally our very first wildflower, but this crazy spring, it’s scrambling to keep its place in the line-up.

 Click here to see what it looks like when it goes to seed.
Hold on to your hats, the willow (species unknown) out by the mailbox is simply crazy.
This is soooo weird, because these guys didn’t get going until a MONTH from now last year, when other things were up and running that so far I’ve seen no sign of.
And now, for the audio portion. I visited the wetland across the way. Want to hear the quintessential sound of Vermont spring? (Hint: if you are not from around here, the correct answer is “yes”.)


I admit, I got distracted by the end by a tadpole, which I didn’t capture in the video. But here’s a tadpole for you:

And-and-and I spotted something green amidst the clutter of leaf litter and and and it’s TRILLIUM.

Stay tuned on this puppy, it’ll be glorious. (Trillium erectum.)

the unfolding of spring: blink, and you’ll miss it.

I don’t know about you, but my brain melts at temperatures above 80 degrees. It’s Vermont. It’s March. Good Lord. The process of documenting spring’s awakening is UPON US, baby. The frogs started hollering yesterday afternoon. All kinds of things are happening-all-of-the-sudden, and here I am, with a melted brain. Here’s what I was able to capture today:

The lilac buds started opening. Today. Last year, the buds were closed on April 6th, and it took them until April 22nd to get to the stage shown above. This year, they went from closed, to open, in two days.

The lone miniature lawn hyacinth poked up.

So did these guys. I never did really ID ‘em last year – I think I went with white blue-eyed grass.
Here’s one of my world-famous time-lapse sequences of buds opening up. I believe this is an introduced species – Cornus mas, or a cherry dogwood.

The terminal bud.

The next set of buds. No news.

The next set of buds…hello!

…the next set of buds…

An explosion of yellow. I swear, I’m going to have to just camp out next to this and try and spot how this happens. Sproinnnggggg!

Ta da!


Along the driveway, the wild rose is leafing out today. Last year? Late April.
As for the gray birch – already, the buds are sporting their magenta headdresses while nearby, the catkins open up. This is a process that started last year on April 11th. So yeah, it’s been an accelerated spring.



I’ve got my work cut out for me, to run around and keep up with all of this – wish me luck!

I really shouldn’t be allowed out in public

The lilacs continue to open up, slowly by slowly… (Syringa vulgaris)

I think you’re supposed to be on the inside of the flower.

Vlad the Impaler, reincarnated as a daffodil.

Our lone miniature hyacinth, April 14th, and today, respectively. Baby’s getting big!

Little clusters of what might be blue-eyed grass continue to pop up here and there.

I want to BE that color.

Now this bug knows what he’s doing. Spring beauty (Claytonia virginica).

These little buggers haven’t opened up yet, so I’m still clueless. Whatever they are, there are a lot more of them today than there were a few days ago.

As well as a whole army of trout lily leaves, which somebody seems to have been munching on:

That’s another spring beauty in there.

Also still a mystery: these super-fuzzy guys, that create little white flowers.

No news on the magnolia front.

I went up into the woods and Charlie followed me. Since we’ve got evil monsters in the woods, and I didn’t want Charlie to get used to the idea of hanging out up here, I carried him inside and then headed back out again.

I found a new cache of white blue-eyed grass (Sisyrinchium albidum) on the west side of the house.

After all of these forays, I went for my run, which was inexplicably much faster than my run of two days ago. On my way out, I stopped to chat with our neighbor, who was busy grading the private road we share (“hooray!”, says the trusty Honda!). He said the trapper walked the land and estimates there are nine, count ‘em nine, beavers working the pond and stream. He’ll trap some but not all of them – the goal is to have enough beavers around to maintain the dam that forms the pond, but not enough to wreak havoc on the field.

On my way back from my run, I saw something so splendid that I ran inside to get the camera. We maintain a largely shoes-off household, so I took off my running shoes, and on my way back out, naturally, I opted for the easiest footwear possible:

Am I a hottie, or what? What on earth could possibly be worth going out in public looking like this?

The first fern fronds of the season, that’s what!

cat/kin

We all ripen and develop at our own pace.

Some of us are rarin’ to go.

While others are biding their time. Lilac (Syringa vulgaris), same plant, just a branch or two apart.

Have I mentioned that these mystery flowers (first shown here,  here, and here) are barely a quarter inch long?

Miniature daffodils are making their move. Any day now.

The maybe-it’s-blue-eyed grass flowers are popping up in more places. Would you have guessed these little buggers were so satiny up close and personal? Oh, the blessings of macro zoom.

On the gray birch front, here’s where we are: Some catkins are opening up and looking like this one – the guts are a yellowy green:

I believe the one above is the same kind (male, gray birch --- as opposed to female, gray birch) as the ones shown below, that have been open a little longer:

The gray birch buds, on the other hand, are really sporting their new headresses. Still not clear what is happening here – I’m still going with Incipient Leaves:

Some crocuses/croci, are about done:

Not this one, though:

The miniature hyacinth has a baby sibling coming up:

And today’s new arrival?

Spring beauty – Claytonia virginica

I got help from Charlie (Felinicus beastum)