Show from April 16, 2006

I don't know about you. but I can barely move from all the raking over the past two days. The ground in my yard is already dry and I wanted to get the snow mould off the grass.

Everything is coming up so fast. It seems that spring has arrived over night. I have a little grove of purple crocuses blooming their hearts out under the shrubs, and the ash that volunteered in the back yard looks ready to burst into leaf – the buds are very swollen – yet the Forsythia that usually blooms as soon as the snow slips away shows no sign of doing anything. It's very odd.

The ground is warm, too. Not a bit of frost, so yesterday, I put in a bunch of lilies and liatris. Maybe this year we'll have one of those wonderful warm, early springs – the weather network is predicting that we will have above normal temperatures in the Winnipeg region this spring and certainly, it looks like warm weather all the way to the end of the month.

One of the other plants I put in yesterday was a pineapple lily or Eucomis, (that's E-u-c-o-mi-s), sometimes call Kings Flower. This is a very unusual plant which sends up spikes of flowers in white, yellow or pink. Leaves grow from the top of the flower head, so that the plant looks just like a pineapple. In our climate, it is recommended that you plant them in pots because they require warm soil and bring the bulbs inside for the winter just as you would your gladiolas and dahlias.

Another wonderful summer bulb is Gloriosa superba or flame lily , which is a climbing lily. It has wonderful flowers whose narrow, slightly ruffled petals are yellow fading to scarlet. The petals bend back from the centre, leaving the stamens exposed at the bottom. Flame lily is the national flower of Zimbabwe. It should be planted in pots in this climate with a trellis, but otherwise treat it as you would any other tender summer bulb.

Another striking plant is the foxtail lily, or Eremerus (E-r-e-m-e-r-u-s). It's a tall plant whose yellow, orange or pink flowers resemble a bottle bush. They are hardy to zone five, where they can be left undisturbed for up to 15 years. Here it is unlikely that they would make it through the winter (although near a foundation with some mulch might be worth trying). Be generous with the mulch. Even in zone five, they recommend mulching up to one foot with leaves or peat. Since Foxtail lily doesn't don't like to be transplanted so treat as an annual.