Young Choe is a genius

These are either native kusamona or at least mostly native. She's doing a presentation at the Lahr Symposium next Saturday. Register on the Arboretum website.

This afternoon Ed and I returned a ladder he'd borrowed and we ran into Young.. She showed us what she was working on and what she'd already finished. I'm always amazed when I see her creations though I know how brilliant she is. If you don't go to Lahr, you'll be able to see these on display for the week following the symposium. They'll be at the National Bonsai & Penjing Museum.

If you look around a little bit there are flowers out there

Edgworthia chrysantha, Scilla, Prunus mume 'Okitsu-akabana'

And many of them are fragrant. When left this afternoon, the Magnolia denudata were one the edge of flowering. The cool, wet weekend may hold them up but it won't hurt the buds. It's going to be fun from here on in.

Spring is coming....slowly

Magnolia zenii and M. (not biondii), Cornus officinalis, and Primula sibthorpii It wasn't a super warm day but the plants keep coming on.

Nice sunrise this morning at the Arboretum

Anemone hepatica var. asiatica

Many plants are flowering now; spring has snuck up on me. Among them are these tiny woodland flowers, hepaticas. Hepatica used to be the genus but they have recently been included in the large genus Anemone. These were wild collected in Korea and this is the common form of the species. There are countless horticultural selections a number of which are available in the US. They are delicately spectacular and quite costly.