Oh! Has It Really Been A Week?

Gentle Reader~I can scarce believe a week has slipped by since my last entry!  It has been blisteringly hot, over most of the UK, as the arrival of summer I reported in my last entry continues!  The Jet Stream drifted over us and is now sitting to the north of the country allowing the hot southern air to bathe us with some long overdue heat.  Indeed, much of Britain has been hotter than the Mediterranean! 

Here is a pretty posy of flowers picked from the garden, I am no flower arranger, I just gathered as I went along some oregano, Alchemilla mollis, sweetly scented pinks and lavenders, and more~

While this warmth is welcomed by many, it does bring it's own set of problems.  It is too hot to do anything other than sit in the garden by day ~ it is very uncomfortable working in your own personal sauna ~ and by evening I am generally too tired from the often oppressive heat, which is exhausting in itself, even if doing very little of anything.  I seem to have done little else other than water and pick fruit!  Why, those two jobs are enough anyway. 

The lack of rain means that the lawn is turning very brown indeed, for I will not use precious water on that, and as it is not growing it does not need cutting either.  The advice from Gardener's World is not to cut your lawns in these conditions.  I am concerned, so this evening I will throw the grey water from the house, which I save as much as I can, over the lawn in an attempt to give it some much needed moisture.  I do not want it to die completely as I do not relish the thought of re~seeding.

First, I must share with you some upsetting news.  For the first time ever, my blackcurrant crop has failed.  I had no reason to suspect anything was wrong.  The spring, although cold, saw good, healthy leaf growth which was quickly followed by plenty of flowers that in turn set fruit.  I truly believed I would harvest a bumper crop.  We have had a prolonged dry spell, so I watered the plants every few days, and then, at the beginning of this week they were looking plump and juicy, little jewels of deepest purple~black waiting to be turned into jams and pies.  I picked a bowl, but when I tasted them they are horrible.  There is no Delicious blackcurrant taste, they leave a bitter aftertaste in the mouth, and they are quite mealy in texture.  I cannot begin to tell you my disappointment.  I have been on the RHS website, and it seems I am not alone.  No one knows the reason, we can only assume the colder than normal winter and non arrival of spring is behind it all.  One person put it succinctly, saying the sugar:acid ratio is wrong.  I still have about 4lbs of fruit left over from last year, so this is now highly prized!  Such a sad waste of a good and nutritious food crop.

Happily, I can tell you, gentle reader, that the raspberry crop remains unaffected by the weather, and I am now picking a small bowlful of this delightful fruit (probably my favourite after blueberries) daily.  Some I am freezing, some I am eating fresh for breakfast.  I feel richer than a Queen!

While some parts of the garden, like the poppies, native foxgloves, and borage, are going over and setting their seed~the harvesting of which is a high priority job this week, other parts are coming in to their own.  Do you remember the few images, last week, of the oriental lilies?  They were teasing and taunting me with big, fat buds that just did not want to burst open?  Well, they have begun!  Oh! What a treat they are~a display of fireworks colour and brightness, in colours to rival the heat of the sun by day and the cool of the moon by night~

Here is the first one, a bright and vibrant yellow~

which was quickly followed by the Hot Hot Hot of this incredible orange~

I think it looks mighty fine along side that pretty pink rose?  A lovely contrast of colours ~ then, just this very morning, the cool, creamy~white, a perfect foil against the scorching vibrant orange~

There are still two more types of these lilies yet to open and delight~I wonder what their colours will be?  I hope for pink, and maybe even one with those delightful stripes and spots that lilies sometimes have~
Quite unintentionally, as the lilies have declared, my garden has taken a little side~step from it's usual cooler shades of purples, pinks, and blues with hints of white into brightly hot and vibrant hues, and the Crocosmia Lucifer, which I bought a few years back, is no exception~

For now I must leave you, Gentle Reader, until another day ~~ but I promise to return quite soon with a photo~heavy blog to catch you up with all the flowers in my Shire Garden~

~~~A Gardener's Work Is Never Done~~~

The Drone of Lonely Lawn Mowers

The drone of lonely lawn mowers, like giant bees, buzz across the gardens of the village earlier in the week.  Everyone was out working hard, just like those honeybees, cutting grass before the next forecast deluge arrived at the weekend.

It almost seemed a shame to mow through the pretty daisies and buttercups sprinkled across the green like stars across the night sky, but they have had two extra weeks to grow, and it has been three since the lawn was last cut.  Here are the before and after~

See the pretty daisies and buttercups?  Look how green the grass is too.  It makes me want to walk barefoot across the lawn, so cool and pleasant.











The daisies and buttercups are gone, there is a semblance of stripes, but I am shocked at how poor the condition is.  Yellow is the new green!  I will have to look up what to do about this to improve it for next year.  I don't mind the daisies, but I don't like the yellow grass.




There were pollinating insects at last!  This is a hover fly on the pink osteospermum~

and here is a white tailed bumblebee getting ready to dive, head first, into the oriental poppy~

Then, with what is becoming almost too predictable for comfort, it all changed for the weekend.  On Thursday I made an emergency dash to the hardware store for thirty bamboo canes to stake up the lillies in an attempt to give them some support from the forecast gales and rain, due on the weekend.  It is now Saturday, it rained heavily all night, but that is okay . . I don't mind the rain at night.  Night time is a good time for it to rain!  The wind, is another matter.  My lawn is littered with the fronds of a neighbouring Cordyline Palm tree.  This is a viscous tree.  I do not like them at all.  The fronds are tough and I can quite see why they are used for making sturdy baskets in foreign climes, for they are strong, fibrous, and do not compost well as they just break down into fibrous strands that knot into everything.  They have a vicious spike on the tip that can give a nasty, sore wound.  They caffle around the lawn mower blades . . and the flowers produce a pungent, sickly sweet smell that cloys and permeates everywhere.  I do not like them.  Rant over! 

For two days now the wind has blown hard, and more again today.  Thankfully, my attempts at emergency staking are mostly successful.  The ground is deep pink underneath the rugos roses where the petals have ripped off.  They should recover well, as they flower all summer long before producing those beautiful, glossy, red rose hips.  The poppies did better than I expected too, but they are a sorry shadow of what might have been.  I am increasingly amazed at the tenacity of plants to survive and recover.  This photo was taken before the wind~

My lettuce has not fared well . . the slugs have decimated the small crop, so I must start over.  It is not too late to sow another crop.  My curly kale and Swiss chard seedlings also became slug fodder.  What can I do?

Still, the flowers are doing really well, and here are some photographs for you to see them all~

This is one of my favourites (I do seem to say that about most plants, don't I?) It is purple alyssum.  When I bought the seeds I thought they were annuals, but this is a not~so~common perennial variety!  The purple cushions of bloom just get bigger each year~

I love how these two Alchemilla mollis tumble into each other, over from a raised border and down the step.  Very effective, and it pleases me a lot~

This is a dwarf clematis.  You can see there are many buds, and I wait patiently to see this a mass of purple, one of my favourite colours in the garden~

This 'dwarf' geranium looks very healthy, but so far it is all leaf and no sign of flowers.  It is puzzling, because it is also twice the size it should be! I grew it from a cutting taken in spring this year. We must wait and see~

The Nigella are opening too.  I love their feathery fronds surrounding the pure, white flower.  These are all self~seeded.  Originally, there were blues, pinks, and mauves, but only the white seems to survive now.  Very pretty, though~

This is a dwarf verbascum.  I check daily for the Mullein moth, for verbascum and mullein are different names for the same plant.  Mullein moth can destroy a big, healthy plant overnight if left unchecked.  I love how this opens up in sections along the flowering spikes~

A wild poppy, not quite like the Flander's Poppy, and I wonder if it isn't a cross between two varieties~

The same bloom in close up~

Finally, Gentle Reader, just yesterday evening I received a beautiful gift from a dear friend.  A copy of  The Plants of Middle Earth by Dinah Hazell.  I cannot tell you how thrilled I am, especially as I already have many of the plants listed growing merrily in my garden.  Now, new ones are added to my wanted list too!  Isn't this such a thoughtful gift, for a gardener who also happens to be a fan of Tolkien and Middle Earth?  I am such a lucky gardener.

Setting the Stage

{Directions:
Winter: exit Stage Right, with slow stubbornness 
Spring: enter Stage Left, with hesitance}

Gentle Reader, today I set the stage, I give you the prologue to this challenging task ahead.

While the work of clearing and cleaning, reorganising and regrouping, and all the other chores that mean a gardener's work is never done, my garden has fallen into a state of neglected disrepair. 

I love gardening more than I can say, with deep roots running in my blood, but I confess, I am in pain with an arthritic back that limits what I can do, and the uphill struggle against inclement weather conditions mean that I have not give the garden the attention or care that it demands for around three years.  Weeds and pest proliferate if left unchecked, while much loved and favoured plants have withered.  A sad fact, but true, and regaining control, putting things right is the task ahead of me now.

I do not use chemicals but I sometimes feel the weeds and pests are making the most of this choice.  Last year, when mid~June arrived, the days were barely warm and I had lost three successive plantings of seedlings to slugs and torrential rain I just gave up.

Over the winter I spent much time reflecting and considering my options. It is not a big garden, but is big enough, and I need to make it manageable, to meet my needs and expectations.  So what are these needs and expectations?  Then, later on, as I get to grips with the tasks, how will I achieve them?

My expectations are: ease of maintenance with fresh, organic food from raised beds, and plot to plate in minutes, fruit and vegetables for jams, chutneys, and pickles, flowers for cutting, photography and creative inspiration, a verdant lawn to sit and sink my feet into the grass when the sky is blue and the days are warm, with fragrant herbs to heal my spirit, a garden that refreshes and nourishes my soul.

How will I achieve them? One task at a time.  I am no miracle worker, I have no magic wand to wave and it is done.  I know what I want, and while my expectations remain constant, all the time I change my mind as to how I want it all to look. There will be times when three steps forward are countermanded by four back, and no doubt I will keep changing my mind, plans will evolve, but then that is half the fun I think, don't you?  Budget is a consideration too, and so I am looking at what does well in the garden to avoid costly mistakes in poor choices of planting.  I am already offering plant exchanges with neighbours, and taking cuttings too.  Recycling and reusing is important to me too.  There is, I feel, a certain charm in the look of recycled things, and this also appeals to my ethos and values of not sending stuff to landfill unnecessarily.

Being of an overwhelmingly stubborn character, I want to do this all myself, without outside help unless the work is very heavy and not managable by me even using of the laws of physics!

There, Gentle Reader, you have a nutshell version of my hopes for the garden.  Later, I will be more specific, talk of raised beds and planting.  The reality, so far this year, is that Spring was supposed to arrive several weeks ago.  We are still waiting.  I don't know if she missed the boat or was simply held up along the way, but now, slowly and hesitantly she is arriving.  There are promises of Spring, and maybe even Summer, popping up all over the garden.  I talk a lot about the weather because I think it is the one biggest condition that impacts upon the garden and how well it does.  The weather patterns are changing, and I know I must change how I garden, and what I grow, to make my garden successful.  Indeed, my next blog entry may be about the weather!

When I looked out of my window this morning, across the lawn I thought it was snowing!  Pink snow in May can only be one thing: apple blossom drifting on the gentle breeze.  Indeed, the display of blossom is promising.

 
Here are a few more photographs I've taken over the last few days that show Spring finally arriving, and a little of the cleaning up and planting preparation that I have started.

These are trays of cultivated foxglove plantlets that I brought on from seedlings purchased from Thompson & Morgan an established mail order company.  I am very happy with their progress. There are over one hundred here, many more than I will need, so once potted up I will swap them for other things with my neighbours, and any surplus ones I will sell off and give the money to charity.

Here are some native foxgloves (digitalis purpurea) that I love to see in my garden and I let them seed where they want to grow.  Sometimes, I have to move them though, as they aren't picky where they grow.  These three are growing against a low, south facing wall in a border with herbs.  That is fine by me, although they might get a little crowded, three so close together, I might have to move that middle one to another spot.

Below is a terracotta pot that originally held a Pasque flower waiting to be placed in a raised border.  Over the winter, an Alchemilla Mollis (of which I have many in my garden) self seeded.  I was going to weed it out, but I just love the contrast of the two very different textures of leaf and colours of green that I am leaving it for a while as a possible photograph opportunity.

Edibles play a large part in my garden, and I am especially fond of my herbs.  The sage is finally starting to return into growth after the long winter months.  This is currently along the edge of the south facing raised vegetable plot, and it seems to love this sunny, well drained spot.  As well as seasoning, and as with many herbs, it has healing properties too.  I love to roast veggies in the oven on a bed of sage, then eat the crunchy leaves with my salad.

This is Sweet Cicely, such a pretty  name, don't you think?  It is rather close to the rosemary (another favourite herb of mine) but for now it looks so happy I cannot bear to move it.  I plan to harvest seed to sow and raise more of this delightful and versatile herb, for I think it would look really good with cut flowers in a vase, as well as the culinary and medicinal uses.  Umbelliferous plants are amongst my favourite, and I hope to introduce many more umbels to the garden this year.  I shall return to The Perennial Nursery, a delightful, small, independent plantswoman's business that shelters under a rocky outcrop in the wilds, and where I can rely on sound advice and quality plants.

Devonshire Violets run rampant in the nooks and crannies of the garden walls, giving delight to the senses with shyly bobbing fragrant blooms.  You will see the Corsican mint too, bottom right.  I love this small, invasive mint and wish it would spread more vigourously between the paving stones.  I love stepping on it and crushing the leaves, releasing the most intense mint fragrance into the summer air.  I think I have a mild obsession with this small beauty!

A promise of gooseberries soon!  I must work on my gooseberry plant, something is wrong.  It is not growin in size as it should, nor is it producing much fruit.  A little research is needed, I think.

More herbs, two varieties of Oregano, again this Mediterranean herb thrives in this raised, south facing plot (more on this raised plot in the future) but as you can see, I am happy to let the Alchemilla Mollis and a digitalis purpurea alongside, and the feathery fronds of Nigella (Love~in~a~Mist) having escaped from the garden have arrived here too . . perfect!

Blackcurrants do very well in my garden, and if these blooms are anything to go by I think there will be a bumper crop this year, for all five bushes are a mass of pinkish~white blossom.  I can look forward to summer pies and crumbles, jam, and some for the winter from the deep freeze as a boost of Vitamin C.

Finally, today, this enormous white pansy bloom.  It is nearly twice the size of all the others in the tubs, and at around four inches from top to bottom it dwarfs the very plant from which it grows!

So, Dear Friend, the stage is set for Spring and Summer too.  There are many months of dilligent work ahead, but for now it is weeding and clearing spaces and making the most of those spaces while the garden takes shape.  I hope, along the way, to share recipes, ideas, and crafts too.

I will change my mind a hundred times or more, of that I'm sure, so I hope you will come back again and see how I progress, and maybe share a gardening tip or two of your own.

Welcome to My Garden in The Shire

Gentle Reader, Welcome! Won't you step into my garden in the Shire and sit a while, dear friend, and we will share some tea and talk about the plans I am making for my garden?

Once upon a time, which now seems as if it was in another life, my garden was a pretty place, with  flowering plants a~plenty, a weed~free lawn of verdant green, some shady trees where underneath I'd sit with a book and read for endless hours while the bees buzzed in and out the lavender and roses.  A vegetable plot produced and keep me in fresh salads and herbs all summer long, with squash and beans, potatoes, parsnips, courgettes, onions, soft fruits and so much more.  In the Autumn I would put up a store of pickles, chutneys, jams, and fill the freezer with the harvest.

Now, in this charming little spot, things were never perfectly tidy and neat, for I am far from perfect, and neither tidy nor neat in nature, with a tendency to let nature do her own thing, so hither and thither there were weeds, things growing where they chose, and plenty of nooks and crannies, and food, for wildlife too . . and no nasty chemical sprays or powders!  That last bit can make gardening a tricksy business when it comes to some of the more persistent pests like slugs and snails, couch grass, and prickly bramble vines, but I soldier on.

Then, one day, life interrupted, and a couple of years of inclement weather disrupted my idyllic corner in the Shire.  I was not able to dig and weed, tend and grow, or care for my garden as I should, and as it deserved.  For two years now everything has been left almost completely alone, and to it's own devices.  I have mown the lawn but not really looked after it, and today, much to my chagrin, yellow is the new green. The weeds have grown, the slugs and snails proliferated, most everything I planted failed.  The weather deals cruel blow after cruel blow and only the hardiest things have survived.  With no greenhouse to bring things on, I struggled and gave up.  I do not know what this year's weather will bring, but I am determined to regain control and stop everything running amok!

I know I have lost many plants, the wind and rain have seen to that, for the ground is so very wet, and the winds blow wuthering wildly in from the west, conditions many plants just do not like, and who can blame them?  Some plants, like hostas, just have 'snail fodder' written all over them, and when the snail population explodes in those perfect~for~snails conditions what can you do?  I have spent some time observing, seeing what does well and what doesn't, so that my chosen planting will stand a better chance of surviving what nature throws at it.


Here is an overview of the lawn and borders, rockery, leading into the soft fruit area . .

I am surprised, if truth be told, at how nearly presentable the lawn looks, but then you are not getting close enough to see the border full of couch grass, or the nettles under the yew tree, and the brambles rearing up in the distant corner 'neath the camellia.  Oh, and I have a few of those small, stone troughs to consider.  Once, in a former life, they held salt for cattle in the fields to lick.  The mill stones are orignal too.  

This is the proposed vegetable plot, still under weed suppressing cover, currently used as a holding area for plants for the borders.  This very morning I turned back one of the corners and I think the job is well underway!  Hurrah! There may be raised beds here.

The small curved area at the top of the drive which will eventually have a low, retaining stone wall.  Here, I plan foxgloves and ferns, maybe the very hardy Alchemilla Mollis too.

 

Ah! There you are . . you stayed!  You have seen my garden almost at it's worst, weeds and all! I am so pleased the photographs of weeds and much unmentionable rubbish did not deter you.  Plans are afoot, my friend, and much work is needed and I am an army of one who does not care to dig in the rain or weed in the cold.  A work~in~progress, but progress is being made.  It is not a large garden, but plenty for me to deal with.  If I have changed my mind once, I have changed it a hundred times as to what I plan to do.  The top priority is to make it as easy care as I possibly can, without resorting to chemicals unless absolutely necessary, and for it to be productive for the plate, a pleasant to sit, and pretty to the eye. There are beds to be dug, borders to weed, compost bins to move, a tree to cut down, and so much more when I can make up my mind exactly what to do.  So many gardening ideas, so little space in which to put them. Wildlife, fairies, and helpful critters welcome!

Thank you for visiting, I hope you enjoyed your tea and your tour.  Please, come by again, if I'm not in the garden I'll be in the house making plans!  Questions, suggestions, and input welcome in the comments section!