FORGET-ME-NOTS ARE BLOOMING

FORGET-ME-NOT

Tuesday, 9:00 AM.  44 degrees F at the ferry dock, 46 on the back porch (discrepancy caused by the ENE wind off the lake).  The sky is overcast and it rained much of yesterday and again some last night, for a total of perhaps an inch.  The barometer is still dropping, now at 29.73", predicting cool and rainy weather for the week ahead, and clearing by Monday.  The weather has not been very pleasant of late, but it is a perfect spring for transplanting.
  The common forget-me-not, Myosotis scorpioides, in the Borage family, is a  plant of European origin that is much naturalized  in wet places and on damp ground.  It is weedy in the garden but can be very beautiful when occurring spontaneously.  It is considered a perennial but  is pretty much an annual that reseeds itself.  There are several native North American species but I am not familiar with them and most of what one encounters is, I think, the European species.  There are other naturalized species as well. A species native to Alaska is the state flower.  The Greek genus name refers to to the mouse-ear-like  blue petals of the flower.
   The forget-me-not has a rich history in literature and folklore.  This grouping is along a retaining wall on a property fronting Hwy. 13 on the north side of Bayfield, but they grow everywhere the conditions are appropriate, and they often are a beautiful display in one location one year, and absent the next. 
   My recorded dates for first blooming of forget-me-nots are: 5/12/16; 5/05/15; 5/28/14; 6/05/13; 5/09/12; 5/25/11; 4/27/10. Pretty much all over the spring calendar, but since they are primarily annuals, I would expect them to be erratic.