plenty of poppies

Poppies come in a huge number of varieties, and they look so different, it's amazing they are from the same family.  There are annuals, perennials, lots of colours, hairy or smooth. And the leaves are completely different.
Here's what pops up in my garden:

The first arrival is the Oriental poppy.  Each flower lasts only two days, but the delicate wrinkled petals are just beautiful.  Above is Patty's Plum, and I also have the more common orange one.  It's a tough perennial.  After the blooms are done, I cut the plant right down to the ground, because they can become a magnet for earwigs.  But by August, a new, fresh ball of leaves appear, gathering food for next year's blooms.  The leaves look very much like thistles - long and pointed, but with hairs instead of bristles.

I planted one Islandic poppy many years ago, and it has produced seeds so prolifically that it pops up all over my garden since then.  I try to keep the seed heads deadheaded, but I always miss some, which produce enough seeds for next year.  The leaves are very dainty and small.

This California poppy was part of a bee-friendly seed mix free from Vesey's seeds.  The leaves look almost like dill.

This beautiful pale pink annual poppy popped up in the vegetable garden.  Years ago, I snitched a ripe pod from a daylily garden, dropped the seeds around my garden, and only now have conditions been right for it to sprout.  The leaves are bluish green and ruffled.

the elusive Lady's Slipper

Deep in the woods, Prince Edward Island's provincial flower, the Lady's Slipper, blooms at the same time as our other iconic flower - lupins.  While the tall, spiky lupins can be seen in ditches from the comfort of your car when out for a drive in the countryside, Lady's Slipper is quite another story.

This wild orchid is present in only a few places in the shady woods, at a time of year when the mosquitos are at their absolute most ferocious. Even after spraying myself liberally with deet, I could barely stay still long enough to kneel down in the spongy green moss and focus my camera before feeling the tiny biters go right through the shirt on my back.  So these photos are hard won, but worth it!

is anything more graceful and lovely?

pale ghosts that need a few more days to become pink

A few other pretty flowers were also showing off:  this is bunchberry.  After the flowers fade, they are replaced with bunches of bright red berries.

blueberry blossoms are like tiny bells

I don't know the name of this one, but the three small balls of flowers are shaded by the taller leafy canopy above them.

This tiny star of a flower made a perfect shadow of itself on the leaf below.  I should have spent more time fiddling with the camera to get a better detail in the flower, but the mosquitos had moved in for the kill.

wet weather

It's been raining every day, which should be a downer, but when I look closely, the raindrops add a whole new dimension to the flowers.

the seed heads of prairie smoke are pretty funky.

ah - the tulips.  I can't get enough of them.

raindrops keep fallin' on these heads....

Serviceberry flowers turn to dark berries that taste like blueberries with a hint of almond

bleeding heart dripping rain

rose leaves drinking in the dew

I rescued these bulbs one spring from a dump.  They had survived on top of the ground for a whole winter.  I took them home, and they have rewarded me with beautiful colours for five years.

The black tulips last a really long time.

I just love this wavy leaf

the buzz

Last Saturday was a perfect sunny spring day, and the bees thought so too.  They were creating quite a buzz in my flower bed.

Bees in the Pasque flowers are dizzy with excitement.

check out the bundles of pollen this guy is carrying.

bee on a hyacinth

at the Lieutenant Governor's shindig

The instructors of the PEI Seniors College courses, including me (I teach gardening, natch) were invited for a lovely afternoon of drinking tea and nibbling sweets, a tour of the beautiful mansion, and conversation with Lieutenant Governor Frank Lewis and his wife Dorothy.  It was a truly enjoyable experience, and I was able to check out the gardens as well, which are just starting to come out of winter hibernation.  It's lucky we chose a nice day, because today, just a day later, it's snowing again!

The view from the house towards the garden.

The tulips are starting to push through.

the view from the garden towards the house.

the back of the garden has tear-shaped beds framing a large trellis with a seat to watch the world go by.

one of the few flowers in bloom:  Glory of the Snow (Chionodoxa) has bright blue flowers that appear before the snow disappears.  The tiny bulbs should be planted in the fall

perfectly clipped boxwood hedges frame the garden

The boxwood hedges frame an extensive rose garden.

The roses are protected with an extra mound of soil for the winter.
This will be pulled back when summer finally arrives.

thump on the window

Baby it's cold outside.  And we are having one storm after another.  But the birds, like this Northern Flicker and the bluejay, with their skinny bare feet, seem to thrive, as long as the food keeps coming.

What I didn't realize, that by putting all that suet, sunflower seeds and peanuts on the deck so I can see the birds from my window, I'm making them vulnerable to something else that can see them too.

The other day, I was peeling apples in the kitchen, when there was a thump, followed by a bigger thump against the glass door leading to the deck.  I looked up in time to see a sharp-shinned hawk bounce off the glass, in hot pursuit of a chickadee.  The hawk flew over to the oak tree, its feathers ruffled.  And the chickadee got away!

Having a confab.

The bluejays just love peanuts.

Can't resist a few more of my lovely flicker.  These guys have it all - stripes, spots, red crest, moustache, yellow under the wings.  Pretty fancy!

coming and going

Before Christmas, I purchased two Amaryllis bulbs at different times.  I planted the one on the left two weeks before the one on the right.  The second one began to grow very quickly, and rewarded us with spectacular blooms the second week in January.  Now it's on its way out.

The second one, although planted earlier, sat and sulked on the windowsill.  I thought it might have been because the soil was too wet, or it was too cold.  But now I'm seeing something I have never seen before.

Two flower stalks are coming up at once!  Maybe the energy needed to produce two stalks slowed it down.
Stay tuned for more pictures as this takes off!