Around the Garden

Daffodils may dazzle, but spring is so much more than those cousins of onions, “fluttering and dancing in the breeze” as Wordsworth has it. At Long Hill Estate’s yearly Daffodil Day event, Marcy Klattenberg set off on a nature walk with a throng of visitors and she did not begin by admiring the star of the show.

Instead, surrounded by puddle-jumping ten-year-olds, not to mention a goodly number of sedate adults, she was in search of the more discreet signs of spring. Heading out toward the west, she stopped to point out the differences between male and female red maples’ flowers, the male version of which, having done its work, was already being shed.

Shortly, she stopped to admire the tiny chartreuse blossoms of the Lindera benzoin, or spicebush, one of the first shrubs to provide nectar for early-awakening insects. Spicebush lives up to its common name, and provided spicy flavoring for Native Americans’ food. East of the Mansion, and south of the vernal pool, two sure-fire signs of spring co-exist, but they couldn’t be more different. The giant skunk cabbage loves wet feet, and lures pollinating flies by warmth and scents of decay. Trout lilies, growing in woodland shade, send up speckled, two-inch-long leaves, followed by tiny pale yellow reflexed flowers that conjure up adders’ tongues, another of their common names. Trout lilies are considered spring ephemerals, since the entire plant vanishes in summer. These plants all have either very small flowers or, in the case of the skunk cabbage, hidden ones. Another demure plant popping out not only at Long Hill, but also at the intersection of Court and Pearl Streets, is the variously named shadblow, serviceberry, Juneberry or Amelanchier. Sometimes a shrub, but often a single-stemmed tree, it was named shadblow for its habit of blooming when the shad run; others called it serviceberry because, when it flowered, the ground would be thawed enough to bury the past winter’s dead. All of these spring bloomers require close examination – they are not drive-bys! If you want an eye-popping blaze of yellow, daffodils and forsythia abound. But if you like puzzling out nature’s curiosities, this is a good time to take a leisurely stroll and examine some shy beauties.