The End of April in the Backyard - April 30, 2021

 

I always watch on April 23 for the trees to leaf out, I could probably tell it's just after April 23 without a calendar. The samaras have quickly grown from small reddish little whirly twirly seeds to larger green ones that fit perfectly across your nose.

And the azalea I planted for my Mom for her birthday and Mother's Day in the early 1980's when Dad was alive, is growing too big and thick. I've been thinning it out during winter and will properly prune it after the blooms have faded in late May. This is always a reminder of Mother's Love.

Azalea getting ready to bloom just in time for Mother's Day. 

As predicted the dandelions shot out of their basal leaf formation and flowered spot on time, and knowing they will develop seed balls shortly afterword, I sat on a stool and hand culled out about 100 plants including the taproots.  But they are tricky.  Today is raining so they close up to keep the pollen from washing away, and tomorrow when the sun comes out and it reaches an unseasonably 80 degrees, the dandelions will be back and smiling at me that they have the upper hand.  note:  plants beets when the dandelions bloom. 

Front lawn - never water, fertilize or use chemical lawn on April 25 2021. 

When forsythia flowers begin to fade the soil temp has reached about 55 degrees. 

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Each plant in the yard tells a story of what I should be doing next. I love the study of Phenology. The appearance of robins in spring, flowering of crabapples and lilacs, the flowering of the cherry trees at Planting Fields Arboretum.

Magnolia flowers at their peak of perfection on April 19th, 

White Merrill Magnolia 

Saucer Cup Magnolia in peak of perfection April 19 2021

And the dates of egg-laying of birds, like the doves who have returned a second year on April 12 to make a nest of small sticks on the motion detector light on the front stoop. The male and female take turns sitting on the eggs and have no fear of my coming & going from the front door.

And so many countless things that take place like the dates of leaf coloring and drop in autumn are all phenological events. They respond to a combination of climate factors such as temperature, rainfall, and daylength.

Of course, these can be measured separately, but what I find fascinating about watching plants is that they are programmed to combine all such factors to determine when certain events such as bud opening should occur.

Journaling is a wonderful way to tell their story. So I keep observing, learning, and taking note of life unfolding in my gardens.

 April 14 2021 - In the Phenology of the early to mid -April botanical world on Long Island, the plant kingdom is already bursting in vibrant blossom. Jot down notes, date everything, & observe. There's so much wonder and magic in Springtime. Weather has been behaving like Mother Earth is in menopause. We're had unseasonably warm days near 70 in April, but weather will become frigid around April 15 - 17th 2021. This may affect fruiting trees if the petals fall off due to frost if we get snow on the weekend.

Acer rubrum - these are the flowers in April that produce fruits. The red maple or swamp maple grows in acidic, loamy, moist, rich, sandy, silty loam, well-drained and clay soils. It prefers wet soil conditions but has slight drought tolerance. The fruits (samaras) provide food for squirrels and many other rodents. Rabbits and deer eat the tender shoots and leaves of red maples. Native mason bees thrive on Spring season's first flowers like red maple, and its pollen is important food for emerging insects. Mason bees are among spring's earliest insects, making them important helpers in the red maple's pollination process.

Yoshino flowering cherry tree. One of the earliest flowering trees on Long Island.

The Yoshino cherry aka Japanese flowering cherry is revered  at National and International Cherry Blossom Festivals. In mid April on Long Island it has a vibrant display of white-pink blossoms and faint almond fragrance. In the summer, this tree sports an oriental branching pattern, has glossy bark, and dark-green leaves. Located by the old Grumman's Corp in Great River. 

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Spring is a time of nature's uncurling. No plants better exemplify this awakening than the ferns, which send up their fiddleheads from buds that lie just beneath the soil surface.  

Fiddleheads or fiddlehead greens are the furled fronds of a young fern, harvested for use as a vegetable. Left on the plant, each fiddlehead would unroll into a new frond (circinate vernation).  The fiddleheads eaten on Long Island are from the ostrich fern (Matteuccia struthiopteris). Other ferns can be toxic, so never forage without an experienced guide.

 It's also important to harvest just a few fiddleheads in a cluster or the fern could die. Lucky for fiddlehead fans, ostrich ferns are fairly common, especially in temperate woodland areas and near streams on the island. 

They grow in dense clumps. Ferns of the class Polypodiopsida typically possess a rhizome (horizontal stem) that grows partially underground; the deeply divided fronds (leaves) and the roots grow out of the rhizome. located in Great River on April 14 2021. 

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                        Snake's Head Fritillary - Fritillaria mileagris - Liliaceae 

Snake's head fritillary is a woodland bulb grows as a multicolored mix of pure white and white-checkered reddish-purple nodding bells. Fritillaria meleagris is also commonly known as Guinea Hen Flower, frog-cup, flower, guinea flower, Lazarus Bell, Chequered Lily, Chequered Daffodil, Drooping Tulip.

Snakes Head Fritillary is poisonous, containing Imperialine, Tulipalin A and Tuliposide A. Ingestion of the plant can lead to gastrointestinal tract disturbances and can adversely affect kidney function, inducing vomiting, spasms, hyptension and finally cardiac arrest.

Located by the brackish waters of the Connequot River on April 14 2021. 

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 Let's not forget the star of mid-April on Long Island, the beloved daffodils. 

A poem by William Wordsworth

I wandered lonely as a cloud

That floats on high o'er vales and hills,

When all at once I saw a crowd,

A host, of golden daffodils;

Beside the lake, beneath the trees,

Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine

And twinkle on the milky way,

They stretched in never-ending line

Along the margin of a bay:

Ten thousand saw I at a glance,

Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they

Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:

A poet could not but be gay,

In such a jocund company:

I gazed—and gazed—but little thought

What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie

In vacant or in pensive mood,

They flash upon that inward eye

Which is the bliss of solitude;

And then my heart with pleasure fills,

And dances with the daffodils.

 April 13 2021 

Classified on their own as the division Bryophyta, there are approximately 12,000 species of moss. Today, I'm observing the moss that has grown on the shed roof for decades. Going to watch the spore pods open, save spores and grow in flats. This moss forms dense green clumps or mats, often in damp or shady locations. The individual plants are usually composed of simple leaves that are generally only one cell thick, attached to a stem that may be branched or unbranched and has only a limited role in conducting water and nutrients. Although some species have conducting tissues, these are generally not well developed and structurally different from similar tissue found in vascular plants. Mosses don't have seeds. After fertilization they develop sporophytes with unbranched stalks topped with single capsules containing spores. Look closely & see the stalks forming with the capsules at the end. I'll be closer examining with my microscope as the spore sacs begin to explode open.

 April 11 2021 - Sassafras albidum tree growing on my property. 

Sassafras is a genus of three extant and one extinct species of deciduous trees in the family Lauraceae. Sassafras is native from southwestern Maine west to New York, extreme southern Ontario, and central Michigan; southwest in Illinois, extreme southeastern Iowa, Missouri, southeastern Kansas, eastern Oklahoma, and eastern Texas; and east to central Florida.  

 I've been studying Phenology for decades. I remember working in the Long Beach school district & attending Hofstra full time on the Dean's list, and collapsing every night, and one morning awakening and wondering how the trees were green the next day. What had I missed? So I documented 'green leaves on maples' on April 23 2003. And started My Book of Phenology that I keep inside my house. Every year I add notes & dates. This is Sassafras on April 11. I'm waiting for tiny leaves to develop so I can pick them to make file (fi - lay) for gumbo & stews. Yes the leaves contain safrole - a controversial organic compound in many ways. Who would think this sweet picture of bud burst and unfurling of early April sweet smelling flowers would have a sinister side of it? Known to be a carcinogen and an illegal substance all in one? Also known as "brown" camphor oil 1.070, and Chinese sassafras oil, it's sometimes used in the manufacture of MDMA aka ecstasy, and is often spelled XTC. MDMA is a Schedule I controlled substance under federal law. This native tree sure has an infamous side to it. I grow them to host Spicebush Swallowtail butterflies. No sense having a butterfly garden without having a host plant to keep them close by throughout the stages of their lives. Larval host plants of the Spicebush swallowtail larvae are thought to feed only on plants belonging to the family Lauraceae.