A snowy start to the new year

Christmas has now been packed away in boxes, except for the evergreen wreaths at the front and side of the house.  They are still fresh looking and I don't want to take them down yet. The house looks a little bare, so I bought some daffodils the other day, which bring a little brightness and cheer. Much as I love all the sparkle and glitter of Christmas, that's over with now and I want to look forward with hope to the Spring and daffodils give me that. Things are not good in the world at the moment, worse than they have been since the start of the crisis, so we all need a bit of hope to keep us going and to know that soon this shall pass. 

After Christmas we had snow here in Lancashire, lots of it and it's taking a long time to clear.  So there's no chance of doing any gardening jobs or going to the allotment yet. I have been feeding the birds, enjoying watching them on the feeders and walking around the garden spotting the changes taking place. The crab apple still has lots of orange/red fruit on its branches which the birds have been ignoring even in this cold weather. But now the fruit is going soft and mushy on the branches perhaps it will be more attractive to them. The brightness of the berries is a lovely splash of colour against the snow.

                                              

In the autumn I planted bulbs in pots, crocus, little tete a tete daffodils and tulips. Its lovely now to see little green shoots emerging from their snow topped pots on the patio and potting bench. This is my bit of hope that over the next few weeks they will continue to grow and will soon be flowering.                                   

Also in the autumn I planted up pots of hyacinths which I kept in the garage in the dark and brought out into the light in December to grow on. Some were ready and flowering at Christmas and some will have their buds opening soon. I bring them into the warmth of the house gradually so I will have a continuous display for several weeks. 

                                             

January can be quite a dreary, depressing month even when we're not going through these bad times, but I am trying to focus on the small, simple things which make me happy.

What's helping you at the moment during lockdown?

A happy, healthy and safe New Year everyone.

Through the Garden Gate--October 2020

 

We have enjoyed watching the garden change colour in the last few weeks. I do love October with all the changes in the garden and the countryside. There is still a lot of colour and interest to be had in the garden, even though the leaves are falling. We can see a lot of trees beyond our garden so we are still able to enjoy the changes in nature even after our own trees have dropped their leaves.

In the garden we have yellow from the silver birch and red from the liquid amber and rowan. 

The grasses are now more visible in the borders as the other plants die down, some of them having lovely autumn tints. The Rowan has yellow berries which contrast well with the red leaves and look like little fairy lights.  The crab apple seems to have even more fruit this year, those are red. last year the Rowan berries stayed on the tree well into the new year, but I don't think they will this year as I saw some blackbirds having a feast on them this morning.

In the borders, the pink sedums are a welcome late flowerer along with the rudbekia.  I haven't done any cutting back yet as I like to see the seedheads of some of the dead flowers and how the foliage changes colour. You can miss so much if you cut back too early. I have seen blue tits and sparrows balancing on tall stems trying to eat the seeds from the dead flower heads. This is all the more reason for not cutting back too early.

I have been busy in October making up patio pots with autumn and winter displays.  There were so many lovely colours of mini cyclamen at the local garden centre, I couldn't resist buying some and then going back for more!

The antirrhinums I potted up in the summer are still looking good so I have left them in their containers, they look as good as the cyclamen.

We have had a lot of rain recently so I haven't been out to do any gardening.  I am hoping for some fine days soon so that we can go out to visit one of the large gardens in our area to take in the autumn colours.

I am linking this blog post to Sarah's at 'Down By The Sea' for her monthly 'Through The Garden Gate' post.

Slowing down on the allotment

Autumn on the allotment is a time when I start tidying up, slowing down and preparing for the next growing year. Every year is different and all gardeners know that there are good years and bad years for crops.  It can be a result of the weather, pests and diseases, time and energy.

We are not spending as much time down on the plot now--about once a week we go down.  Although I have a long list of jobs to be done, they are not as urgent and can be tackled through the autumn and winter when the weather allows.  As I walk around the plot and see the empty spaces where the summer veg were, I am pleased to see that there are plenty more veg to see us through the winter. The brassica bed is looking good with lots of cabbages. I thought I might have overdone the planting as I always plant extra in case any get attacked by slugs or caterpillars. 

At the moment there are some really healthy looking cabbages and the kale bed looks really colourful with three types--'dwarf green curled', 'cavalo nero' and red kale.  It looks a shame to cut at them, but I do of course. 

Other veg still growing are leeks, brussels sprouts, parsnips, beetroot and purple sprouting broccolli. 

The last couple of weeks I have been weeding the fruit beds which were in a mess.  There are two cages, one with blueberries and raspberries, the other with blackcurrants and redcurrants. In addition, not in a cage are gooseberries and rhubarb. I have been working my way through these beds doing a different one each week and pruning as I go along. The raspberries are still producing fruit and every week I am always surprised and delighted to see there are still more to pick. 

The sycamore tree at the top of the plot has been dropping its leaves for a few weeks now.  They were all over the place on the paths and the beds, so sweeping them up  was another job which got done. They are now all in the leaf bin composting down.

The weather has been really rainy this week so we haven't been able to get any more done, but its good to see jobs gradually being crossed off the list.

Through the Garden Gate--July 2020

July was quite rainy and cooler—not summer weather at all, we are longing for some better weather. I thought there didn’t seem to be much change in the garden from last month, but when I looked back at last month’s blog photos, I realised that of course the garden does look different. The borders are full and colourful.  The mid to late summer colours are appearing now

bright yellow and orange crocosmia

more orange from the heleniums

 Can you spot Holly the cat under the grass below the heleniums? She's lying next to the cat mint getting very drowsy.

deep magenta pink phlox.

purple buddleia

My gardening jobs for the last few weeks have been just deadheading and cutting back.  It’s been very relaxing to just potter about in this way. It’s that time of year when you can relax and enjoy the garden, just a pity that we haven’t had the good weather to sit out more.

 The sweet peas are only just starting to flower.  They are what were left over from the allotment, I put some to scramble through the climbers on the archway and others to grow up an obelisk in a grasses bed. Although there aren’t many yet to cut, there are more each time I cut them.

I planted a few sunflowers in pots, these are a dwarf type called 'Choco sun', I'm looking forward to seeing them in flower, they look nice and bushy.

 With not as much work to do in the garden we have started to go out more to places which we feel have good safety measures in place now that COVID restrictions are being eased.

We went to RHS Harlow Carr, see my blog about it here https://margaretspatch.blogspot.com/2020/07/getting-out-and-about-at-last.html  and last week we visited an National Garden Scheme garden near Skipton in the village of Carleton-in-Craven.  The house and garden were called The Grange. It was a big garden to walk around with some wonderful herbaceous borders.

I am linking this post to Sarah's blog at http://downbytheseadorset.blogspot.com/2020/07/through-garden-gate-july-2020.html 

Getting out and about at last

Now that Lockdown measures have eased and gardens are back open to the public, I have been keen to get out and visit again.  I’ve been feeling a bit down and hemmed in recently, so this was probably what was needed to perk me up.

We hadn’t been to RHS Harlow Carr since last October and as we normally visit several times a year, I decided it was time we went again.  We had to book a time slot to arrive by then we could stay as long as we liked up to closing time. We had a picnic in the car park to save carrying it around the gardens with us.  The car park is next to a woodland walk so is quite a nice place. There’s a lovely path which skirts the edge of the woods and leads you to the gardens.

We felt quite safe in the gardens, there was hand sanitiser in various places, notices advising about social distancing and no crowds of people, plenty of space to walk around.

Once in the gardens we noticed lots of changes since our last visit and despite there being less staff to help during lockdown the gardens were looking lovely and well tended.

I’m always impressed by the container arrangements—so big and bold.  Too big for my garden, but I can still get ideas for planting combinations.

We came across this border which was full of different varieties of Rudbekia.  It was a Rudbekia trial, apparently 2020 is the year of the Rudbekia.  I didn’t know that. I also didn’t know that there are so many varieties of Rudbekia. I recognised about 3 names out of the 43 which were planted there.

The streamside walk was looking very colourful.

The sweet peas in the kitchen garden were much further on than mine.  I thought that someone needed to cut them before they went to seed. I would have liked that to be me.

Walking through the scented garden towards the foliage garden where we always like to sit for a while in the summer house, we had a surprise as we weren’t allowed through into the foliage garden. And it looked much different, we couldn’t see the summer house, just a gravel path with flower beds alongside leading to somewhere. It was all a bit mysterious.  Then we spotted the information board which told us that work was in progress to make this little garden into a Secret Garden with a serpent path. What we could see of it looked lovely and I can’t wait now for it to be finished so that we can explore.

The Alpine house was looking busy with lots of people wandering through, I didn’t want to get too close to anyone, so we didn’t go in. We walked around and looked through the windows spotting this amazing looking aeonium.  

I had a good look at the alpine troughs as we walked around the outside of the Alpine House as I am going to re plant some of mine at home.

I loved the beds planted up with annual flowers, cornflowers, calendulas, poppies etc.

Some of the beds in the big herbaceous borders were being dug up as they were trying to eradicate bindweed which was taking over. I know what a nuisance that can be, we have it on the allotment. There was still plenty of spectacular colour to be seen  in other borders, though.

We ended our visit by looking round the plant centre and shop and of course I had to buy something.
I bought sempervivums and sedums for my alpine pots, there's always a good selection at Harlow Carr.