Monday, May 1, 2017

Daffodils, a symbol of friendship


I’ve always loved daffodils. Maybe because yellow is one of my favorite colors. Maybe it’s because that gorgeous brightness after the dreariness of late winter/early spring convinces me spring has finally arrived. Whatever the reason, daffodils are stunning! 

Daffodils and narcissus are the same family, amaryllicaceae. I’m still trying to wrap my head around that. I always thought of daffodils as the bigger, yellow, trumpet-shaped flower and that narcissus was the flatter-looking white-petaled flower with the yellow trumpet (that’s what my mother had said). They are all narcissus and I found out that those flatter-looking narcissus are paperwhites. Jonquil is another popular type with the difference being smaller, clustered blossoms with the leaves are more cylindrical. 

Interesting facts:
The bulb has contractile roots and pulls itself deeper into the ground after blooming. The plants are dormant throughout the summer to late winter. Next year’s flower stem and leaves form in the bulb to be ready for sprouting in the spring. 

All parts of the daffodil contain lycorine, a toxic chemical. The bulbs have been mistaken for onions. However, they do not have the onion odor nor do they cause tearing. Eating any part of the plant can cause nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain and diarrhea. 

The front garden here last spring had narcissus. They bloomed before I caught the gardening bug so I didn’t research them at the time and I’m not sure exactly what type they are. Currently there are sprouts, but I’ll have to wait until they blossom before making the identification

I purchased a pot of bulbs the end of February which have already bloomed. Normal planting time for spring-flowering bulbs is in the fall, but I planted these last week. The hardest part was deciding where to plant. I was thinking about putting them under the little crabapple tree because they will bloom (next spring) by the time the leaves come out on the tree. Then I read that it’s good to plant bulbs with others to create a square or circle, so I put them in front of a mushroom garden sculpture. 

One more chapter in beautifying my yard.