Given that I lost patience with winter way back in December, I’m pretty excited to notice that despite weekly storms and another overnight icing of a wintery mix, spring is starting to win the tug of war. When the sun is out – and the wind isn’t blowing a gale – it’s warm enough to bask a little. Everything is dripping, the ground is squishy, and the birds are singing love songs. Looks at least partly springy out to me. I know I’m probably jumping the gun a little because March is usually disappointingly March-like but I can’t help it. I’m just so ready to see spring in the smallest signs.

The biggest sign of spring is easy enough to see – and feel: the sun is finally high enough in the sky that the greenhouse is getting cooking. By mid-morning on a sunny day over the last couple of weeks it has become so deliciously summer-like in there we have had to strip off sweaters and scarves and squint or put on sunglasses. The plants are responding to the extra light and heat by outgrowing containers, blooming away, and becoming susceptible to infestations. – Aphids and whitefly seem to love spring as much as I do. So we and a handful of volunteers have started taking sunny opportunities to keep up with the grooming and leaf washing. (We’ll try to rotate all the garden volunteers in for a vitamin-D fix.) I have followed the sunbeams around my house to do the same thing… And today Gail and I started emptying benches to make room for more plants because we’ll start some seeds this week. If that isn’t a sure sign of spring, I don’t know what is.

Missing February bloom day is my excuse for posting some gratuitous sunny greenhouse flowers (clockwise from top left): Everyone thinks this camellia (unnamed) is a double hibiscus – it’s that tropical looking. Amaryllis ‘Zombie’ has been on a blooming rampage since December. The blue Marguerite (Felicia amelloides ‘Variegata’) is also unstoppable, and completely unbothered by insects. And even though the Spanish shawl (Centradenia floribunda) will quit blooming by summer it’s worth every inch of its bench space for the flowers now.

Is it partly springy in your garden yet? Are your houseplants going nuts? When will you start your first seeds?

The first thing I learned in bee school is that more people are interested in keeping bees than I would have thought. In the 2 classes held at RIC there are over 100 people enrolled. The second thing I learned was that beekeepers are as generous and enthusiastic as gardeners. They want anyone and everyone who is interested in keeping bees to succeed. To that end, the RI Beekeepers Association runs several bee school classes every year, holds monthly meetings, and encourages every newbie (newbee?) to ask lots of questions and shadow a mentor. And it’s a big enough network that we students have been reassured that there would always be a more experienced beekeeper nearby willing to come over to help inspect a hive and answer questions. With such a safety net, it would be very hard to fail.

Which is a good thing because there’s a lot to it. A lot of bees for one thing – 50,000+ workers and drones (depending on the time of year), plus one queen, make up a healthy colony. The queen can lay over 1000 eggs per day that grow into new workers (and drones) to replace old — individuals (besides the queen) only live about 40 days altogether.

The colony’s goal is to reproduce and survive the winter and it’s a fascinating community effort. The workers have specific roles that change over the course of their lifespan, going from nurse bee to house bee to guard. After about 3 weeks in the hive, they go out as the foragers we gardeners know and love. Interestingly, the workers, not the queen, make all the decisions about what the foragers should bring back to the hive (nectar, pollen, water), whether the queen is getting old and needs replacing, and when it’s time for the colony itself to reproduce (swarm). Drones only job is to fly around in great comet-shaped congregations and mate with the queen. They mooch food from the workers and are kicked out of the hive before winter.

And there’s a lot involved in keeping a colony healthy. So much that it has made my head spin and I haven’t even learned yet about all of the problems, diseases, and infestations to which they’re so susceptible…

In last week’s class I learned that there are no ordinances against keeping bees in Rhode Island. But keepers in the urbs and suburbs should be discreet (hide hives in the back yard and paint them to blend in) and be super sensitive to neighbors’ worries. (Giving away honey is said to help assuage fears.)  Apiaries should face south or southeast for winter sun, and be out of the way of heavy human, animal, and car traffic. And we’ve got to get it right. Once the bees are in residence, the hive can only be moved less than 3′. Or more than 3 miles. And bees will need a nearby water source to keep them out of your neighbor’s pool.

Blithewold’s bees are situated beautifully, facing south in full winter sun. It was warm enough today that I thought I might see some activity (in the winter, bees leave the hive on sunny days for “bathroom breaks”) but I pressed my ear up to the hive body and thought I could hear them hum. I can’t wait to learn more and maybe shadow our volunteer beekeeper and have a peak inside…

Cupid’s dart hit a bull’s-eye this morning. Another snowfall – a sugar dusting this time – helped me realize something that I’ve known all along without knowing it. I am capable of becoming every bit as attached to places as I am to people. It’s so obvious: I am in love. Blithewold, will you be my Valentine?

Happy Valentine’s Day!

As snowstorms go, this – Nemo, the Blizzard of 2013 – wasn’t a pretty one. Though it was pretty spectacular in some ways… The crazy blue flashes of lightning were pretty scary. Power outages made a lot of our houses pretty chilly. But the snow itself – heavy, wet and icy – and the damage it caused, was really pretty ugly.

Here at Blithewold, about 45 trees were badly damaged and at least 7 are total losses. The grounds are a mess of broken limbs — I would caution against taking a walk here to see for yourself at least until Fred, Dan, and Nick have had a chance to clear trees of dangerous hangers. (They’re called widow-makers for a reason.)

Click on pictures for bigger view and captions.

But It was a relief this morning to see how some of the flattened shrubs and weighted limbs had popped back up after yesterday’s rainy thaw. I know first hand the temptation of knocking heavy snow off tree limbs and shrubs but generally it’s better to let nature handle that. By clearing limbs ourselves, we risk doing the plants – and ourselves – greater injury. That said, if another round of snow had been expected, then gently – so gently!- sweeping what you could off limbs to at least lighten the load would be worth a try. (I’m trying to train myself to think that whatever doesn’t break them makes them stronger.) The pictures below are of our huge chestnut rose (Rosa roxburghii) flattened (taken Sunday) and today after it had bounced back. Its limbs were wired after Hurricane Bob flattened it in 1991.

The gardens will be fine, although here and there – mostly in the Rock Garden – we’ll have to reposition shade lovers out of newly sunny spots. And even though Bristol lost power for days, the plants in the greenhouse were completely safe and warm. This was exactly the storm event that Gail and I used to worry about before the greenhouse generator was installed. It purred like a kitten all the way through and we are beyond grateful.

How was your storm? Pretty or pretty ugly? Did your garden suffer much damage?

I wouldn’t want to alarm anyone who hasn’t been glued to the news but word is we’re in for a “potentially historic” blizzard. I’m just barely old enough to remember the infamous Blizzard of ’78 that buried this part of New England in deep drifts and stranded for days everyone who thought the forecasters were talking Jive. No one wants a repeat of that. Not even close. So Blithewold’s hatches have been battened and we’ve all gone safely (I hope) home to wait it out.

The snow had just started when I took these pictures this morning and it’s been falling steadily – if not heavily – since and it’s a bit breezy. But RI is already under a state of emergency so I guess worse weather than this (which I think already qualifies for pjs, slippers and cocoa) is expected. They’re saying 16-24″ for most of the state. Yikes mikes. I hope everyone in the path of this stays as safe and warm as the plants in the greenhouse look and as I feel right now.