The spring has flown! Work deadlines have kept me tied up through the glories of mid-spring. Most of those glories have been wonderful, but familiar.

A major exception has been the Angelica!

I purchased it as a young plant two years ago, and expected it to bloom last year (it is categorized as a biennial). It turns out to be a “soft” biennial, that might wait an extra year.

I was very excited when the stalk first started going up in late March.

Over the next month, it got taller and taller, until it finally developed the umbel that I was expecting.

I expected it to open into a white-flowered umbel… rather like a giant Queen Anne’s Lace.

Nope!

It took another two weeks to open, but I could really only tell because it was covered in foraging pollinators… the flowers stayed green, a little like giant, spherical parsley flowerheads.

The resulting show has been both less pretty, and far more amazing, than I expected.

I expected one big flower. There are dozens!

The earliest flower is now developing seeds, but I can tell which heads are in bloom at any time based on the cloud of bumblebees.

Yesterday morning, I went out early, and was surprised to spot a bunch of bumblebees clinging to the bottom edge of the flowers. Napping!

I’m surprised such an open flower makes a good bivouac, but they’re the experts 🙂

All parts of the Angelica are good to eat; it tastes like a potent combination of celery and fennel. I’m guessing the seeds should be good for cooking, and I’ll be sure to plant some for future years.

The Angelica also has one offset on the main plant, so I’m hoping that it might survive the flowering. Otherwise it will be three years before I have this fun again!