One of the first flowers to appear around my home are snowdrops beating out the crocuses by nearly a month. These rugged little plants begin poking up near the foundation of my home as soon as the snow melts back.
And sometimes even before.
The three-petaled blossoms with an inner bell are small but white with a little green chevron on the bell.
These durable flowers grow from bulbs which can be purchased online. I’ve seen them survive a surprising amount of abuse from cold weather. If they get snowed on, they just wait patiently until the snow melts off and they rise back up as if nothing had happened.
If you plant a group of bulbs, they will begin spreading. If you get too many, they can be transplanted by just digging them up once the blossom has gone by and before the leaves die back. They don’t seem to object to this. A number of years ago one of my siblings was raking vigorously where I had just planted some new bulbs. He inadvertently raked up the bulbs (they are very small) not noticing them and dumped the bulbs leaves and all into the woods. The bulbs were not fazed even slightly by this but took root and are now blooming just underneath the pine trees.
Snowdrops are always a welcome sight in late March or early April, giving that little promise to us that while spring seems slow in coming, it is here.