Snowdrops are the harbingers of spring

I can't wait for this miserable winter to be finished, done, over, caput. Hopefully it will soon be a distant memory, once spring comes and I can return to my garden. Today is a beautiful sunny day that reminds of spring. In the garden, the harbingers of spring are the humble snowdrops--so beautiful. It will be a while before they pop up in the garden (most of the snow has to melt first), but they don't seem to mind the chilled ground. 

I'm posting a a very nice little poem about snowdrops and a photo of them that I took some years ago. 

Have you heard the snowdrops ringing

Their bells to themselves?

Smaller and whiter than the singing

Of any fairy elves.

–Sydney Thompson Dobell (1824–74)

Honeybees enjoying the snowdrops

It's still quite early in the season, but the snowdrops have bloomed first as they always do, providing food for the honeybees that are no longer dormant in their hives. We've had exceptionally nice weather in Oslo for the past two weeks, with daytime temperatures around 50 degrees F. So the bees are out in force during the early afternoon when the sun is at its warmest. I took this video the other day and wanted to share it with you. Turn up the volume for full effect!

Harbingers of spring

How the snowdrops look now as of March 5 this year

How the snowdrops looked on March 16 of last year

Each year in March, the snowdrops make their appearance. They are the harbingers of spring, and my heart is overjoyed each time I see them. They are hardy flowers, poking up through the remaining snow and dead leaves covering the garden. They precede crocuses and hyacinths which make their appearance in April, closer to Easter. 

I love hardy flowers. I love anything that survives a tough environment. In that regard, I'm a fan of berry bushes too, as well as rhododendrons. Raspberry, gooseberry, blackberry, black currant and red currant bushes survive the cold winter and freezing temperatures and bloom like clockwork each year. There is something so heartening about a garden. It gives one something to believe in, especially when it seems that all hope is lost in the world. A garden provides hope. It is a place of renewal. It tells us that we can start again, start over, leave our winter souls behind and embrace the warm sunshine on our faces. I've often wondered what the world would be like without the sun. Life as we know it would end, of course, but I'm sure many people would commit suicide before that eventuality. Who would want to live in perpetual darkness? I suppose there is a good reason that Christ is seen as the light of the world; our souls do not have to live in darkness if we seek him. It seems that more than ever, we need to seek him, since our world is moving toward darkness. I will find him in my garden, that I know.  

Snowdrops and honeybees

Spring is here and daytime temperatures are getting warmer. I did several days' work in the garden during the past two weeks. I usually make myself lunch and a thermos of tea, and start my garden day by eating lunch in the garden. Then I get to work, raking, cutting dead flowers, clipping the raspberry and blackberry bushes, and spreading compost soil on the vegetable beds in order to prep them for the coming garden season. I've also sowed out different seeds in the greenhouse--pumpkin, butternut squash, tomatoes, rose mallows, sunflowers, and hollyhocks. There is still a lot of prep work to do, but it's work that relaxes me in this pandemic time. Who knew that we would be starting a second year of this scourge? At least when I'm in the garden, I don't think about the pandemic at all. 

It's still too early for most flowers to bloom, but the bulbs are beginning to poke their heads up out of the soil--crocuses, daffodils, tulips, and hyacinths. The only flowers that have bloomed so far are the snowdrops. They're spread around the garden (by design) and each year the patches grow a bit larger. This past Monday, the largest patch had visitors--honeybees and a butterfly. I didn't know that they liked snowdrops, but they do, and now I know that. Nature always has something new to show us, to teach us. Here's a photo I took the other day, showing a couple of bees if you look closely. 

The garden in March this year and last year

Such a contrast--my garden is still covered in snow this year (see first photo), whereas last year at this time it was snow-free and the snowdrops had bloomed (see remaining photos). It was probably still chilly, as it is now, but at least I could get started with raking and cleaning. I have no idea how long it will take until all the snow has melted in the garden now, but at the rate we're going, it could be mid- to late-April before all the snow is gone.

I cannot remember another year in my life when I wanted winter to be over as badly as I want it to be over this year. We have had so much snow, and frankly speaking, since I am not a skier, I don't care about a lot of snow. In an urban setting, snow is pretty for the first day when it silences the city, but after that, it's just messy, with dirty snow piles everywhere. Plus the fact that the sidewalks this year were permanently covered in ice, since no one bothered to clear them continually of the snow that fell. The key word is continually; this city just lets the snow build up in layers on the sidewalks, and think by throwing down some gravel, that this will take care of the problem. It doesn't.

In any case, spring has officially arrived, and the sun is getting stronger. My chili pepper plant on the kitchen window sill has already begun to produce small peppers, five of them to be exact, with more to come. So nature knows what to do and when to do it. Thank God for that. The cycle of life continues, and it is restorative for my soul.

Back to the garden

I thought of the title for this post earlier today, because today was the first official day that I returned to my allotment garden in the Egebergløkka community garden. Back to the garden reminded me of the song Woodstock by Crosby Stills Nash & Young, not for any other reason than that the lyrics include a line 'And we've got to get ourselves back to the garden'. Just goes to show you what kind of associations your brain will make if you let it. But I understand wanting and needing to get myself back to the garden. I've been dreaming of it the entire winter.

I did a lot of work today to prepare the garden for this year's planting. It helped that the temperature was around 70 degrees Fahrenheit, making it that much easier to be outdoors working and enjoying the lovely weather. I spent most of the afternoon raking leaves and dead grass, removing dead plants, and putting all of it into black garbage bags. I realized how much I miss pure physical work that doesn't give you much time to think about the myriad of things that cause distress and anxiety. My friend at work says that gardening is my form of meditation. I think she's right. I have no need to sit still and meditate; I immerse myself in the necessary work of the garden and find peace. I have already measured out the area I need to install a greenhouse and marked it with stones, and am waiting for the annual board meeting that will hopefully approve the purchase of standard-size greenhouses by individual gardeners. I also need to buy a new garden hose, so I've been looking around for a good one.

I took some photos of the first flowers to show their faces in the garden this year. The Norwegians call them 'snøklokke'; in English they're called snowdrops--https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galanthus

Galanthus (snowdrop; Greek gála "milk", ánthos "flower") is a small genus of about 20 species of bulbous perennial herbaceous plants in the family Amaryllidaceae. The plants have two linear leaves and a single small white drooping bell shaped flower with six petal-like (petaloid) tepals in two circles (whorls). The smaller inner petals have green markings........Most species flower in winter, before the vernal equinox (20 or 21 March in the Northern Hemisphere), but some flower in early spring and late autumn. 

The birds were also out in force today, chirping happily with each other. There were several butterflies as well, and a big furry bumblebee. Seeing them all made me happy. The world seems to be as it should be--all is right with the world--when nature is happy and content. Then I am happy too.

Tomorrow I will post some photos of the garden, and my layout for the garden for those of you who are interested in seeing how I am planning it.