I have flower petals all over the house to clean up.
About three weeks ago I posted a somewhat dismal account of what may be in store for my spring flower display, which is always spectacular around here. The problem is that almost all the blooming plants were trying to bloom, in the unusual sixty degree temperatures, as if it was already spring. The plants are no longer dormant as they should be during the coldest months of winter and most of the flower buds were already expanding into the full bloom stage, which spells certain disaster for the limbs with liquid in the veins when the dreaded sub freezing temperatures finally return.
After another day of feeling sorry for myself at the possibility of loosing years of training for a particular growth shape on many treasured plants, (yes, I was trying to get my stupid eyes to swallow up the tears they were wanting to vomit down my cheeks - this shit is important to me) I got off my fat ass and got outside over the next few days and cut stems from all the flowering trees, pulled up many of the flowering spring bulbs (killing this year's growth and next year's blooms), mulched the crap out of everything else, got muddy as hell, and crossed my fingers.
As it turned out, the low teen temperatures arrived, this week, killing all the swollen blooms-to-be, destroying the bulbs upper growth for the year and denying me most of my winter-relieving spring flower displays. In my gusto to try to salvage something of the joy of spring, I "forced" over two hundred stems from flowering trees and managed to get dozens of the bulbs to bloom, all indoors.
My house is a mass of flowers, now, two months early, but at least not lost, completely. There are nine buckets of water holding flowering tree stems, many of them five feet tall, placed in corners around the house. My wife thought I had lost my mind, at first, bringing in all these dead-looking sticks and putting them in water, because it had been years since I tried to "force" any branches, indoors. I have some flowering crab apple, plum, almond and peach stems, some that reach the ceiling, and they are loaded with blooms, shedding petals and making one Hell of a happy mess, everywhere. I decided if I was going to lose the branches anyway, I may as well get some good out of the disaster. I even have a few fragrant daffodils that opened up their glory for us, inside.
Screw the mess ...
I don't regret it one bit!
