Cherry Blossoms Arrive Weeks Early

When Dagmar Moore saw Wooster Square’s cherry blossoms pop weeks earlier than usual, she popped the question: Could it be ​“global warming”?

Moore (pictured) walked her dogs through Wooster Square Park Thursday afternoon as the famous trees blazed with what neighbors called the earliest bloom in memory.

The flowers in Wooster Square began to bloom on Monday. By Thursday they had spread into an explosion of pink across Hughes Place. The blossoms, which burst into a dazzling canopy every spring then fall to the ground within 10 days, draw thousands of visitors to Wooster Square Park for an annual neighborhood festival.

The blooms came so early this year that they’re likely to be gone before the 39th annual Wooster Square Cherry Blossom Festival, set for April 15.

Funeral home owner Bill Iavonne, who’s been watching the blossoms come and go since he moved onto Wooster Place in 1941, called the early bloom ​“very unusual.”

“I don’t ever remember them out this early,” he said.

“I think this global warming has something to do with it,” reckoned Moore, who was walking her dogs Livi, Clancy and Scooter through the park Thursday afternoon.

One local expert said she might be right.

Professor Mark S. Ashton (pictured), professor of silviculture and forest ecology at Yale’s School Of Forestry And Environmental Studies, said the cherry blossoms bloomed early because of the unusually warm winter. The growing season started almost a month early this year. Last year’s winter, he noted, was ​“really opposite.”

A cold winter with lots of snow, followed by a mild winter, is ​“totally in concert” with climate change models, he said.

Many scientists use the term ​“climate change” instead of ​“global warming” because the planet is experiencing not only ​“an overall warming trend,” but ​“greater variability from season to season.”

Recent indicators — last year’s odd October snowstorm, stronger hurricanes, excessive snow one year followed by no snow the next year — all suggest a disturbance in normal weather patterns, Ashton argued.

“It’s called climate change, and that may be what’s happening,” said Ashton, author of Managing Forest Carbon in a Changing Climate. He said most scientists agree that in the long term, human impact is bringing about that change.

In the new world of climate change, it will be harder to tell when Wooster Square’s blossoms will pop, Ashton said. ​“You can’t really predict what you’re going to get.”

Sharon Douglas, head of the plant pathology department at the The Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station, gave a more skeptical take.

Plant growth began three to four weeks early across the state this year, said Douglas, who has a PhD in plant pathology and follows yearly growing seasons. The early growth comes due to the temperature of the air and soil, she said.

The star magnolias and saucer magnolias are in bloom at the Ag Station and all around town, she noted. But she wasn’t ready to call the early blooms part of ​“climate change.”

“A lot of times when we have quirky or unusual weather, people immediately attribute it to climate change,” she said, but irregular weather may just be a normal deviation from the average.

Meanwhile, Wooster Square boosters have been getting out the word to blossom enthusiasts that the colors have burst.

Bruce Lippman (pictured), of Orange, said he’s been tracking the buds on a blog run by photographer Bart Connors Szczarba.

Lippman scooted over to Wooster Park Thursday morning with his friend Joe Odoardi. They’re both part of the Milford Camera Club. Lippman said he likes to snap photos of ​“urban imagery.”

“This offers the beauty of the park in an urban setting,” he said between clicks of his Nikon D90.

Odoardi (at right with Lippman), of Trumbull, said he has driven by the park before, but Thursday was his first time getting up close to the blossoms.

“This is amazing,” he said as he strolled down Hughes Place.

Charlie Murphy (pictured), co-chair of this year’s cherry blossom festival, said the blossoms will likely be gone before the April 15 celebration. He and his wife, Charlotte, have been working to get out the message about the blossoms: ​“Come and see them and enjoy them” soon — ​“and come back for the festival.”

The festival will feature Italian opera singing, salsa dancing and lots of food—click here to learn more on the website.

Timing the festival to hit the blooms cam be difficult, because the blossoms typically last only five to 10 days before falling in a white ​“snowstorm” then creating a carpet underfoot, said Charlie Murphy.

After last year’s brutal winter, the blooms came too late for the festival. Only one tree bloomed in time for the big celebration weekend. Blossoms finally popped around April 19.

Szczarba, the Wooster Square blossom blogger, has tracked when the flowers open for the last three years. In 2009, they lasted from April 17 to 28; in 2010 from April 4 to 9; and in 2011 from April 19 to 30, according to his blog.

Click here for Szczarba’s comparative pictures of years’ past. His photos of the blossoms will hang at the Creative Arts Workshop from Friday until April 13 — after the blossoms themselves will likely have disappeared.

Moore, the dog-walker, regretted the timing mismatch between flower and festival. ​“We never hit it right.”

“But you have to live with it,” she reflected.

As her standard schnauzer Livi tugged her away from the park, she declared Wooster Square ​“the prettiest part of New Haven,” and spring ​“the prettiest time of the year.”