Climate change is alive and well and living in my garden

[Yamadori]

We have lived in this house a long time, and over 35 years ago I planted a little rosemary bush. It is now a huge rosemary bush. For many years, it would start to flower around the new year and continue all the way through spring, and for the last 10 years or so, it has crept earlier and earlier, and had begun to flower some time in mid-December. Last year it was the beginning of December.

I've just been out in my garden, and the first flowers have opened today.

Has anyone else noticed similar with the plants in your garden?

I have an oak that thinks it is spring - it is next to one that doesn’t!

Bulbs are already poking up,cosmos still flowering....

https://naturescalendar.woodlandtrust.org.uk/what-we-record-and-why/why-we-record/what-is-phenology/
Take a look at the list of species and events that you can record. Choose one or more that you can check at least twice a week.

@mumda Thanks, I remember finding out about those studies some years ago and I did do it for several years running.

I just wish I had written down in a notebook and recorded the timings of things all the years I've lived here - like the date each year I first saw a peacock butterfly, or saw a swallow, or found a ripe blackberry. It would be fascinating to be able to see any long-term changes over the last (nearly) 40 years.

This rosemary bush has always provided us with a sprig to sit under our joint of roasting lamb on Boxing day, which is how come I know when it flowered every year. It has crept earlier and earlier, and it is great to have something with nectar to feed dozy bees in the winter and early spring.

Primula x bulleyana flowering in one of my gardens this morning.

@AlwaysGardening When does it usually flower?

My rhododenrum is flowering, and one of my strawberry bushes was in flower and now has fruit on it, which the blackbird has found.

I've got roses and a hydrangea petolaris budding at the front of my house. It's north facing and the weather has been miserable so they've hardly been basking in mediterranean conditions.

DH volunteers for Butterfly Conservation and one of the things they record is the change in times of emergence of butterflies through the years.
Amongst various problems due to climate change for butterflies some are laying their eggs at the wrong times - getting out of synch with the growth of plants that their caterpillars feed upon.
Also some are moving northwards. Here on the south coast we haven't seen a small tortoiseshell for a couple of years but there are plenty further north. Also you might notice more Red Admirals - more are overwintering here instead of flying back south to the Med and North Africa..

My spring flowering azalea flowered again last month 🤷🏼‍♀️

This year the winter jasmine, Viburnum bodnantense and Cyclamen hederifolium were in flower at the end of August. So I rushed to my gardening diary to record this anomaly, only to discover that I’d recorded the same thing last year and several years previously.

A lot of plants sneak in an extra autumn flowering if the weather is favourable. Primroses do it very frequently. My strawberries are at it at the moment - I’m wondering whether to bring them indoors and hope for ripe fruit.

...is your garden in Droitwich?

Got bulbs in pots popping up and one of dahlias that did bugger all in August has just flowered.

I have strawberries that have flowered and fruited. In October.

We still have a lot of flowering cosmos, straw flowers and nicotiania.

I planted lots of forget-me-nots and different varieties of foxgloves for next year and they are all growing really strongly. The angelica which will flower next year should have died back by now but is covered in large green leaves and our apple tree- which has been picked and pruned has new leaf buds and shoots.

No, about 70 miles SE of there.

Spring/ early Summer so May or June.

My rosemary started flowering again a couple of weeks ago, my cosmos only got started a couple of weeks ago, primroses and strawberries. But I nearly always get a late second flush of strawberries and it's not totally unheard of for other plants.

My rosemary, 1st November 2022

I take a set of pictures of the garden on the first of each month. The same batch of photos as the Rosemary shows Cosmos, Nicotiana and Nasturtiums all in flower.

I went to finally prune my lavender and noticed new growth!

I also have strawberries!

I'm taking the opportunity to take a load of hardwood cuttings this year. At the rate we're going, they will have rooted before winter.

We have had so much rain my hibiscus are dying. They're waterlogged. I'm not sure what to do.