Anyone else got signs of Spring in their garden yet?

Two collared doves have been getting rather amorous on our trellis - it's a bit early for spring.

Collared doves and a cock pheasant come to feed in my garden. I've just found out that they eat snowdrop flowers as soon as they emerge. So they seem to be the culprits who have decimated my Dad's snowdrops. I like the birds too.

Two pigeons are getting very lovey dovey and were there again today grooming each other, and later were trying to pull bits of ivy off the wall, I wanted to shout 'too early to nest!'

Ah! We have sandy soil, so that explains why scabious just die after a season.
Yes, we have two fatsias japonicas now, and they have several flower spikes but I don't think much of them.Went to a flower arranging talk a few years ago and they used the leaves, but obviously you need to be doing quite a big arrangement as the leaves are enormous.
This is the first Winter here that ( by now) no shrubs/plants have died.

Scabious is a flower of chalk land so not surprising they gave up the ghost really. They love it in my garden. But lupins which I adore I struggle with so they are now in 3 pots.

I'm in Dorset. Have a miniature iris in flower today,daffodils are through and some in bud.

Due to dog Georgie's absence, lots of snowdrops coming through as well as some crocuses and daffodils looking promising. She tended to dig them up when chasing her ball. It will be some time before she will be active enough to do that. Silver linings and all that.

I'll take a photo when the current storm has passed!

I spent the the first afternoon of the year gardening, today. New garden, so it was quite exciting to see bulbs coming up in unexpected places.
Also, as I cut down overgrown honeysuckle and ivy, I found a clump of hellebores growing underneath and coming into flower, delightful.

I fear the same has happened here, Nelliemoser.
Some of our so-called hardy shrubs such as spirea, berberis salvia and pieris etc seem to have died. Even the gaura. Only those used to these conditions, eg lavender, rosemary, santolina are going to survive.
You never know though, they might recover.

hildajenni Were they Snowdrop bulbs or plants that have just flowered? it is hard to get them going from bulbs and getting them in the green is the way to go. My sister in law gave me some in leaf and they do much better in my garden than in her's.
This link might help.
www.rhs.org.uk/Advice/profile?PID=703

Some plants are very fussy about soil conditions.
I tried scabious in my slightly acid sandy soil and they have just turned up their toes and given up the struggle.
I must choose better plants for my soil type.

Just a bit of . Everything is lying doggo, altho' lots of tweeting in the trees.

Noticed winter honeysuckle flowering, but it has been misty, wet and horrible today.

Daffodils peeping through and camellia budding .

I think signs of spring are later here this year. We had an extremely cold spell, about 2 weeks, in mid Jan. and it has been very dry, hardly any rain since Oct.
The climate does seem to be changing.

Snowdrops are giving a good show and the Camellia which is about 25 years old and planted directly into the soil is a mass of buds. It usually is in bloom by the end of March.
Last week we pruned two Apple trees and a plum tree. Getting rid of the trimmings was quite a labour of love !!

Sorry that a much treasured link to you Dad is lost Hilda but often blackbirds pick around them, looking for worms, and the bulbs can get moved around the garden. There's a chance they might be under other plants or shrubs where the birds have tossed them. Failing that, I recommend replacing them with bulbs that are "in the green", (still with their leaves on) rather than bulbs from a garden centre or nursery in the autumn. Hope you find your own though.

Snowdrops and primroses.

Snowdrops and three hardy daffodils

Just before my Dad died, he gave me some snowdrops from his garden. They were lovely last year but this year there isn't any sign of them. I think that mice might have eaten the bulbs. I am very sad as not only were they a link to my Dad, but they were given to him for his garden, by relatives of my Grandad. I'll keep on looking for them but they should be flowering by now!
All the little daffodils we have in pots are well through, some have flower buds.

Fatsia do flower, usually in late Autumn. They have stalks of what appear to be spikes golf balls covered in small flowers. They emerge from the top of the branches and have an upright habit.

It looks very striking. I used to think they only flowered on large established bushes, as we had one in our last garden. But the new 3ft Fatsia that I planted in a pot this year, had one flower spike in the Autumn.

Fatsia is a lovely architectural plant rosies I envy you having the room for one! Leaves are good for flower arrangements, if that's your thing?

Is the Mahonia scented Nellie? Seem to think I used to have a few of those, used as an intruder deterrent in my old house. The only shrub I have room for now is a Camelia which I grow in a pot. The Skimmia that I inherited was HUGE and had to go, I'm afraid. I planted a wisteria to grow up and over my front door and window. But after 5 years of plentiful leaves and endless snipping off of tendrils, that too had to be removed. .

I wanted one when we planted up a new shrubbery, but DH didn't like the leaves so I settled for a Fatsia Japonica in it's place, nice but no real flowers.

Not quite yet. There are a lot of snowdrops showing white but no bells yet. With the slightly warmer weather they will probably be out soon now.

My new little Mahonia has it's flowers out and there will be berries which the birds love.
If you don't know them a Mahonia is big very attractive shrub with very vicious prickly leaves which are a glossy green.

When it's established it gives a wonderful display of yellow flowers to brighten January and February. Everything else still looks pretty miserable.

Bristol,some primroses in flower,snowdrops still in bud,but my hellebore which I planted 3 years ago has 2 buds and a bloom fully open.