Q. What is the yellow flowering forsythia look alike plant that blooms about the same time?
Answer
Your Forsythia look alike appears to be winter jasmine, Jasminum nudiflorum, one of the only two species with opposite leaves and yellow flowers. A native of China, it survives outdoors in sheltered places as far north as Boston, Massachusetts. In mild climates it blooms throughout much of the winter; in harsher ones, it blooms in late winter, usually a little ahead of forsythias and before its leaves expand. It grows from 3 feet to, when grown against a wall or support, nearly 15 feet tall, producing slender branches and rigid, hairless, four-angled branchlets. The approximately 200 species of Jasminum, of the olive family Oleaceae, are natives of the old world, mostly of warm-temperate, subtropical and tropical areas.
http://www.missouribotanicalgarden.org/PlantFinder/PlantFinderDetails.aspx?kempercode=a152
Hope this helps.
Courtesy of the NYBG Plant Information Service