Mid-March Floral Report

I was out walking Olga a couple of weeks ago when I noticed one of our neighbors was throwing away several geraniums, roots and all. They seemed perfectly healthy, so I grabbed them from the neighbor's yard waste bag, brought them home and potted them. We're already being rewarded with blossoms!

Another street find was this large lavender plant. It was sitting in its pot next to a trash can in a park. Boy was it a pain to lug that thing home. It's pot-bound so I think we'll put it in the ground.

Some sad news about our snakehead fritillary, which I photographed just last week. The squirrels ravaged it a few days later. This is what was left. I put the flowers in a vase, and gathered up the remaining bulbs and any pieces that were still whole and replanted them, putting shards of old flowerpot around the base to protect them from another raid. But the jury's out on whether it will survive.

On a happier note, our grape hyacinths are blooming like crazy. I love these things, even though they're pretty much weeds. We have loads of them in the flower beds and I've forbidden Dave from digging any of them up, which drives him crazy.

Inside, the hyacinths that our friends Adam and Tim bought for us are blooming. The house is full of their heavy, sweet scent. (And the squirrels can't get to them!)

And finally, I did move the amaryllis to our dining room windowsill, where they are out of Olga's reach and hopefully will finish their blooming cycle. You can see how I staked up that flower stalk on the right, hoping it will recover from Olga's recent rampages. As I wrote earlier, it looks like we're getting only two flower stalks this year, so I hope they both make it!