bouquet of bulbs

The daffodils are over (I've beheaded the last of them, except a few by the south fence) but the tulips are doing nicely: most of the Darwin hybrids, all of the T. bakeri etc., and some "Lady Jane" T. clusiana. The sparaxis still look great, the muscari still look good, more anemones are open (a pink and a white near the drive), and more and more freesia are showing up. There are more calochortus.

There are a few scarlet flax, a fair number of California poppies, ditto osteospermum daisies. There has been one bloom from the dietes. The alstroemeria are opening more; the lithodora diffusa is looking very good on the east side of the fence. A few anagallis, but not enough to make a summer.

The ceanothus is still in bloom, and the solanum was spectacular yesterday when wseen from the south.

I've been thinning out the gilia and clarkia in the Zone.

warming up

We had one frost scare two or three nights ago, but everything survived.  I've now taken away most of the insulation I had put on last year.

Two weeks ago I forgot to mention that a very daring cosmos was open behind the house.  It's only knee high, from a strain ('Sonata') that is supposed to grow head high, but still.  The red primrose I mentioned then is doing very well indeed, as are the cyclamens; of the three I planted at the south fence, the third (bright red) finally seems happy.  In the back, the hyacinth is opening and so are a few daffodils, though I think I'll move them; in front, the 'Ice Follies' and 'Barrett Browning' are looking very good, and I want more of them in the adjacent bed that now has only zantedeschia and lobularia.  All manner of tulips are threatening to open, and the ones I planted in fron of the corner lawn (where the erigeron also is) are at least up.  Another sparaxis is open, just, and the freesias are covered in buds.  Most of the ipheion are blooming, and the dwarf iris are nearly over after making a good show in the daylily part of the Zone.  Several red anemones have joined the blue one: two in the tubs in the southern Zone and one or perhaps two in the front lawn.  I've also seen a first scarlet flax, a first few anagallis, and a first 'Johnny-jump-up' viola cornuta.  The ipomopsis seems nearly extinct in the western border -- oh well, I wasn't quite happy with it there anyway -- but is growing behind the house.  The bloom on the plum tree  was within a few feet of the tops of the branches, and I hope there is some left after today's storm.

I managed to mow the back lawn yesterday, and cut the biggest epilobium down to roughly knee high rather than try to keep a cage around it.  For the rest, the only work I've doen is weeding.  Oh, and I've pulled out most of the gilia capitata, except in the Zone.  Not that it's ugly, but in the lawns I have better uses for the space and light.

In the western border, neither the berberis nor the hibsicus have done anything yet, but the teucrium does its best to make up for them.  The grevillea are both in bloom, as is the loropetalum, though the latter is hard to see because it has not added any height to speak of.  The 'Newport Dwarf' escallonia is doing slightly better in that respect.