No Time To Stand & Stare

Be careful what you wish for.......

Before my change of career, I dreamed of an idyllic life, a little garden business, less hours, more time with the family, more relaxed. How did I end up with a seven day week, four acres, farmer's arms and a permanently sore back.

I've started this post three times now, around midnight....and fallen asleep each time before I've finished. But I'm actually in a better place now than two weeks ago...I felt a little panicky, as if I was never going to get on top of things whereas now I'm just happy, and feel so lucky to have job that I love with no commute and no boss.

The feedback from visitors is amazing and so encouraging....it makes the long hours worthwhile, as do the results - the garden's looking lovely, even if I do say so myself!

The Garden In May

What a beautiful time of year in the garden, the most exciting as we revel in the daily surge in growth and blossoms. The greenest green and such pristine foliage, free from rust and mildew...for now! Mind you, it's hard to keep up with nature....plants just want to grow so there is incessant potting on and planting out.

This week, we planted 12 rudbeckia Marmalade & 9 achillea Cloth of Gold in the prairie, 5 peony Sarah Bernhardt in the new autumn bed. Lavatera, cosmos & snapdragons in the old autumn bed. 12 dianthus carthusianorum, verbena rigida & salvia Hot Lips in the sunny, dry front garden border. Thalictrum lucidum beside the pond, thalictrum Elin, euphorbia martinii and nicotiana sylvestris in the shady garden. Orange wallflower, gaillardia & dahlia Bishop of Llandaff in the hot bed (cottage garden). Crambe cordifolia in the orchard.......do you think perhaps we have a slight problem..of the plantaholic variety?!

A few photos taken this evening.

Sorry, can't stop, must go aplanting!

Gimme More

I do wonder if my appetite for plants will ever be satiated. There are entire plant families out there that I'm only just discovering. Although I'm usually quite happy to stick to those that suit our little peninsula - heavy clay over limestone - windy with very little frost.

Campanulas, geraniums, astrantias, verbenas, phlox, primulas all do well with us but we have created shady areas that were never before planted and this has opened up a whole new world of plants to us.

Having just returned from the Garden Show Ireland, I'm feeling rather giddy - like a child in a sweet shop, the more I saw, the more I wanted and it was perfectly fine (I kept telling myself) to overindulge as I no longer spend any money on clothes (just recycle what I already have) and I don't go out much (sad old me).

Just a few of the treasures I have brought home:

Thalictrum lucidum - Shining Meadow Rue - 3-5ft with handsome foliage and airy, creamy, fragrant flowers in summer. Apparently an easy plant that requires no staking - watch this space!

Jovellana punctata - sprays of unusually marked flowers from spring until autumn, growing to approx 5ft and attractive to bees and butterflies. Prefers moist soil in part shade....I haven't decided where to plant it yet..mmm.

Rosa Pleine de Grace - A vigorous rambler, free flowering with a strong clove like fragrance. The flowers are followed by clusters of orange hips.

How excited am I???

A Perfect Patch

This week, I have been delivering my "Cut Flower Patches" which contain annual and perennial plant plugs for people to plant out in their garden and which will hopefully give them beautiful blooms to fill their home all summer long.

If you fancy growing a few cut flowers for your home, why not give it a go? It's one of the most rewarding and "feel good" pastimes, believe me! With this in mind, I thought I would share with you my top five plants for cutting in May.

Tulips - The sheer variety of colours and forms makes them a dream for hand tied bouquets - easy to grow and easy to arrange, although they don't reliably bloom in following years. I find that the doubles last longer both in the garden and the vase.

Alliums - Purple Sensation & Roseum are the stars of the onion family. Even easier to grow than tulips and they will return each year, gradually increasing in numbers. The bees love them and they last for ages in a vase.

Hesperis - (Sweet Rocket) This lovely biennial smells superb, especially in the evening, and once planted, should self sow thereafter.

Lunaria - (Honesty) Another great biennial, similar to hesperis, easy to grow in poor soil, it's available in purple and white. There is also a lovely one with variegated foliage.

Erysimum (Wallflowers) Finally, a biennial / short lived perennial available in many different colours, a beautiful scent and loved by bees!

Roll on May!!!

An Early Start

Nothing is so beautiful as Spring
When weeds, as wheels, shoot long and lovely and lush;

I do love Gerard Manley Hopkins, the greatest rapper that ever lived. His poetry surely does beg to be broadcast in time to a beat, but that's for another blog post.

This morning, I rose with the lark, jumped into the car with the dog, and headed to the garden at dawn. There was a ground frost but, as Dolly Parton says, if you want the rainbow, you gotta put up with the rain - last night, no wind, a clear sky and a full moon - the after effect....a slight ground frost.... which led to a slight panic as I had put many a plant out of the tunnel yesterday and into my lovely new cold frames, kindly donated by the parents of a friend. All's well mind as the plants are unscathed.

GMH was certainly on the button with regard to weeds. The annual weeds are sprouting before our eyes. Yet again, so are all of our lovely, beautiful, reliable plants....trees, shrubs, perennials, biennials, bulbs and annuals. How do we never tire of this annual occurrence, the vibrancy of the green, the lushness of the foliage, the entire exuberance of it all, so pristine and new.

And the icing on the cake.....the swallows have arrived!

April Flowers

We open the garden the last weekend in April and it set me to thinking, is this good timing to show the garden in terms of spring flowers. But this is a quandary shared by many gardeners including, apparently, HRH Prince of Wales.

If only we were open last week, or next week. The main narcissus & muscari are starting to go over, the primula Quakers Bonnets that have adorned the garden since before Christmas are starting to wane, only ever so slightly but they are past their peak.  

On the other hand, the late narcissus are starting to flower, the muscari latifolium are in their prime, with their "look at me" two toned tops. The "forget me nots" never fail to lift the spirits, we have strategically lifted bonnie self sown clumps and moved them to prime spots. The hellebores have flowered profusely since January, the seed heads are now starting to swell. The camassia leichtinii in the orchard will keep us on tenterhooks 'til the last minute as to whether they will flower by then or not.

I have fallen in love with pulmonarias, with only a few in the garden, I have been inspired by the collection at Ballyrobert Cottage Garden, too numerous to mention but Blue Ensign, Roy Davison & Sissinghurst White are among them. 

The geranium macrorrhizum, which I used to despise, I now appreciate for its versatility - thriving in every possible situation. It is starting to flower. I am excited. As is ever thus.....spring....the season of anticipation.

Weeding Vows

I vow to eradicate every last creeping buttercup, dandelion, hairy bittercress & docken from every single inch of our 4 acre garden. Me, myself, on my own.....what am I thinking - my hands have seized and my arms and shoulders are aching. Heavy clay, that's the problem and where I have added lots of grit, the weeds put up far less of a fight to come out. We add tonnes of the stuff every year but it's never enough.

I vow to hoe on a regular basis - how long d'you think that'll last? If only I were more of an organised, disciplined person.

On a less depressing note, the weather has been mild (albeit too wet) and the plants are coming along nicely...as are the weeds.....enough moaning Cherry.....feeling like a cranky old lady these past few weeks.

The new autumn beds needs lots more plants. So far, we have just moved bits of other things - anthemis, crocosmia, daylilies, salvia nemorosa but there are lots of gaps.

The old autumn bed (above) has been weeded, the sedum removed (too wet & rich for it) the river lilies & asters lifted and divided but it still needs more structure and repeat planting. That's the thing with gardening - you're never done!