Mother Nature has started to fidget with this year’s Spring season here in Vancouver (my apologies to those in other parts of Canada who may not be ready to hear that at this point). The weak low-slung sun has been spending more and more time looking us over and the rain of Winter (November until the end of February—not kidding!) is starting to intermittently wane. We have already been blessed by the initial arrival of Spring’s first messengers the Snowdrops, been charmed by the fragile beauty of Crocuses, and now we are being wowed by Daffodils and the earliest of the Cherry Blossoms.
Spring delights and surprises us every single year by bursting into life after we’ve had months of raised collars, gloved hands, and wet pant hems. Suddenly, we are treated to the blossoming of some elegant little flower or other. It just never gets old, does it?
One early Spring flowering bush that I always start to track by the end of February, is the Forsythia. The screaming yellow forsythia was a favourite of my late mother’s and since her birthday is during the first week of March, I always hope to catch a glimpse of one in fledgling blossom in time to celebrate her soul.
Forsythia (or forsythias—both are considered ‘right’) are not native to North America. Strictly original to Eastern Asia, several varieties were pinched by white guys (Europeans) and ended up in Holland around 1833 in the hands of botanists who seemed to play endlessly with hybridizing them (I did not make that verb up). The sorting out of various species that would work in gardens outside of Eastern Asia seems to be a long tale of trial and error, which we shall skip.
Not content to call the plant whatever it had been called for centuries in Asia, the name Forsythia was chosen out of respect for the Scottish botanist William Forsythe who was, among other things, one of the founding members of the Royal Horticultural Society but who had nothing to do with establishing this particular plant. Robert Fortune, who was reputed to be the one who brought the plant back from China settled with being a footnote, but his name lives on in the formal titles of numerous other plants.
As time went along, it was decided that North America did not have nearly enough of the plants that the colonists were used to from ‘back home’ and forsythias were included among the many types of greenery that made the trip to this continent from Europe in order to be propagated into abundance. Through careful study over the years, Agriculture Canada came up with a number of species that are hardy enough to look a Canadian winter in the eye and laugh dismissively. Nevertheless, periodically the winters in this country are a bit…challenging (even for Canadians). Luckily, the forsythia plant itself is considered to be hardy enough to outlast all but the very worst wintergeddons. The same can not be said for its flowering buds.
Since the forsythia sets its buds on last year’s wood during last year’s growing season, the buds have to weather Winter’s bad mood before blooming. And they usually can. Mind you, a VERY cold winter will take down buds that are on an unprotected arm of the shrub—usually one that has not been safely tucked under a protective blanket of snow but rather left above the snow level to fend off the effects of cold temperatures and wind chills by themselves. If you own a forsythia bush and you find that it looks a little scrappy, do not lose heart. Your forsythia might well sit out from doing its best flowering this year but keep the faith and, assuming next Winter will not be quite as mean-spirited as this year, you will likely be treated to the shrub’s familiar show next Spring.
Forsythia are somewhat undemanding and will take to any sort of soil that is well drained, even surviving periods of drought without complaint. However, they draw the line at being planted in the shade. Forsythia love the sun and will refuse to flourish if planted in a spot without lots of it.
One single plant can grow to 10 feet high and just as wide. If you want to curtail its growing enthusiasm, a forsythia won’t mind being pruned or having its old wood removed every 3 or 4 years. And, since the lifespan of this shrub can be up to 40 years, make sure you’re happy with where you initially plant one.
As with so many of Spring’s first blossoms, although forsythia flowers LOOK like they should have a sweet scent, they actually have no smell.
If this Winter seems to be endless for you and you need to find a dash of hope, nip outside and cut off a few branches of your (or your neighbours!) forsythia bush and bring those twigs inside. If you set them in water, they can be tricked into assuming that the warmth of your livingroom is their cue to start blooming and will happily burst into flower. Well, not immediately—they’re not dandelions! Kept long enough in that situation, those twigs will send out roots, and you will be able to transplant them directly into your garden (in full sun) to fill in that gap where the deer ate the azalea last year. (Apparently, forsythia taste bitter.)
Sidebar: Forsythia flowers are edible and can be used as a very pretty garnish for salads or other things one needs a pretty garnish for. Even so, bear in mind that bitter thing.
Forsythia are one of a handful of the early flowers that lift our spirits and keep us going through March and April while Mother Nature tries to decide whether or not she’s actually finished dishing out Winter. I hope that you are able to find a shrub of your own over the next few weeks to keep an eye on and help you to hang in there until The Great Melt. After all, in the language of flowers, forsythia represents Anticipation.
