Climate warming? :-) With the atypical and wild weather swings much of the country has experienced over the last year or two, many plants are behaving out of character. Drought and/or early or late season cold snaps can affect plant performance.

We need to get used to it. It's becoming the new gardening "normal"!

I can't tell -- are there flowers buds on the other part? Could have just been something wonky this year, or maybe the light conditions are different or some sort of wind tunnel was created that affected the flower buds.

My little fothergilla (planted as 1 gallon last year) has 3 or so stems, one was a week later budding than the others, making me origianlly think the stem had died.