Pot luck...
The green leaves of Acer 'Osakazuki' emerging from their ruby leaf casings. Plants offer beauty in so many more ways than just flowers
A steady cold drizzly mist meant no outdoor gardening, though I did a bit of pricking out in the almost equally cold polytunnel.
However, it dried up enough for a walk along a footpath near us and we came across an area newly planted up by the local authority. All the pots and plant trays had been left nearby and had been strewn across the path and beds. After some um-ing and ah-ing,I collected up most of the smaller pots and took them home. My rationale for this is:
- if they'd wanted them they'd have taken them or locked them up in their adjacent lockup
- They probably throw them away rather than return them to the nursery so it's like recycling
- that I'm giving them as good a home as they'll get anywhere
- I tidied up the mess a bit for them
- our in-house ethicist (youngest Trillia) agreed that it was probably morally acceptable.
Here's the scene...
So you if you are from St. Helens Council and you want your pots back, I hereby confess and will return them on demand.
For Margi and Juliet
Just to prove I can do orange! It wasn't intentional, but I will admit I like both the Fritillary and the tulips.
Another of the birthday tulips. I think it looks really good against the Spirea, but I didn't know that when I planted it...
The Crown imperials are almost next to the orange tulips but I can't get them in the same shot without including daughter's red car...
Lithospermum 'Heavenly Blue'
33 and counting
This morning I counted 33 plants in flower. And I counted all the narcissi as one and all the tulips as one. Counting them helped cheer a damp morning. Here are some of them. I might write up the full list later.
A clump of Erythroniums under the phormium. This one appeared by itself so I don't know which it is.
Dicentra spectabilis doing its annual pretty, modest thing.
Blackthorn has a week of beauty and then just provides a green backdrop and valuable bird food for the rest of the year
The Crown Imperial in flower. Planted on the 17th October so almost exactly 6 months from planting to flower.
Symphytum 'Hidcote Pink'
(Comfrey). I'd not realised what a great ground cover plant it makes.
The whole list in flower as at 25/4/06
It's not till I typed this list out that I realised how many I don't have the proper names for. With apologies in advance to those who dislike the use of synonyms...
Front garden:
Corsican hellebore
Knautia macedonia
Purple and purple/white striped tulips
Centranthus rubra (Valerian) (only just out)
an unknown purplish aubretia
Side area:
Forsythia
Flowering currant (Ribes something or other)
Blackthorn
Magnolia
a white quince
Daphne
Amelanchier lamarkii
Pulmonaria 'Victorian Brooch'
Primroses
various Narcissi
Back garden:
A white camellia
Symphytum 'Hidcote Pink' (Comfrey)
Viburnum tinus
a dark pink Azalea
Erythroniums
A pink Camellia
Anemone blanda (blue and white)
Pulmonaria 'Sissinghurst white'
Pulmonaria 'David Ward'
Fothergilla major
cream tulips
Viburnum burkwoodii
forget-me-nots
Dicentra spectabile
Lithospermum diffusum
Crown imperial fritillaries
Snakeshead fritillaries
A pink and a white heather
First sightings
I spotted the first swallow of the year last night. Also we have a couple of goldfinches in the garden. I've seen them before but only as passers by. Seems like these could have taken up residence.
And I am the proud owner of four young Trilliums, two each of luteum and grandiflorum. One of each has a flower bud. These are definitely on the list of plants I'll take with me when we move.
Commiserations to H1 who had her first driving test yesterday. She didn't pass due to some 'stupid examiner who put his foot on the brake, when I was just about to'.
But fingers crossed for H2 for her interview at Hobbycraft on Saturday for a part-time job. When she gets some money in her pocket - well who knows what will happen..
The first almost properly warm day
For the first time this year it was warm enough to sit outside in shorts and a t-shirt - just about. I potted up loads of seedlings before a very pleasant hour sitting in a pub garden with a pint, both daughters, DB and Big T.
A few new pics from today:
A close up of one of the cream tulips.
One of the Crown Imperial Fritil- laries that I thought I'd lost. Once they appear, they flower in no time.
A plump peony bud full of crimson promise
Every year this female blackbird squawks endlessly and divebombs our cats whenever they go out into the garden. The noise drives us mad but the divebombing is fun to watch!
A 'not gardening' day in the garden
A chap I met last night asserted that gardening is 'boring and repetitive'. I asked him what he meant and he mentioned mowing, edging, weeding the patio. Well I agree to some extent - because those tasks aren't gardening, but simply outdoor housework. However, occasionally they need doing and with visitors coming round last night that's what I did. The drive, patio, lawn and borders are rather startlingly tidy now, but it did look nice when I stepped out of the back door this morning.
The cream tulips below are in the spring border under the birch tree. I thought they would be white, but I'm glad they're not. I'm going off white in the garden - it's too stark. This border is at its best in April and May before the tree fully opens.
The joy of long, mild evenings
For the past two nights I've come home, done a couple of indoor jobs, then strolled up to the polytunnel for a potter. To the accompaniment of evening birdsong I've slipped a happy half hour between work and dinner, potting up seedlings, watering, weeding pots and generally moving things along. It feels like I've gained hours.
A note on meconopsis germination - basically, all the batches I sowed have germinated. It made no difference whether they were sown in September, December or Feb. All had some time in the fridge and were sown in light, free-draining soil, but other than that, they don't seem fussed. Incidentally, I forgot to open the polytunnel yesterday and it got to 35C. Fortunately I'd moved all the meconopsis out the day before...
More dreaming....
I read today about someone who buys all their plants from individual growers at farmers markets. One day maybe that might be me, a hopeful (but probably chilly) stallholder with my little collection of meconopsis and hardy perennials plus a few hardy shrubs clutching a mug of tea and desperately hoping the awning won't blow away in the stiff March wind. Perhaps.
Anyway, don't tell hubby, but I ordered 3 Eremurus robustus today. I saw them last year at Tatton Show and was blown away - except that they'd all sold out. They're out of breeders rights so maybe I'll be able to add their offspring to my imaginary stall some day.
I took a picture of this white Camellia, which is pretty, but disappointing because the outer leaves start to brown before it's fully open, so the whole plant has a slightly down at heel look to it. That'll teach me to buy a plant that is simply labelled 'Camellia - White'.
And this picture looks like a cluster of dead leaves - why take a photo of that you may reasonably ask? Because it's a Trillium luteum which I thought had died and clearly has not. I also planted a couple of Trillium Grandiflorum, but there's no sign of them at all yet.
Time for a tidy up
I'm a messy gardener. Or as I prefer to see it, a gardener who doesn't have enough time to be tidy. But eventually even I get sick of tripping over broken pots, tools and half empty bags of compost. So today's short spell outdoors was 90% organising with just a smidgeon of actual plant work thrown in for good measure.
The polytunnel was the main beneficiary, with another tier of the new staging finished and all the seed trays laid out. The only mystery is how they fitted in before the staging went up. The shade tunnel got a spring clean too. The hardy geraniums that I divided last autumn are coming on a treat and the meconopsis seedlings are growing on nicely. Two unsung gems are the acer cutting I took last spring which is well rooted and sprouting healthily and the pot of acer palmatum seedlings which have finally germinated. The plan is for these to become the rootstocks for my first acer grafting attempts next year.
And for Mum and Dad - the tulips below are some of the ones you gave me for my birthday last year. They're now flowering beautifully in the front garden.
Some of the birthday tulips
Obsolete IKEA shelving makes great staging, while a 1950's school desk becomes the potting station
The shade tunnel looks empty now that it's tidy
The mecon- opsis and acer seedlings happy in the shade tunnel.
Gardening, cycling and planning
After three days of gardening we set off with the bikes in the car in unpromising cool drizzle. It just about cleared up by the time we stopped and we managed a pleasant hour or so of country cycling in rural west Cheshire.
We got back to warm sunshine and hot cross buns which set me up for a construction session, building staging for the polytunnel out of old IKEA shelving ends and strips of wood. Messrs Heath and Robinson would be proud of it.
Spring flowering plants soak up every scrap of warmth to press on. This is the same magnolia bud I photographed yesterday.
The great Easter break
Four days off, and potentially a little gardening therapy every day. Yesterday I spent a few hours in DB's parents garden. Today I should get to J&Ps to finish digging out their borders - with luck and good weather.
Here's one new pic to keep you going till I take some more today.
Long distance visitors
Been checking my visitor stats recently - it's great to see people dropping in from all over the world. From comments I'm guessing at a few nostalgic expats (and some glad to see the back of England!) as well as some enjoying a close up view of a bit of foreign land. The furthest one so far is Brisbane, Australia. If you're a long distance visitor do leave a comment. Thanks and happy blogging.
The prairie garden is under way
Oh to have the energy of an 18 year old. I did today, albeit only on loan from the eldest Trillia. Between us we dug out 20 barrows of surplus soil and took the top 2 inches off the grey stone gravel path. All we need now is 3 cubic metres of fresh gravel and several more hours hard labour. So far I've got several grasses for it including stipa gigantea, a white eremurus (I really want the pale pink one), verbena bonariensis and echinacea. Helleniums need to go in as well, I think, for late summer colour.
A pair of wood pigeons are nesting in the bare branches of the silver birch, quite visible from the ground and almost certainly within climbing reach of the cats.
The threatened snow hasn't materialised as yet, but the M62 is closed due to blizzards about 20 miles away. And -3C is forecast for tonight. But spring is marching on regardless. This is part of the hardwood cuttings bed, with several dogwoods, apple rootstocks, the winter flowering cherry and several other shrubs all looking as if they intend to root. I shan't dig them up until autumn though.
Despite being driven indoors four times by squally hail showers, I got a few worthwhile jobs done. I've dug out the border by the pond, lined it with compost bags and backfilled with heavier soil and manure. This is mainly for the new primulas which I've not grown before for lack of a moist area. Three each of Primula beesiana and vialli have gone in. I also split the hosta and the astilbe, making 6 or 7 new plants from each and replanting them in a drift. I think it'll look much better.
I've discovered what happened to the Arum lily which barely produced a leaf last year. I think it nearly died in the heatwave the year before and decided to produce babies. I found hundreds of tiny off-shoots from the mother plant and have potted up the best of them. The original plant came from the huge one that was at my grandparents had at their house in Angmering, so I'm keen to keep it.
Many of last year's offspring are coming to life - I have an acer palmatum atropurpureum from a cutting and a Sorbus 'Joseph Rock' from seed, amongst others. Also two of the Acer palmatum seeds have germinated. These are to grow on for grafting onto later.
Today's picture is Geranium 'Ann Folkard'. I think this young spring growth is a beautiful colour, making it doubly valuable as the flowers are also wonderful.
Some pictures to cheer a chilly soul
Still less than 10C out in a brisk cold wind. These pictures give the impression of a bright spring day, but it's not. Does anyone recognise the Camellia, by the way? It was in the garden when we moved in and I don't know what it is.
My unknown Camellia. The only surviving shrub from the previous owners
Pulmonaria 'David Ward'. A bit fragile but a pretty colour
Pulmonaria 'Victorian Brooch'. I don't often buy PBR restricted plants, but I'm pleased with this one - long lasting, sturdy, good colour and leaf pattern.
Fresher
The weather's fresher and so am I - a fresher as a volunteer at Dunham Massey. It was good to get out and do some hands-on gardening instead of walking round and looking. We pruned hydrangeas, mulched an astilbe bed and raked up after the lawn scarifier. We got so much more done as a team than would be possible on your own. Cold rain set in which put paid to progress on the lawn, so I went back to my 'real' job.
But I got a nice surprise when I got home - my spring delivery from Penlan Perennials has arrived - some 'insurance' Meconopsis grandis, two stipa gigantea for the gravel garden (when I finally build it) and some primulas for the bog garden (ditto). If this weekend is dry, I might finally make some progress...
Welcome rain - but on the wrong day
My carefully worked out plans to spend today (Sunday) creating the gravel garden and getting rid of the last of the fence have been scuppered by a rapid sequence of cold, squally showers. I've sown a few salad seeds in the polytunnel and tidied up in there a bit, but have otherwise mooched about indoors in a 'why did it have to rain today' sulk. To cap it, the forecast for the rest of the week is dry.
On a more positive note, the lemon tree is sprouting merrily and most of the seeds I sowed two weeks ago have germinated.
The green leaves of Acer 'Osakazuki' emerging from their ruby leaf casings. Plants offer beauty in so many more ways than just flowers 
So you if you are from St. Helens Council and you want your pots back, I hereby confess and will return them on demand.
