Leave it to Spring!

 Which tree or shrub?
New Spring Growth

I've never been photographically fair on spring. And in my writing I adopt two extreme attitudes. I gush in a whirl of flowery cliches, where 'beautiful' and 'wonderful' describe 'blossom' and 'rhododendrons'.

Then I flick the grumpy switch and moan about weeds, weeds, weeds - repeating the 'weed' word for added emphasis. Aargh! I've done it again!

New Hope, New Growth

So where's spring's middle ground? Where's the beauty balance - all the little lovelies with less of the obvious 'wow' factor, and none of the weedy? The true essence of spring, the new hope that comes with new growth - have I lost my appreciation of such things?

Aha! Not quite! I've found it in a series of photographs taken by my visiting webmaster. He doesn't gush at pink and white fluffies, and he doesn't notice the weeds. He's a leaf man, and this is so refreshing.

He sees the variety of fresh spring growth - the unfurling of the fern fronds, the little maples, the crinkly Angelica, and the new Stachys leaves - so rightly called 'Lamb's Ears'. He celebrates their detail and almost reverently photographs them. I'm faintly ashamed that I've been overly preoccupied with the W word and which rhododendron will be flowering next. Leaves are the answer. Leave it to spring!

It's so refreshing having someone other than the gardener taking the photographs. They'll see blossom in a tree and photograph the blue sky beyond. They'll show off the shapes of sunshine and shadow on the frilly yellow tulips. I see these tulips rather differently. I remember planting five of them just last year and this spring there are just two flowers. Hmm... I can do the maths. So next year there'll be minus one? Or four fifths, if the progression to oblivion is geometric...

Enjoy!

I hope you'll enjoy seeing these rather different images of spring in my garden. Enjoy!