PS

thanks you and goodbye to the purple sprouting broccoli. it was fantastic. so tender and tasty............welcome to the rhubarb, still a bit skinny but also tasty..............and thanks for your efforts to the volunteer nasturtiums in the veg bed, nice try but that isn't where you live, you'll be much happier in the window box trust me..............

red lettuces in the veg bed. note also giant chard which has been there all through the winter............

tamed catmint..............annual seedlings and volunteer Shirley poppies.........

the lilac tree. i must admit the description "dwarf lilac" seems a little misleading..........but as long as it's happy.........

Angi's bay tree and friend. note carrot seedlings in the tub just developing tiny leaves...........

Lilac time

Flowering madly, and great wafts of perfume in the garden which is lovely.............showery weather but not cold and some sun so everything really bursting out and growing fast. the organic rose and the paeony are just about to flower but the oriental poppies are lagging a bit this year and we even have one or two daffs still going. lots of borage coming up everywhere it's not supposed to be so i've moved some out of the annual bed........the new potentilla has a flower, deep red, very pretty. in the greenhouse the salads have now moved outside, some red lettuce into the veg bed and some in a pot, and i've planted some cucumber seedlings. new bay tree from Angi in a nice square terracotta tub looking very elegant. have tried to tame the catmint to leave room for the sweet peas which are all ready to go out..................the basils are very slow, but it has been quite cool, ditto the marjoram and busy lizzies.
front garden has gone completely mad, to think i once thought nothing would grow there...........once the bluebells have finished there will be some tidying to do, but not yet, it's all too pretty at the moment................

corner by the pond looking pretty, Mum's spirea, Welsh poppies, persicaria and lemon balm

sugar snap pea "Sugar Bon".............mmmmm, those were lovely last year, hope they do OK.......plus volunteer bit of wild garlic

the veg bed. radishes in front; spinach and chard in the middle; sugar snap pea at the back, yum, and the artichoke trying to get in the picture........note cat-proof cage!

perennial bed. new potentilla beside the tree peony and new rudbeckia "Irish Eyes" at the back, also fennel, sweet rocket and euphorbia. oriental poppies not out yet.

annual seedlings just starting to come up. also many weeds.................

delphinium again

runner beans and parsley in their barrel. delphimium in its slug-proof (we hope) pot. beans were slow to get going last year but when they did zoomed right up to the roof and produced loads of beans, so here's hoping.........

the herb area - note lovely chives (with flowers) and rescue rose (v grateful)

look at all this beautiful salad..............rocket, lettuce x 2 and Chinese cabbage......

seedlings in the greenhouse

I'll be with you in apple-blossom time..............

which is now. very pretty, the three patio apples in their pots are all flowering, and the cherry at the front. the front garden is positively verdant, it's obviously decided it doesn't want to be paving so stuff is growing everywhere and it looks rather nice. a small cherry tree is sprouting by the front door, i guess we'll have to pull it out in case it undermines the foundations but it isn't doing any harm for now...........
greenhouse seedlings well away and we are now eating fresh salad ever day, soon be time to move the salads outside. carrots and parsley sprouting, basils off to a slow start but appearing at last, and for the first time the cumin as well. damned lovage back again and we also seem to have a mutant variegated borage seedling in the herb bed................
annuals in the warm bed sprouting, lots of weeds too but easier to pull once they're bigger..........some self-sown Shirley and Welsh poppies have appeared, and a clump of honesty in the wild wood. Epimedium very pretty this year with yellow flowers, but the Cystis much slower to flower than usual. have planted some more lilies for summer flowers against the wall. the Dame's Violet is back, a bit frostbitten but ready to flower...............not sure that the Passiflora has survived after all though, no sign of anything happening which is a bit sad........
bought some new things at Redhall, a potentilla with silvery leaves which i think will have red flowers, and a Rudbeckia "Irish Eyes" - in honour of the ancestors! a delphinium too which we're keeping in a container to try and slug-proof it, i've never succeeded in growing them but the flowers are so pretty....................
paeonies just about ready to come out..........and maybe even the one at the front, which has *never* flowered............that would be exciting. we will certainly have blackcurrants this year; the rhubarb is up and we've eaten the first of it, strawbs are looking healthy, gooseberries have tiny fruit forming, and there are even figlets on the tree................

Weed of the Year

.....is Herb Robert. never having had it in the garden before, this year we have it everywhere for some reason. it is quite pretty but one can have too much of a good thing...............spring is now definitely here, although it's still been quite chilly, but that seems to have stopped the weeds from completely taking over as they've usually done by now............Carrie's clearing-up operation of last year has left the clematis somewhat shocked so i'm not sure that we'll get many flowers this year, as it hasn't really got much left to flower with...........we've re-erected the arch, with reinforcement, and moved it forward so that it kind of marks the entrance to the veggie garden, with the jasmine on the same side as the weeping birch and the rose on the other. the rose did actually survive being toasted by the fire bin and even produced on or two flowers, but we hope it will feel safer and more at home in its new location..............
.........in the beds, mostly weeds, so i've done some hoeing. no sign of the Pasque flowers.........i suspect they may have gone in the autumn clear-up as well, but it's possible that they're just not up yet because it's been too cold. however the tree peony is poking its wee head up, we only put it in last year so it didn't get much of a chance to do anything, i've cleared the weeds round it and given it some compost for encouragement. Passion flower not dead either i'm pleased to see, and a couple of fennel plants beside it. poppies, dicentra and rue back in their usual place, mum's spirea looking lovely now that the leaves are out..............dragon plant quite slow to start but on its way, and the purple Lysimachia and lemon balm back for another season..........and lo and behold, one godetia. it must be feeling a bit lonely and wondering where all its mates are, we still have some of last year's seeds so we can grow some friends for it..........
.........in the greenhouse, salads sprouting away though not yet big enough to eat; Thai basil and lemon basil planted today along with cumin which did absolutely nothing last year so we'll try keeping it in the greenhouse and see how it fares. lettuce "misticanza" and chinese cabbage already sprouting. bird of paradise plant re-potted after something of a struggle, the roots had grown right through the bottom of the pot.............calathea also re-potted. paeonies racing away and of course all the daffs and spring bulbs in bloom.................just waiting for the seed order to arrive and then the spring frenzy really starts...........

Scene: A Blasted Heath...............

well not blasted exactly but pretty bleak............it's been a long cold winter so we are way behind. today was only really the second day of working outside because it's been too cold, but a little mild spell has suddenly brought all the bulbs out and the days are, very slowly, getting longer. the bird life is down stuffing itself with bits of fatsnax and bread, and it does seem that at last spring is on the way. everything has obviously just been hunkered down against the icy blasts waiting for a chance, a week ago there were no flowers and now the irises "harmony" have suddenly appeared, the clump of mini-daffs in the woodland are out and even one mega-daff at the front, snowdrops and lots of crocuses. and one pink chionodoxa just appearing, buds on the honeysuckle and clemati, paeonies pushing up..............yes, it's time to start the Staring. the Staring is the most important garden activity............it involves touring round the garden peering closely at the ground where the plants used to be and where now is a morass of dead leaves, weeds, old bits of plant label, sweet wrappers etc............but lo! in among it all some old friends are actually still there and fighting their way up through the mess. it's really quite amazing to see what has survived. and of course there is always the process of staring hard at a little embryonic clump of something obviously meant to be there and thinking: what the hell's that? all will be revealed within the next few weeks, but some things are not included in the mental garden map..........
......somehow we seem to have acquired enough pots to start our own garden centre and it's unlikely that we'll need them all so what we need is someone starting a new garden who can take some of them................Carrie has cleared the greenhouse and conveyed to the cats the bad news that their indoor winter litter tray has been decommissioned and yes, they will need to get their sweet little paws wet to answer calls of nature..........today i finished more clearing and planted some salads..............weeded the static pots and moved some things into the greenhouse for a head start. last year's geraniums are still indoors but starting to sprout so hopefully we can get some cuttings. despite the cold winter, the prostrate rosemary has been flowering merrily since the middle of January, so much for being a Mediterranean herb...........
...........we haven't yet planned this year's growing, but of course gardening being what it is, nothing we plan will turn out as we intended anyway............some lessons were learned though, like: don't grow cabbages because they grow beautifully but we don't actually like them. also, the outdoor tomatoes did just as well as the greenhouse ones and tasted better, so it's worth keeping the greenhouse space for other things, like more cucumbers because they were lovely. peas and beans are a lot of work but really only the sugar snap peas gave much of a crop, and asparagus peas have beautiful flowers but are like eating an emery board so best grown for decoration........ the purple sprouting broccoli is still going strong and tastes lovely, and we left the runner bean roots in as suggested so we'll see what they do. flower-wise the amazing organic rose is well on with new growth.................the jasmine arch has broken right through and deposited the jasmine in a heap which is not a good start to the season for it, or for the fruit garden it fell into, so we need to replace it quite soon. however the fruit bushes are sprouting already and the rhubarb is poking up, i've weeded the dwarf apples and blueberry in their tubs and given them some fruit food.......................and off we go!

don't call me Shirley

i was going to post a lovely picture of the Shirley poppy which came out yesterday but unfortunately it decided to drop all its petals today.................more flowers to come though. sweet peas are fantastic, i picked a whole bunch yesterday and more had come out today..............the mange-tout peas have been decimated by some pest while we were away but tonight we had runner beans (yay!), asparagus peas, sugar snap peas and climbing French beans, if not exactly *for* dinner, at least *with* dinner. the problem is we never get a full crop because we keep eating things as we stroll round the garden every day admiring it...............more sunflowers are out and looking fantastic, and the passion flowers now making an appearance. the new jasmine "Clotted Cream" has a few flowers, very sweet..................gooseberries ready to pick, Alpine strawberries too................in the greenhouse the cucumbers have gone mad and climbed all the way to the roof, tiny cucumbers have appeared, all bumpy...............we managed to grow one last year and it was very tasty, but this year looks more promising already.............