What's Blooming in The Gardens: April

Oxytropis multiceps (the native Nuttall’s oxytrope)

What’s Blooming in The Gardens: April

by Bryan Fischer, Horticulturist, The Gardens on Spring Creek

April often represents the beginning of what truly feels like spring here in Northern Colorado. Warming temperatures – especially warming soil temperatures – are allowing many of our early blooming plants to hit their strides.

Perhaps first and most dramatic among these, is a diversity of alpine “cushion” plants (plants that grow low to the ground in tight mats) in the Rock Garden that are beginning to open their buds. Unlike most plants, which form buds shortly before bloom, many alpine species actually produce flower buds during summer or fall that are held all winter. This allows them to bloom much more quickly when warm weather arrives the following spring.

Draba zapateri

In the Rock Garden, we have royal purple Phlox kelseyi ‘Lemhi Purple’ or ‘Lemhi Midnight’, the electric-yellow broccoli relatives Draba brunifolia, Draba rigida, and Draba hispanica, and the creamy white Draba zapateri – all showstoppers yet under three inches tall. Many more cushion plants will soon follow.

If you’re looking to recreate these looks in your own garden, consider Tiny Rubies Dianthus (Dianthus gratianopolitanus 'Tiny Rubies'), available while supplies last through our Spring Plant Sale. A charming cushion of foliage covered with masses of tiny, double pink flowers, this species makes a nice addition to a rock garden.

Penstemon arenicola (sand penstemon)

On the east side of the Undaunted Garden, a diversity of xeric plants are coming into bloom. Among these are Penstemon arenicola (sand penstemon) with its cobalt blue flower spikes in among flowering cacti, like the pink and white Pediocactus simposonii (mountain ball or hedgehog cactus). Shared by both the Rock and Undaunted gardens, the cushion-forming pea relative Oxytropis multiceps (the native Nuttall’s oxytrope) is one of a handful of pink, early flowering legumes in these gardens.

We’ll have a variety of penstemons and other xeric favorites available through our online store for Plant Sale. Look for items tagged “drought-tolerant” to find plants similar to these for your own garden.

We miss having visitors in The Gardens! Hopefully the photos included here will bring you some sense of enjoyment and respite. Don’t worry about missing out – there is always something blooming in The Gardens on Spring Creek, and we look forward to welcoming you back soon!

When Plants Fight Back

By Andrew Scott, Horticulturist for The Gardens on Spring Creek This is the second installment of a two-part feature on plant defenses. Read Part I online at North Forty News . Caffeine, nicotine, morphine, cocaine ... sounds like the ingredients label on an old-timey cold medicine, right? These molecules are actually all alkaloids, some of the most common chemical deterrents deployed by plants. As the adage goes, the dose makes the poison. While people can (and do) ingest these alkaloids for their psychoactive effects, they prove to be much more deadly to a small insect that weighs all but a few tenths of a milligram. The sap of opium poppies ( Papaver somniferum ) contains morphine, a potent sedative (via Daniel Prudek , Hodder Education Magazines) Still, alkaloids have a strongly bitter taste, which animals have learned to associate with the toxic effects they can have. Eating green potatoes isn’t likely to kill you, but solanine, the alkaloid that triggers this change...

Blooming Blurbs: Funky Flowers

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Monarchs and Marigolds in Día de Muertos Celebrations

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