Spring has Sprung…don’t miss the final week (Wednesday Thru Sunday) of  Tulip Festival 2012 at Seabird island.  Once again, Kate has done a spectacular job and you can’t help but feel priviledged to be given the opportunity to “Tiptoe through the Tulips”.

Although tulips are often associated with the Netherlands, commercial cultivation of the flower began in the Ottoman Empire,and are indigenous to mountainous areas with temperate climates and need a period of cool dormancy.  Holland is the world’s main producer of commercially sold tulip plants, producing as many as 3 billion bulbs annually, the majority for export.

It is believed the first tulips in North America were introduced in 1847 in Salem, Massachusetts. By a wealthy landowner who imported many different trees and plants from all parts of the world to landscape his property.

The word tulip has a rather odd origin.  When the tulip was introduced to Europe, many gardeners saw a resemblance between the flower’s shape and Turkish headwear, and they dubbed the flower “tulipan”, from “tuilbend”, a Turkish word for “turban”.  From “tulipan” came the French word “tulipe” and the English word tulip.  There is, as you can see, only a whimsical connection between tulips and two lips.

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