We’ve had gales, sleet, snow, frost, downpours and sunshine, lowering skies, gloom, dankness, glowing sunsets, and starlit nights, and throughout all variations it has been bitterly cold with far too many Arctic blasts and draughty peripheries. Yet despite the chill factor, some things seem to have been growing since December, many of them out of season.
For instance, up at the allotment this afternoon, I came upon a very confused globe artichoke. In the last few days it has grown some very chunky buds. Too soon, I tell it. It was also surrounded by a vigorous bouquet of spanking new foliage. In the garden at home a butter coloured geum has been flowering, one stem at a time, all winter. Likewise a blue penstemon. I have also been cropping the wild garlic leaves for several weeks. They are shooting up along the old railway line beside the Linden Walk.
All of which apparently tells me that it can’t have been as cold as I think it has.
Certainly the spring flowers have not been deterred – celandines, snowdrops, primroses, crocus, flowering currant and hellebores all quick off the mark – with daffodils just on the cusp of opening.
Here then are February scenes around and about the Farrell domain in Much Wenlock:
To join in the Changing Seasons challenge please visit Su at the link:
Tish Farrell 
Lovely photographs!
Thank you, Meher.
Beautiful as usual. Change of plan – Kenya instead of Myanmar a possibility.
Oh, now I am jealous. I’ve been following the Standard newspaper lately and things are pretty interesting there. Don’t tell me they’re sending you to Wajir though.
Embu
Now I definitely am jealous.
Plenty of healthy plant life around your domain, Tish!
Not sure for how much longer. Other half says we’re due a mighty freeze-up this week. Hmph!
This week is ghastly, by the look of things….the beast from the east is what I’ve heard…..
Think I’ve already spotted the odd snowflake this morning, and it’s not due here till tomorrow. More vests required.
We got a reasonable number of snow gusts today, forecast to become much worse in the coming days, so I went up to London today, and luckily it all worked out – I was originally going Thursday, then I thought tomorrow….but I may have made the right call!!
I think you probably have. Hope you have a good day.
We’ll see what tomorrow brings…I’m intending to batten down the hatches, so to speak! Hope you stay warm and dry!
Like Marilyn, you certainly seem to have had some exciting weather this past month! Lovely to see nature doing it’s thing and producing so many beautiful flowers. Hope March is more settled (and warmer) for you.
Graham tells me we’re in for some v. cold temps and possibly more snow this week. Too much Arctic interference.
Oh no. I hope it doesn’t cause disruption and damage.
Fingers crossed 🙂
Celeste was saying only this afternoon that she wished she could go for a walk with the dogs in England again, and I immediately mentioned your spot!
But the cold is another matter altogether! Brrrr.
Yep. You’d need lot and lots of woolly vests after Africa, (and I know it can get chilly there too). But the wind has been perishing.
It’s so nice to see flowers in February, some of which are rarely seen in Canada (the Hellebores and snowdrops.)
So pleased to bring you flowers in Canada, Bunty.
A lovely collection of flowers and plant life pointing out that spring is ready to march in your corner of the world!
Thank you, Peter. Spring plants may be too soon though. Now we’re promised snow.
A beautiful display of defiant plant activity, particularly the artichoke and that maroon flower.
The maroon flower is a hellebore. They have their faces down at this time of year, so it involved some considerable contortions to photograph it.
Lovely photos Tish and lots of ‘springiness’ going off in your part of the world. February sure has been a mixed up month and it looks like it is going to continue to the end! I always remember February as being the hardest month though.
We’ve just been rather lucky over the past few years – got too used to mild winters. But I’m hoping the zero temps will do for the slug tribe.
Now that has to be a silver lining 🙂
Strange happenings but doesn’t it make life interesting.
Absolutely, Beverly. It keeps us all awake and looking 🙂
even plants reject stereotypes… checking out the universe a little earlier than expected… like lone wolves. How good it is for those of us who are reminded that life goes on…
Good news messengers indeed, Shimon. Though we’re in for more icy blasts this week. But as you say, life does go on. And lots of seeds arrived in the post this morning – including crimson flowered broad beans which are an old variety. You have beautiful blossom. And then you have delicious beans. Happy week to you.
How lovely to have so many signs that spring is just around the corner and that lovely Linden walk is beautiful in all seasons. Soon be time to start planting again Tish
Oh I’ve started already – on the window sill – broad beans, spinach, tomatoes. Not an ideal venue, but things are sprouting 🙂
This is a wonderful montage! Beautiful photos, with incredible colour! And blue sky too.
Thanks, Ali. Yes, and blue sky this morning too. Though freezing too. How are those pluglets!
I just went out to visit them, Tish. They’re sitting tight, shivering a little, but all there!
Stalwart little things!
Smiling at your draughty peripheries. 🙂 🙂 The photos don’t look cold (with one or two exceptions 🙂 ) and you make it look very beautiful, Tish. As I know it is. But please- no more snow! Sufficient unto the day 😦
Snow! It’s still wafting about here – but not with much intention. Graham who has just been there and back to the post office, says it’s v cold on the chin. And there’s me been longing for a balaclava and not getting one. Perhaps I can knit one before tomorrow’s snow forecast.
🙂
Gorgeous, all of them…
Still snowing, here!
And here too, this afternoon. So far it’s not settling. Thanks, Anna.
Your lovely crocuses reminded me that if I did under the debris, there may very well BE crocuses in that wreck of of a garden. Tomorrow, if it isn’t raining again, i will look.
Good luck! Hopefully there will be something to perk things up in the garden. This morning our two open daffodils had their faces in the dirt. They seem to rouse themselves later, but bad weather is on the way it seems.
So lovely, I’m sure they’ll survive, even the artichoke with bad timing will be okay. Tomorrow and Thursday are forecast to be horrendous here, wish I could hibernate!
What a lovely series of juxtaposed captures! Vibrant colours alongside the stark bare branches! The suggested warmth & growth alongside the still sleeping.
Hope the sudden cold snap (reported by my family & friends in London) haven’t adversely affected your blooms & buds.
Blooms and buds are holding up so far 🙂