Garden Glimpses: Fractured Spring
Climate change continues apace, and this has been one of the oddest springs in my experience. After a ridiculously warm early winter and the earliest recorded blossoms in my garden, Mother Nature seems to have taken a step back, realized how overextended she was, and called a halt to the whole thing. Weeks of below normal cold punctuated with hot stretches that flirted with the mid-80s created a “two steps forward, one step back” mentality in the garden, with nothing blooming in season, and unique bouquets of cut flowers that would normally never blossom together. Drought vied with torrential downpours, and a late freeze crushed the star magnolia blooms at their peak.