APRIL PURPLES

      At least four kinds of plants, including blue violets, grape hyacinths, periwinkle and ground ivy, produce lovely, purple flowers in abundance on many sunny lawns in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.  Those blossoms offer much beauty and interest through much of that month, right at home.  And all these blooming plants spread across lawns.

     Blue violets are native woodland wildflowers that have adapted to lawns.  I have seen beautiful purple violet flowers cover some lawns so well that those yards look purple from a short distance for a couple of weeks.  Violet blooms peek out coyly from grass and their own broad leaves that cottontail rabbits and wood chucks like to eat.          

     Grape hyacinths are originally from Eurasia.  They are in the United States because many people have planted their bulbs in flower gardens to enjoy the plants' pretty, purple blossoms.  But hyacinths are adaptable and escaped many of those gardens and spread across lawns.  I see many patches and clumps of this attractive plant's intriguing and beautiful flowers on grassy lawns.  

     Each plant has a few grass-like leaves, and a short flower stalk with a cluster of small, round flowers that resemble a tiny bunch of purple grapes, hence the common name.  And each bloom has an opening underneath it where small insects get in to pollinate it, and where seeds fall out and blow away on the wind.

     Periwinkle vines are planted in flower gardens. But being a creeping ground cover, they escape from many gardens.  And their leaves are glossy and evergreen, providing additional green color on lawns in winter.

     Each purple flower, of many, has five petals and resembles a pinwheel.  And each attractive blossom has an interesting star-shape at its center where the petals come together.  

     Ground ivy is a kind of mint, originally from Eurasia, that creeps across lawns close to the ground.  This plant is actually too low to mow.  It has roundish, scalloped leaves and tiny, purple blooms in little clumps in leaf axils.  The beauties of those blossoms can best be appreciated with the use of a magnifying glass.     

     Look for these flowering plants with lovely blossoms on lawns in April.  They are enjoyable to see, and they lift many human spirits from the doldrums.  

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