A taste of Spring.

The last few weeks in Tampa have been gloriously mild in temperature with weekly rainstorms that are doing a fantastic job keeping the ground moist. Together, these conditions make for a very happy early spring.

Although the nights are still cool and another frost is possibly but unlikely, we have gotten started in the MOSI gardens. A selection of cool season annuals now dresses some of the more visible gardens surrounding the butterfly enclosure.

Along the front walkway to the BioWorks Butterfly Garden long lines of purple alyssum waft a scent of honey toward our guests. White angelonia bobs in the breeze and purple salvia is abuzz with hungry pollinators. Purple and white flowering kale crouch on the front corners of the garden with lines of petunia and pale bacopa blooming in front of them.

Under the spreading boughs of the Richard T. Bowers Oak, pink dianthus, purple salvia and lavendula make for a colorful corner while white and pink petunias ring the small picnic area. A patch of dusty miller and silvery artemesia provides a neat patch of pale color in the dapple sunlight and a selection of herbs like parsley and dill is waiting for the Eastern Black Swallowtails to arrive and lay eggs.

The small pond by the front doors of MOSI is a cheerful tumble of yellow, pink, purple and white. Snapdragons, salvia, angelonia and petunias are all blooming happily in a riot of Spring color. The planter wall by the butterfly garden is brimming with parsley, pink dianthus, Dahlberg daisy, purple salvia and pale purple trailing bacopa.

Inside the garden the flight encounter is a riot of bright color with the deliciously sweet scent of sweet almond and citrus blossoms hanging in the air. On cool days like today the butterflies are so still that you can walk right up to them and take incredible photographs.

The Flower Garden

by Wayne Jarus

A blur of color in the wind
Fertile soil as nature’s palette
A fragrance so seductive we think of sin

A gardener’s work must begin
Work the soil before he sees
A blur of color in the wind

Damp earth the gardener’s canvas
Spring warmth brings the seed to sprout
A fragrance so seductive we think of sin

A fiery sun nurtures the seed to begin
Emerald leaves open to feed and bring
A blur of colour in the wind

A palace of wild beauty within
The gardeners reward of toil is
A fragrance so seductive we think of sin

And within this plot of raging color
The worker’s castle for months to stay
A blur of color in the wind
A fragrance so seductive we think of sin.

©2007, Wayne Jarus