gardening

East West, Home’s best…

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This week our family weekend trip was replaced by an Easter week away, coming back to spring after a week in the Norwegian mountains was all the more striking given the contrast with the snow and sub-zero temperatures. 

A cup of tea and some Easter eggs to enjoy, walking round the garden and experiencing the spring.

The spring border is now at it’s peak, with small tête à tête daffodils, naturalising hyacinths (all planted from bulbs bought in flower at various supermarkets) and scillas as well as budding shrubs, including a small edible cherry.

This year there are fewer pinks and dark reds, the hyacinths appear to be changing their colour as they naturalise, something we need to rectify next year.

Spring bulbs in flower in what we call, only slightly facetiously, the ‘spring border’.
Flower bud on an edible sweet cherry (variety unknown).

The small potted flowering cherry by the front door was almost in flower when we left, other buds on the same plant have now caught up with the earlier flowering twigs close to the wall and it’s now a race with the tall columnar flowering cherry (prunus amanagowa) to see which opens first. I hope to have a spring garden party when they are fully open! (Hopefully in good weather).

Flower buds on a dwarf flowering cherry (variety unknown) against a warm brick wall.
Japanese flowering cherry buds on Prunus serrulata “Amanagowa”

The pear tree has also clearly enjoyed a warm week with buds also starting to burst.

Pear buds starting to open

The last of the winter viburnum bodnantense flowers are still glorious while the leaves are now also fully out and the faint scent is more.marked.

Viburnum bodnantense flower

The red flowering currant is also at it’s spring peak. I really like the raspberry red flowers, but it’s an undeniably scrappy shrub in shape and the rather unfortunate cat pee smell makes it unappealing as a cut flower. However, as with previous years I’ve taken the risk and cut a few branches for a base in combination with the first opening (and by contrast deliciously scented) skimmia blooms, some ivy with black berries, corkscrew hazel and a fully in bloom camellia. It will be interesting to see how these all survive in a vase…

A skimmia flower head, just starting to open. The flowers have a beautiful scent.
Alpine flowering currant – it has rather small and indistinct green-yellow flowers but makes a fine dense hedge with bright green leaves in spring.and is a good foliage plant for a vase.

I love having fresh flowers in the house and growing your own is undeniably better for the environment than buying often imported or greenhouse grown blooms.

A vase full of fresh cut spring flowers

Other shrubs in flower currently include this box.We have several in the garde that seem to be affected by either or both of box caterpillar and box blight, but so far at least this one has remained unaffected.

Box (Buxus)  flowers, a small but vibrant yellow.

In the back garden, the waves of the chionodoxa are really at their peak now, they must spread by themselves as we are now starting to see them in our peony bed cleared 2 years ago.

Chionodoxa ‘glory of the snows’

This spring time is a good opportunity to plan for new plantings in the autumn.

These daffodils are rather lost here. I plan to put in a few hundred crocus for earlier in the spring, but perhaps I should also consider some new narcissus too? I really like the pheasants eye varieties but would like some to flower in early April.
Same bed looking the other way. The tulips are not really right for this bed. Their leaves are too dominant. There are also alliums and red peony shoots in this bed so perhaps less room for narcissi than I’d like..

Similarly, the plum and pear border have a few rather lost daffodils and many tulips that may not flower this year. I’m keeping an eye on this bed for the rest of the spring to see if it needs to be refreshed next autumn too.

The camellias are all in bud but this red flowered shrub is fully out and covered in bright red flowers. It is incredibly beautiful, but I always feel the rose like flowers and glossy green leaves are somehow a little artificial or don’t really belong in the bright Scandinavian spring.

Our second rhododendron is also out now, and after removal of some tree branches shading it and a renovation prune last year, it’s looking magnificent.

Pink rhododendron

Also now coming to a peak are the hellebores. Although breeding has made the flower stalks a bit more upright, many of them still nod downwards, but a few sacrificed to float in water and the flowers are an exotic revelation…

Helleborus flower heads floating in water.

Like this they last a surprisingly long time indoors.

Anyway, that’s enough of a spring update for now. Time to go and plan the next holiday!

Nearing the peak: 18th May

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Our back garden has a very well developed Rhododendron and azalea them. The structure was put in by the previous owners but since then we’ve added quite a few ourselves. That means that May is a month where the back part of the garden reaches peak loveliness.*

So today a guide to the currently flowering Rhodies.

Let’s start with a couple of my favourites, and they’re favourites because of their scent as well as colour.

This luteum is now out in full. And has a lily like fragrance

Orange Rhododendron luteum variety

The bright orange contrasts beautifully with the “Astrid” variety next to it, which isn’t scented but has a gorgeous lush colour.

Astrid is the dark red colour next to the orange – I’m not sure what this variety is called
This blue variety, ramopo, also has blue tinted leaves, the flowers aren’t scented but the leaves and wood have an astringent herbal scent when rubbed. It’s very refreshing and makes.mw wonde if it would repel insects.

Then we have the favourite I’ve mentioned before. Our wonderful polar bear Rhododendron – the fragrance is wonderful, but look as the silky billowing white flowers that open from pink buds. It’s a good 3m high and laden this year. Fantastic..

Rhododendron polar bear.

It’s neighbour, also a luteum has only one flower this year and I fear it will need to be replaced, but again a beautiful lily scent and I love the delicate petals.

A smaller orange luteum flower over beautiful bright green leaves

We have many Cunningham’s white in the garden. They are sometimes dismissed as EasyDendrons and you can (and should!) trim them like a hedge, they always spring back and are super reliable. I sometimes think they’re a little boring, but look at those delicate markings on the flower! And the dark green foliage really shows the contrast well. There’s a reason they’re popular.

A streak of Cunningham’s white flowers across a well pruned shrub.

Also white flowered and unscented is this wild form Rhododendron which has very attractive pink buds that open to white cup shaped flowers. The leaves are furry on the underside too. Also a favourite and not very commonly seen.

Furry leaf, pink buds, white cups shaped flowers. Check.

Helen Moser is another pretty common variety that is also at its peak now. As the flowers age they get very attractive markings inside developing. I assume some kind of landing strip for bees?

Helen Moser

We have several other pink azaleas but I don’t know what varieties they are. This one has very small leaves and builds a low shrub (1.5m high max) with an attractive structure too. No no

These are a deciduous azalea, we have a couple of them, just starting to open

The small leaves on this königstein are also very attractive and now it’s covered in beautiful star shaped purple pink flowers.

Königstein azalea.
I also love the star shaped purple flowers on this one. It’s another standard variety that is pretty commonly seen. I think it’s the Rhododendron catawbiense species and is very tough.
This is a low growing variety in a darker corner which looks luminous at this time of year, I think it is called Connie

We have a number of very low – less than half a metre high Rhodies that are not really my favourites- I think they’re too low and don’t really add structure, but they’re smothered in flowers at this time of year:

I like this coral pink colour

The reds rather clash with the rest of the cool pinks and purples but they’re undeniably bold

Low growing red Azalea

This cool yellow was an enormous mound and got cut back hard a few years ago. It’s recovered very well (unlike some of our others), but the flowers are now starting to fade. This is an earlier flowering azalea.

The yellow flowers work well with both the red and the pink nearby.

There are several more coming into flower soon, and several that have ended. May is a fantastic month, but there’s so much to see and appreciate it can be a bit overwhelming.

Tomorrow I will cover the lilacs, also getting close to their peak!

*kinda. I think there’s always something beautiful to look at here and that’s sort of the point of this year’s attempt to write a diary.

Springing Forward

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As the Spring has come back (and I realise I’ve hardly posted on here this year), our garden has once more blossomed once more into a lush gorgeous Eden, which I’m determined to enjoy as much as possible.

 

Alpine trough mark II
The last of the skimmia flowers
Cherry blossom
Acer in spring
Euphrobias and shocking pink tulips
Watching the red squirrels
New tulips
The rhodedendrons shooting up
Time for a tea party on a warm evening

At the same time, work is even more hectic than it used to be, we’re short-staffed and over-committed. It’s too easy to try and race to catch up with myself all the time and I find that my time in the garden is increasingly limited. It’s frustrating that although I love gardening and find it relaxing, I am actually sometimese too anxious about work to put the time in to get on with it and it starts to become a source of yet more stress.

I have therefore decided to set myself a new challenge – a vase of flowers for my office every week for a year, but only cut from our own garden. It’s a way to bring something of the peace and tranquility into what is often a hectic environment and to observe and think about the seasons.

You might have noticed that I have often posted pictures of vases of flowers and talk about what goes into them in this blog. I love having flowers around the house but I’m usually unwilling to buy them. Partly because of cost but mainly because of the staggering environmental and social cost of producing and transporting cut flowers, most of them from lands a very long way away.

See for example this excerpt:

Costofcutflowers
Excerpt from this report on cut flowers

Given our lovely garden it shouldn’t be necessary to buy them in anyway, though winter might prove more of a challenge.

At this time of year though, I’m basically spoilt for choice in terms of cutting flowers but hopefully the requirement to get out and look around at least once a week will both inspire me to see the garden with new eyes each week and to educate – especially as I start to work out what different shrubs and flowers actually are and which will keep as cut flowers and which will not and also of course how to mix and arrange different blooms. It will hopefully also force me to keep posting – somethign I often struggle to fit in, even thoguh I like the contemplation that writing forces me to do.

I will post the pictures here and on instagram for your delight and inspiration as a moment of joy.

Starting this week with an easy classic, Convallaria majalis, the lily of the valley. It’s actually a native species too, and in the same family as asparagus.

2017-05-22 10.38.06

I’ve always loved the scent, it’s amazing to me that such unobtrusive flowers can fill a room, or a whole house with such a beautiful perfume. They look delicate but are really as tough as old boots, spreading with some vigour in conditions (dry shade under trees) that other plants find tough to thrive in.

*A word of warning though, all parts of the plant are poisonous. The leaves do have some superficial resemblance to edible wild garlic (ransoms) though they are generally darker + tougher and don’t have the same pungent garlic smell when crushed.*

The small flowers are often difficult to see in the garden so I feel I get much more joy from cutting a few and holding them up close to look at them carefully, while admiring that glorious perfume.

This little vase is now on my desk at work and filling the office with a heavy and heavenly scent.

2017-05-22 10.37.54

Other bigger and more exuberant flowers, I’d rather keep in the garden to admire from afar. The little white bells contrast so beautifully with the large deep green leaves too and I find them surprisingly long lasting in a vase.

So, perfume, beauty and long-lasting flowers, more or less the ideal first entry for my cut flower challenge.

See you next week…

 

Sweet Harvest

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The first harvest of our new Victoria plum tree is finally ready. 

And it is as good as I had hoped, a sweet, slightly tart and beautifully juicy plum. It’s impossible to buy flavour like this and as with Proust’s Madeleines, it is a flavour that takes me straight back to childhood. 

To be entirely honest, we almost forgot about them. The tree is slightly hidden behind a high group of sunflowers and is not yet tall enough to be easily seen. However, luckily, we go there just in time. 
It’s not a big harvest this year, and there is an argument you should not let a tree fruit at all in the first few years to build strength, but we could not resist. 

We also plucked our first runner beans this morning, and I forgot to take photos but we harvested and ate our rather meager (but delicious) new potato crop yesterday. The potatoes were rather neglected at a crucial time as they were in a pot and allowed to dry out while we were on holiday. However, the runner beans have done extremely well and we have a very good crop developing. They are so decorative too. We’ve put up a trellis and they are growing up into the neighboring hibiscus. I would almost grow them just for the beautiful scarlet flowers and heart-shaped foliage. 


 I planted both of these crops with our youngest child, who has really shown an interest and a feel for gardening. It is such a joy to spend time in the garden with her, passing on the knowledge, the skills and the enjoyment via all the senses that the garden provides.

This year for her, the big discovery has been the fresh fig. I adore these and my lovely husband gave me a mature specimen in a pot as a Mother’s Day gift this year. The first figs have now started ripening, and though requiring some encouragement to try one at first, they are now a firm favourite of our children. It is such a wonderful and very funny thing to watch them first rejecting and then realizing how tasty a new kind of fruit is.

This time of year, harvest-time, is when the joy of growing your own fruit and vegetables really comes in.

Anyway, a wonderful way to start a Monday morning.