It’s lovely how one phone call can lift the spirits. Friday was the coldest day of the year for my garden and I was thinking about presenting a six shades of brown. There were some truly great contenders but in the blink of phone screen my mind set changed and some colours came into focus.
One
Shouting most loudly to be included this week is the lovely hellebore double ‘Pretty Ellen’. Even with the downward aspect of the flowers the colour gives a warming glow to a shady corner of the garden. I think I should have more of these and so I shall look into how to propagate them. I imagine it will be a slow process.
Two
The viburnums in the back garden are fairing rather better than those in the front garden. One is a large and oldish looking tree which has the pinker flower and the other is a smaller tree with more consistently white flowers. Both are much loved by viburnum beetle – which I’ve never seen, just the holey evidence of their presence.
Three
It may be cold out there but the rosemary bush has a gentle dusting of pretty purple flowers.
Four
The iberis sempervirens that covers the rocky wall of the north facing border is also beginning to flower.
Five
The leaves of Arum italicum looking beautifully glossy and untroubled by slugs. I read that these combine well with snowdrops. My snowdrops are being very shy this year. It looks like I may have lost some which is very careless of me. I think it will be another week before a snowdrop picture graces one of my posts.
Six
The last of my six gives the clue to my delightful phone call. Last weekend I tackled a good part of the cutting that back that was needed. Roses were pruned, geraniums and alchemilla mollis cut back and the builder’s bag that is serving as my temporary compost heap was overflowing. I was longing for the day when the brick structure would be demolished. I pushed over a few of the less stable bricks and poked and prodded the rest. Hurrah, no more waiting. My delightful builder has two free days and will arrive next week with an array of suitably destructive tools and a skip. I will spend the weekend ferreting out all the debris that accumulates in the garden and down the side of the shed. All will be well with the world.
For more stories from gardens around the world go to the links on The Propagator site. Now there’s a man who loves his compost!
I’ve planted the same group of plants either side of a small path.. The Agastache ‘Alabaster’ were in the garden already and they have now been joined by Echinacea purpurea ‘White Swan’, Gaura lindheimeri ‘Whirling Butterflies’ and Pennisetum villosum. Fingers crossed for next summer.
On the diagonal opposite to this area is what was fondly known as ground elder corner. After three summers of digging it out I think I have the upper hand and so I am beginning to put in some permanent plants. First to go in is Trachelospermum jasminoides, a firm six on saturday favourite. I’m hoping it will very quickly cover the great expanse of unattractive brown fence.
Also adding some late colour are these Lillies. Yet more naming debates: are they now Schizostylis, or Hesperantha? I know which one I prefer. These came from the old garden and are bulking up nicely.
And since repetition is allowed and because the late colour is so fabulous, I give you again the Salvia ‘Amistad’ and the Rose, Darcy Bussell. The Salvias mooched along all summer but they have really established themselves in the last month. Darcy Bussell just keeps on putting out new buds.
This week I dug up the last of my sarpo mira potatoes. This is the total haul from two plants. Barely enough to mash and I was certainly crushed.
The tale of woe continued. Into the greenhouse I went to pick some tomatoes. I noticed that the romano peppers needed tying in again. But as I brought the stems together to tie them in they snapped. But these things happen, don’t they? This photo was taken after a good many of the peppers had been used for the evening meal.
This bright cheerful zinnia, grown from a tiny seed, continues to shine.
The astrantia major are flowering again.
Autumn is coming and softer colours take their place in the garden. I call these ice plants but I’m going to venture to suggest the Latin name of Hylotelephium spectabile. Yes or No?
So I add to my crimes, ignorance. I had no idea the bulbs would flower this year. What a blissful ignorance it was. Without it I would not have been half so thrilled and excited as I was when I saw this flower and I didn’t step on it!
Pride before the fall and fall the persimmons did. Two branches came down, both heavily laden with fruit. They broke from the inside so nature has done a good job of opening up the tree.
No sooner had the delphiniums put up their second flush of flower stems than the storm arrived. Of course I hadn’t got round to tying in the tops but the ties at the bottom seem to have helped steady the stems enough to keep them safe.
The stately cosmos that was just opening out its flowers was not so lucky. I had tried to push a cane into the ground but there was no give at all. The plant snapped off at the bottom. All was not lost as I cut back the side stems and brought them inside to fill a vase.
The fruits of the passion flower are ripening and providing a focal point over the top of an arch. These is the more common Passiflora caerulea and although the fruits are edible when very ripe I prefer to leave them be.
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Indeed the doorbell rang a moment ago and although it was not the aforementioned plants I was excited to receive the first of the bulb orders. Excited on two counts: Yes! I had my six for the week (it was touch and go) and I could cross Colchicum speciosum Album off of the wish list. I hope they are going to like the space I have ready for them. Fingers crossed that it is sunny enough.
Cutting back plants after flowering really can work. The alchemilla mollis which were sheared to the ground have come through again and at this time of year they look beautiful with their dressing of early morning dew.
This is Geranium ‘Brookside’. It roamed through the garden in early summer, knowing no boundaries and so cutting it back when it finished flowering caused me no stress. The plant needed to be tidied up. This week I noticed it was flowering again.
Also starting up again are the seedlings of Nigella, love in a mist. I have a carpet of them which I should probably be thinning out and sharing around the garden. But I might just leave them all here to keep the weeds down and see how they come through next year.
In the greenhouse I have managed to keep a tray of foxgloves and echinacea pallida seedlings alive and it looks like some potting on needs to be done. Temperatures are on the up next week so they I hope they will put on some good growth once moved into a pot.
Encouraged by the good example of others I decided to try some winter vegetables. I rescued a tray of rainbow chard and perpetual spinach from certain death and planted them out a few weeks ago. The pesky slugs made straight for them but they have pulled through and growth looks good.
Last November I planted out bare root roses in a new border and Darcy Bussell is still flowering. I am impatiently waiting for the roses to become fully established but even in the first year the flowers have been rewarding.
From the Albert 1er gardens just off the Promenade des Anglais. A great selection of tropical plants, all of which were unknown to me except under the vague heading of palms or cactus like things. This one did have an information board close by so I can tell you it is Asparagaceae Dasylirion Longissium LEM. or Totem du Mexique. Frost resistant to -12 degrees apparently.
From a sun baked border at the Musee Matisse in Cimiez. A mixture of the familiar and the exotic.
I have long wondered if I should incorporate some grasses into the garden and I love this combination. Does anyone knows what the planting is? I don’t think it would fit the scale of my garden but it was so light and feathery that it did go on the ‘in my dreams’ list!
More beautiful grasses and ? I hope the photo is clear enough for you to put forward suggestions.
A riot of colour to end on. I wish I could get my garden to look like this in September! Maybe this is the result of good deep borders and planting for height. Something for me to consider.
A persicaria – labelled as ‘pink’ so I can’t add any further information. It goes some way to my getting persicaria into the garden but I am on the hunt for some of the dark red ones. I planted it next to the salvia ‘Blush Pink’ bought earlier in the summer and I hope they will be happy soul mates.
I singularly failed to record the other great gardening activity of the weekend which was the apple picking. It was a smaller crop this year, both in numbers of apples and size. Some were little bigger than a golf ball but as they all go for juicing they were all picked. In about a week I will know how many bottles this year’s harvest produced. The bent double apple tree of a few weeks ago is now nearly horizontal so I took a picture of that!
Every week I think about including this Cleome ‘Senorita Carolina’ in the six but for some reason it stays on the sub’s bench. This week it makes it into the team. I really don’t know why it has taken me so long, it’s been flowering like this all summer. The real colour is slightly less vibrant than captured here. It’s a tender plant so if the winter is anything like last year I shall probably lose it.
Just coming into flower is the Anemone ‘Honorine Jobert’. Earlier in the year its poor leaves were scorched by the sun but as the season moves on it’s site is more in the shade where the splash of white shines through.
Given the size of the apples this year I was surprised and impressed by the persimmon fruits. They are much larger than last year and although I am not a great fan of the fruit I do enjoy their orange colour as they ripen in November.
n20gardener 