My Magnolia started flowering last week and is maybe 30% out this weekend.
Normally I'd expect this in mid march, so I reckon we're at least 3 weeks
ahead of schedule this year.

Andy ( Devon )

On 24/2/07 14:41, in article , "Andy"
wrote:

My Magnolia started flowering last week and is maybe 30% out this weekend.
Normally I'd expect this in mid march, so I reckon we're at least 3 weeks
ahead of schedule this year.

Andy ( Devon )


One of ours is close but not quite there yet and our Cornus controversa
variegata is showing just a touch of green.
--
Sacha
http://www.hillhousenursery.co.uk
South Devon
http://www.discoverdartmoor.co.uk/
(remove weeds from address)

Andy wrote:

My Magnolia started flowering last week and is maybe 30% out this weekend.
Normally I'd expect this in mid march, so I reckon we're at least 3 weeks
ahead of schedule this year.

& Sacha wrote:
One of ours is close but not quite there yet and our Cornus controversa
variegata is showing just a touch of green.

Fabulous isn't it? I'd been quietly thinking winter is well and truly
gone and that spring was here for the past few weeks when the first
Magnolias started to open. Now, many of the big ones are almost at
their best and very splendid they look too. Down on the sea front,
there are also purple-leaved plums (Prunus cerasifera 'Purpurea') in
full bloom, creating great clouds of pale pink that swathe the
magnolias. Wonderful!

Here, a large Cornus capitata (an evergreen tree from the Himalayas)
is showing the first of its buds. At the moment they are just tiny,
green pinheads peaking out from the tips of the expanding shoots.
Over the next month or so they will expand to marble size, each
accompanied by 4 large, very showy creamy yellow bracts, slowly ageing
to deep pink over 2 or 3 weeks. These are followed by large, rosy
red, rounded, strawberry-like fruits lasting well into autumn. The
Cornus is at least a month ahead of itself this year and following
last summer's glorious weather it should be better than ever.

I've also noticed that a big clump of very broad leaved Clivia miniata
near the back door is well advanced with great fat flower spikes
already 30cms tall. This one has been outside for 7 or 8 years and
gets better and better. In 2002 I found a stray seedling from it
germinating in gravel nearby. It was rather hastily transferred to a
scrape of dry soil by the fence under a Callistemon. It is producing
a flower spike as well.

I returned home somewhat earlier than expected on Saturday afternoon
and had a really good 'mooch' around the garden to see if there had
been any winter damage. The fence along the back is smothered in the
carmine buds and white flowers of Jasminum polyanthum at the moment
and the banana fragrance they exude was almost overpowering. Unwisely
(or not) I left out a 'Majesty palm' (Ravenea rivularis and a 'Dwarf
Date palm' - Phoenix roebelenii over winter. Neither are supposed to
tolerate very much cold and the Phoenix in particular has been
reported to die even when overwintered in a cold greenhouse. Both are
growing away like fury, each with a 'flush' of several new leaf spears
pushing through. The Phoenix's 'cousin' - P. canariensis is now very
widely planted in southern gardens and there's a 12m. high, 115 year
old one here to prove its hardiness. However the much smaller growing
roebelenii is almost as cold sensitive as canariensis is hardy and I
expected it to be slowly rotting away.

I'm also delighted to see that a young Solanum wendlandii has not only
survived well, but is already starting into growth. This is a very
robust climber from Costa Rica with dangerously thorny leaf stalks
that rip anyone who gets too close. It pays its way by rewarding with
huge trusses of large (5-6cms. wide) violet blue flowers that slowly
fade to pale blue then white as they age. From a distance, it looks
like an abstruse, clmibing blue hydrangea on steroids. Being almost
tropical in origin, it is one of the least hardy Solanums and I'm
seriously pleased to find it is happy growing against the house wall.

Sorry Andy, I hi-jacked your thread. Back on topic. Over the past
week or so, I've also noticed that a huge Magnolia delavayi has
started to show a few flower buds. This is normally a mid-late summer
flowering species that usually starts to show buds in June and July.
Whether they are just an aberration or not depends if more follow over
the next few weeks.