Signs of life

We’ve been clearing leaves from the lawns at Genus HQ with huge piles scooped, wheeled, and deposited into our wire leaf-enclosures.  A large mound to the side of the driveway was removed exposing the delicate shoots of snowdrops, drifts of which we inherited from previous inhabitants when we moved in over a decade ago; such an encouraging sight to see after recent weeks of cold wet weather.

Our county of Gloucestershire has plenty of opportunities to see this diminutive harbinger of spring.  We especially love Painswick Rococo Garden which has one of the largest naturalistic plantings of snowdrops in the UK.  If it’s variety we want we’ll pop up to Colesbourne Park home to the Elwesii strain of galanthus and 250 other varieties many of which are for sale.

Such is the diversity of this plant that they can be found in flower from autumn to late spring and whenever we spot them bravely forcing their noses through our hard frozen soil we’re always reminded that spring is just around the corner.