Through the Garden gate--January 2022

It can sometimes be difficult to find anything to good to say about the garden in January.  It's a pretty bleak and dismal month.  I often sit at the window looking out at the garden for colour and signs of life and nothing seems to change much.  But really, there is colour and interest.  There are shades of brown and green from fallen plant material and tall gangly stems with seed heads still clinging to them, providing homes for wildlife. Sometimes I've seen little birds balancing on the stems trying to find food from the remaining seeds.

The grasses are giving colour too.  Some are straw like now, the evergreen ones giving splashes of bright green along the border. Down in the woodland bed the Witch Hazel is in flower. This one is Hamamelis 'Jelena'. The spidery flowers are a bronzy, orange colour, but I have to get close up to really appreciate it. I'm always a bit disappointed in its colour which seems a bit dull. I may have just planted it in the wrong place to show it off.

In the border alongside the path near the kitchen door is a Sarcococca (Sweet box). Its little white flowers giving off a delicate scent which wafts around this area. It has taken a few years for this to get established and produce these scented flowers.  This year it has excelled. It was growing in a pot at our previous house and we brought it with us to plant up here.

On finer days I have been out walking round the garden, looking closer for signs of life and spotting little bulbs just poking through the soil. Last year I planted more snowdrops, these are always the first to appear. It's always a delight to spot them--the first flowers of the new year and a sign that Spring will soon be with us.

After not being well and fit enough before Christmas to do any gardening, I am now feeling a bit better and  trying to keep active. I am aware that with Rheumatoid Arthritis there will be times again when I won't be able to do any gardening, so I am making the most of this time whilst trying not to overdo things. I have been slowly pottering around the garden doing jobs. I started clearing soggy leaves and plant material from the front garden flower beds and was pleased to find more spring bulbs underneath. When last year's bulb pots had finished flowering I stored them down by the side of the shed out of the way. I thought they might have rotted but after clearing the weeds out of the pots, there were the little bulb shoots coming through. So I have set these out on the outside potting bench, hoping for another good display soon.

In September we had a holiday in Cornwall and I bought some Cornish daffodil bulbs--St.Keverne and Fowey. I planted them up in the autumn into big pots and then forgot about them, but these too are now coming through.

So really there's been plenty of interest in the garden in January--even if I've had to search around for it. And there 's much to look forward to in the coming weeks.

Hope your garden is coming to life too.

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

A New Year on the allotment

After a fairly mild spell of weather, it has now turned very cold. We made our first visit to the allotment of the new year this week. It was a lovely day, although very cold. I needed veg so we went mainly to dig up some leeks--they are doing really well this year and are a good size. I cut some kale leaves too--those are not as good this year as in previous years. Next to the kale I noticed that the little cabbages which I had planted in the summer were growing well--still quite small but plenty of new leaves coming.  They should provide us with some nice early spring greens or small cabbages, as long as the pigeons and slugs don't get them first.

The plot was looking quite tidy and we were pleased with that.  We haven't been to do any work since the middle of October because I have been quite poorly with Rheumatoid Arthritis and was unable to walk properly or do anything with my hands.  On this last visit we had cleared most of the beds of dead vegetation, topped with home made compost and covered with membrane.

There's still work to done but nothing urgent:

• clear away the dead sweetcorn stems
• cut down the asparagus
• clear the old tomatoes and cucumber plants from the greenhouses
• prune the fruit bushes
• sweep up leaves from the paths

and as the weather improves and I get a bit more mobile we will work our way through the jobs.

 We sat awhile at the garden table with our flasks of hot tea  and slabs of Christmas cake, watching the birds and admiring the plot.

It was good to be back.

Through the Garden Gate--July 2021

July seems to have whizzed by so quickly and when I checked my garden jobs list for July there seems to have been very little done.  I think though that this month is when you should sit back and enjoy the garden and we gardeners don't always do enough of that, we're always spotting jobs which need doing. Well we have had the weather to be able to sit and enjoy the garden. It has been very warm and sunny for most of the month and at times just too hot to work in. Finding a spot of shade to sit in isn't easy in our garden and I keep wondering about planting another tree in an appropriate place.

I always find that there's a bit of a lull in the flower borders towards the end of July as the earlier flowers have gone over and we wait for the late summer colour to appear. When it wasn't too hot I just pottered around deadheading and cutting back to tidy the borders.

The buddleia is now in flower--a lovely rich, deep purple called 'Royal Red'. In the front garden the hydrangea flowers are opening up, starting blue and gradually turning pink. 

Also in the front a clump of Rudbekias have come into flower.  These were sown last year as annuals and got left in the ground over winter.  They are a lovely bronze colour. 

The hot weather has caused a bit of stress to some of the patio pots. As I have such a lot of pots, the watering has sometimes got neglected. Looking at them I can see that the geraniums cope better with dry weather, so next year I might grow more of them.

One project we managed to get done was the wildlife pond, which is made out of an old galvanised bath. After much discussion and a few disagreements about where to put it, we finally found a good place in the woodland/stumpery bed. We sunk it into the ground and  arranged some stones around the outside. I put some gravel and a few pebbles in the base of the pond and some bigger stones which will provide shelter and easy access in and out of the pond for any wildlife. Then a trip to the garden centre for some pond plants was needed.  As its only a small pond I didn't want to overcrowd it so I have put four plants in, choosing carefully that they were slow growing plants which wouldn't get too big. One plant which I would like but haven't been able to find locally is a dwarf water lily. Two weeks later we were really pleased to see a frog in the water. 

Last September we had our 50th wedding anniversary, we didn't want a big fuss and because of all the COVID restrictions we couldn't do much anyway. Our daughter bought us a pot of pink lilies. I didn't know if they would grow back again this year, but they have. The smell is wonderful as you come through the gate into garden. 

Now at the end of July the weather is cooler and we had some storms a few days ago. The rain and wind has really battered the garden and those patio pots are in a really bad state.  I will have to do some more cutting back and deadheading We really needed all that rain though, especially at the allotment. Perhaps my patio tubs will perk up now.

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

Through the Garden gate--June 2021

The garden has been full of colour throughout June.  The lupins started to flower early in the month followed by the foxgloves. 

Then we had the hardy geraniums, alchemilla mollis, honeysuckle, clematis, roses. 

My favourite of the roses is the Gertrude Jekyll by the archway.  The smell is lovely.

Two years ago I planted two roses down in the bottom raised bed--'Pride and Prejudice' and 'Rachael'. Unfortunately the labels got separated from their plants and now |I don't know which is which.  This one has been the first to flower, its a lovely apricot pink. 

Another flower which I've lost the label of is this gorgeous poppy--I'm good at losing labels and forgetting the name of plants.

These lovely blue geraniums in the wildlife garden are always full of bees.

At the beginning of June I finished planting up my patio tubs with summer bedding. Pinks, blues and purples are my favourite colours as I'm sure anyone who saw them would be able to tell. On fine, warm days we sit out surrounded by these lovely flowers and listening to the bees buzzing around them.

Early on in June when we were at last allowed to visit people, we went to visit our daughter and her family who we hadn't seen for a year. 

She lives in Stotfold, Hertfordshire and with lovely countryside around them we enjoyed some lovely walks with their Beagle puppy, Snoopy who we hadn't met before. Here where we live in Lancashire its very hilly and walking can be hard work, so it was good to have some walking on the level there. We went to visit one of her local junk/antique shops and I bought these............

I polished the lantern up and it has revealed shiny copper, it does need a bit more work doing on it, but my arthritic hands are a bit painful at the moment.   It was going to live in the garden, but I'm not so sure now.  The tin bath is to be our project for the next few weeks as we turn it into a wildlife pond for the garden.  That might be the subject of next month's garden blog.

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

Through the Garden gate--May 2021

What awful weather we have had during May, I believe it has been the wettest May for a long time. The garden seems to have enjoyed all the rain, though. I have been amazed at how quickly plants have grown.  The borders have filled out and not only do they look good it means that I don't have to weed so much. That's the benefit of cramming loads of plants together.

In the  raised bed are some clumps of  Chaerophyllum Hirsutum 'Roseum' or pink cow parsley which I brought as cuttings from my previous garden. They have taken a while to get established and this seems to be the year when they have decided to make a good show of themselves.  They look beautiful next to the alliums which are starting to open up now and the blue perennial cornflower.

Another lovely plant similar to the pink cow parsley is Myrrhis odorata or Sweet ciceley. This is in the front garden and hangs over the wall. It has lovely creamy white flowers, delicate feathery foliage and smells lovely. Can you see Holly the cat hiding underneath?

The hardy geraniums are starting to flower, I keep spotting little blue flowers here and there. I have quite a few geraniums in the garden of different colours and they flower at different times.  Some are short flowering, others keep going throughout the summer.

This is Persicaria, a tall pale pink variety, I don't know its proper name. It came in a big pot which I was able to split into 4 and plant around the garden. It does spread itself about though and I have been trying to dig some of it up. Much as I love its pink flowers I don't want it taking over the garden.

The Aquilegias are in flower now. These self seed over the garden, but they are so dainty I'm quite happy to let them.

This little corner was planted up two years ago. It's a shady area next to the holly tree and I got the planting idea from a gardening magazine. The colour scheme is blue, white and yellow. At the moment  the Dicentra is in flower, it has put on a fabulous show all on its own. The Aquilegias are just opening up now, they are blue and white. Still to come are white Camassias and blue Geraniums. The yellow colour is kept going throughout the summer with the  Hostas and Alchemila mollis.

In the last week the lilac near the front door has come into flower. The gorgeous smell wafts around the garden.

With the weather being so unlike May I hadn't realized it was time to start planting up my patio containers with summer bedding plants. So my job for the next week or so is to go to the garden centre, get the plants and plant them up.

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