樱花，樱花 Cheery Blossom

VERMONT SOUTH IS KNOWN in the community to have many cherry trees planted by the Council.

The cherry trees started blossoming in the last one week or so. Everywhere on the streets they are blossoming now. It's a pretty sight to behold and quite heart warming to me. We are now nearing the end of official winter (end of August) and it's the cheery blossom time in Melbourne. I remember seeing them blossoming in Tokyo around April time. It's a big festival in Japan to see and appreciate the cheery blossom.

I got the following info from Wikipedia.

A cherry blossom is the name for the flower of cherry trees known as Sakura (Japanese kanji : 桜 or 櫻; hiragana: さくら) in Japanese. In English, the word "sakura" is equivalent to the Japanese flowering cherry.^[1][2] Cherry fruit (known in Japanese as sakuranbo) comes from another species of tree.

In Washington DC they also have a National Cherry Blossom Festival. Here's what they say on their website.

The Peak Bloom Date is defined as the day in which 70 percent of the blossoms of the Yoshino Cherry (Prunus x yedoensis) trees that surround the Tidal Basin are open. The date when the Yoshino cherry blossoms reach peak bloom varies from year to year, depending on weather conditions. Cherry Blossom Festival dates are set based on the average date of blooming (April 4), but nature is not always cooperative. Unseasonably warm and/or cool temperatures have resulted in the Yoshino cherries reaching peak bloom as early as March 15 (1990) and as late as April 18 (1958).

The Blooming Period is defined as a period that starts when 20 percent of the blossoms are open and ends when the petals fall and the leaves appear. * The blooming period starts several days before the peak bloom date and can last as long as 14 days; however, frost or high temperatures combined with wind and/or rain can shorten this period.