Last Sunday was an unusually sunny and warm day, so me and the folks headed up to the Oadby Botanic Gardens for a walk around the extensive grounds with its large array of interesting and rare plants.
I was particularly impressed by this Chinese Witch Hazel tree, with it's glorious yellow star-like flowers bringing some much-needed colour to the gardens in winter. According to the University of Leicester Botanic Garden Newsletter the famous gardener E.A. Bowles called this tree the Epiphany tree because of the timing of it's flowering and because the flowers mimicked the colour of gold and the scent of frankincense.
There were large carpets of Snowdrops and Crocuses beginning to come into bloom, along with many other spring favourites.
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| Crocuses carpet the ground |
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| Cowslips |
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| Cyclamen |
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| Daffodils |
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| Iris |
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Primroses
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The greenhouses there were also full of beautiful cultivated specimens. It was very cheering to see so much colour when the weather has been so wet and windy of late!
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| Hyacinths and Cyclamen |
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Primroses and Cyclamen
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Some much-needed winter colour was added by this lovely plant with its red leaves, as well as the red stems of Dogwood and red berries of rose hips.
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| Dogwood |
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| Rosehips |
There were also signs of spring approaching with the catkins coming out on the Hazel trees.
I hope you've enjoyed these signs of spring as much as I have! Thank you for reading, see you next time.
All the best,
Emma
