01/20/12 Anemones

01/20/12 Anemones

My first anemones have started blooming, a sure sign of spring even though, this year, it has been hard to talk about spring harbingers when we're still waiting for winter to happen and some spring blooming bushes have been doing their thing for weeks now..

A couple of days ago, a few Red Breasted Robins showed up in the front garden. They usually stop here, en masse, on their way North and scavenge all the worms they can find before moving on. That's when my garden gets covered in little craters left by those digging birds with no other visible impact on the garden.

Anemones, though, like many other spring blooms strictly follow length of daylight rather than temperatures. Those of us who are out early or late have noticed longer daylight already.

Indoors: I decided to start some of my heading lettuce a little earlier than normal hoping to take advantage of a cool rather than cold winter and get to eat my first lettuce a little earlier than normal. (No, it's not a sign of impatience, just experimentation, the spice of life!)

Postscript: one of my faithful followers remarked that I made a mistake on my last post by trying to make compost sexier that it really is and, perhaps, turning off some new gardeners finding this challenge too great. I did mention that my compost pile was very unsexy. Here is what it looks like:

It works great and does not need any additional sophistication.