The Bright Side of Spring

Wake Up on the Bright Side It is the bright side of Spring today.  With such an early Easter, the greenhouse nursery growers have retail operations open. We saw Sunshine Express last week, and today we see the growing greenhouses of Seaway Gardens.  They are located on Lakeshore Road, on the east side of the canal.  I mention this for those of you who want to check out the bargains at Seaway. Flats of pansies are 3 for $30.00 or $10.99 each. This first picture shows you just one of the many greenhouses of hanging pots.  In the second picture, I want you to notice the top photo of the lavender-coloured chair in the lavender field.  This is a picture by Marjorie Wallace, an artist I know from redbubble.  You can see the picture on her site here.  I've seen it in all the garden centres, so this is a great licensing sale for Marjorie. You may be asking the question:  When will the orchards bloom?  When should I drive to Niagara to see the blossoms?  Here is what they look like now, as you pull out of the Seaway parking lot and look towards the Lake.  The colour is showing on the branches.  My guess is we'll see our orchards in bloom for our normal Mother's Day celebration.

Exam Question: Calculate Easter

Perhaps Spring is early this year because Easter is early - on March 27th in just over a week.  The garden centres in Niagara sell a lot of potted flowers for Easter.  Sunshine Nurseries on Carlton Street on the NOTL side of the canal is full of blooms.  Pot plants, perennials, and annuals are on show.  You see the 'sea' of flowers in the top picture and an interpretation of the pretty flower Ranunculus in the bottom picture. There was a question the other day on how do we calculate Easter.  I gather from a search that there are dozens of ways of calculating Easter. This link to  the U.K. Independent Newspaper article describes the Easter calculation.  Here are two of the key calculations. "For most of its history Christians have calculated Easter independently of the Jewish calendar. In principle, Easter falls on the Sunday following the full moon that follows the northern spring equinox (the paschal full moon). However, the vernal equinox and the full moon are not determined by astronomical observation." "In 325CE the Council of Nicaea established that Easter would be held on the first Sunday after the first full moon occurring on or after the vernal equinox. From that point forward, the Easter date depended on the ecclesiastical approximation of March 21 for the vernal equinox."

Easter is Chocolate and Eggs

Marilyn's Photo of the Week

Easter Day - Chocolate and Eggs Today is a celebration of chocolate.  I turn to the Guinness World records: The largest chocolate Easter egg 34 ft in height made by Tosca in Italy in 2011.  It weighed 7,200 kg. and had a circumference of 64 ft. The largest chocolate rabbit weighed 3,850 kg (8,488 lb) and was made by Brazilian company Senac-RS, for the city of Gramado's annual "Chocofest" in April 2014. The most expensive chocolate egg (non-jewelled) sold at auction for £7,000 ($11,107) and was created by William Curley, Amy Rose Curley, Alistair Birt, Sarah Frankland, Melissa Paul, Rhiann Mead (all UK) and Suzue Curley (Japan).  The largest Easter egg hunt consisted of 501,000 eggs that were searched for by 9,753 children accompanied by their parents at the Cypress Gardens Adventure Park in Winter Haven, Florida, USA, in 2007. Similarly, the most entrants in an egg hunt competition is a whopping 12,773 and was achieved by The Fabergé Big Egg Hunt, as part of World Record London, in London, last year.  This in from Deb Osborne: Q What happens when you pour hot water in a rabbit hole? A  Hot cross bunnies Have a good Easter Day.

Welcome to opengardensniagara

It's April 1st, 2013, and this is a traditional day of fun and pranks.  In European countries it is celebrated with chocolate fish!  

This is the first edition of opengardensniagara, a blog celebrating the Niagara region and its natural and cultivated gardens!  The objective is to showcase Niagara area gardens with an open gardens scheme in the style of Britain's Open Gardens Scheme  - Gardens Open for Charity.  You can find it at http://www.ngs.org.uk

There's also the Australian equivalent and I had the privilege to meet the CEO, Richard Barley, at the recent Garden Tourism Conference in Toronto.  They are at http://www.opengarden.org.au.

While Britain's and Australia's scopes are nation-wide, I am going to concentrate on this beautiful Niagara region - from the Niagara river with its wonderful Niagara Falls, through to the Hamilton and Burlington area.

I am going to start today with an appreciation of Niagara Falls and the Niagara Parks Floral Showcase.  Here is one of my favourite images from the conservatory at Easter time 2 years ago.

I'll introduce myself tomorrow and tell you more about opengardensniagara.

Marilyn