Spring has sprung!

Spring's colour in our front yard seems to be predominantly purple, something that leads to what I call "Spring's Purple Haze" in our front yard, what with the purple of the Primulas, Crocus and heathers.

Spring's arrival this morning was nothing much to write about: it was raining. It rained for most of the day, except for an ever so brief spell in the afternoon where we actually had that bright orb in the sky to make us all think that spring had sprung. And then of course we had frost overnight....

Second year in our yard, and Hosta 'Chinese Sunrise' is living up to it's reputation as an early riser. Of all the potted Hostas it is easily the farthest along, and the potted ones are typically ahead of the ones in the ground by probably 10-14 days.

A little hard to see them all perhaps in this small image, but this 'Blue Mouse Ears' has 9 noses this spring -thus far- and is showing yet again how vigorous a grower it is.

In years gone by we would have seen daffodils in bloom by now, this year all we see from them on the first day of spring is buds.... man it's been a cold winter. Last year the first daffodil opened March 14th, and that was later than the year before that...

The first Saturday of spring was a wonderfully sunny day, great for gardening. When I stepped out into the front yard I spotted a rather unique robin, so it was back into the house to get the camera with the long lens on it. The bird cooperated very well for a series of shots it must have stayed in this spot for probably 10-15 minutes. As you can see, it's a pied robin, and what's even more remarkable is that the pattern seemed to be almost mirror imaged from left to right. We've certainly seen our share of pied birds with our cockatiels, but they typically have a rather irregular pattern.

This is not the first mutated robin we have seen in our neighbourhood. Since 2005 we have had a cinnamon robin -we refer to it as a hen, but have no way of verifying that- and she has made her nest for the last 3 years in a neighbour's maple tree. Cannot wait to see it again.