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Snowy pleasures

22 Tuesday Jan 2013

Posted by marytheherb in Gardening, Winter garden

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Snow

I went out into the garden a few nights ago and was enchanted by the silence and beauty of it with a thick covering of snow. It felt as though it was a magical land waiting for something to happen.

In daylight it was interesting too, of course. However many times you see it the appearance of plants, paths and structures in the snow is always fascinating.

snow 2013 17

The pond has iced over again and I couldn’t make a hole. I hope there aren’t any more frogs left in there to suffer.

The gold-variegated evergreens provide a good contrast to the black and white look of snow scenes.

Eleagnus with snow

Eleagnus with snow

Euonymus 'Emerald and Gold'

Euonymus ‘Emerald and Gold’

I knocked the snow off the rosemary and mahonia where the branches looked heavy enough to break.

Apple trees have a particular charm with their gnarled-looking, horizontal branches.

snow 2013 15

Today in the garden

01 Monday Oct 2012

Posted by marytheherb in Flower garden, Fungi, Gardening, Greenhouse

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Cerinthe, Mice, Narcissus, Stropharia aeruginosa

I have had a lovely morning in the garden. The weather is warmish and with hazy sun. The dew is prolific.

I was inspecting my beds in the usual fashion when I noticed this very pretty fungus

Stropharia aeruginosa

It took me a while to identify it using ‘Roger’s mushrooms’ website, which I can recommend for its useful search feature and the helpful pictures uploaded by members.

http://www.rogersmushrooms.com/

Interestingly one of the pictures uploaded was from Milton Keynes, quite close to us, and looking absolutely like mine so I am sure it is identified correctly.

I then spent some time trying to reduce the population of lungwort (Pulmonaria officinalis) in a border. This plant is so useful for spring colour and ground cover but sometimes it gets a little out of control and it was swamping everything else. The self-seeded hellebores and the High Sheriff roses now have space to grow.

Overgrown with lungwort

Following this I needed a less demanding job to finish the morning. I pulled the weeds out of two pots, near to the kitchen door and behind a herb area, which have some spring bulbs in them. I added Iris reticulata ‘Harmony’ to one and Narcissus ‘W.L.Milner’ to the other, so I will have more February to March colour right outside the kitchen window. I already have a patch with the delightful and ubiquitous Narcissus ‘Tete a Tete’, which is a bright yellow, so ‘W.P.Milner’ with its pale yellow flowers will be a good contrast.

Yesterday I had sown some Cerinthe seeds in the greenhouse and today when I went in I found that mice had eaten a hole in the packet. They had munched through quite a few packets, so all the seeds are now safely in the house. It is rather touching to think that the greenhouse is mine in the day and theirs at night, although it won’t be quite so interesting for them now.

August memories

26 Sunday Aug 2012

Posted by marytheherb in Fruit, Garden visits, Gardening

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Herb bed 2012

August in the garden in previous years

I love looking back in my garden journal and reading about how the garden performed in previous years. It is amazing how easy it is to misremember and think that last year’s crops were better than they were. In fact now that I have started this blog I am not writing in my journal as much, which is a pity, and I must get going again.

I notice that in August 2011 the weather was rather wet after quite a dry summer. Generally speaking the vegetables were good, although I recorded the runner beans as being affected by black fly and only growing slowly. The apple crops last year were fantastic and so were the plums, a green variety which is ready in early August.

Most of my entry for that month was about gardens we had visited and one in particular stands out for me –  Stone House Cottage Garden near Kidderminster. This is an unexpected little treasure and very quirky. The owner bought a cottage and then built follies and castellated towers around, which have created wonderful warm walls for all manner of climbing plants. It is very much a plantsman’s garden and much of the planting was lost on me but it is very charming and shows what can be done to create different planting situations. The garden is in the RHS members handbook, the website is www.shcn.co.uk, it has a small nursery and is well worth a visit.

At the end of August 2010 I recorded that ‘the drought is well and truly over’. The apple trees had not done well with only two in fruit – the Bramley and another that might be a Discovery. We had hardly any plums. So the fruit situation was similar to now, although the apples we do have this year look poor specimens.

I am noticing that most years the runner beans take ages to get going and are usually afflicted by blackfly, slugs or something else but that by October they are cropping well. Plenty of time for them to improve then. We had our first 4 beans today. I just love them.

Get growing beans!

Slugs rule ok!

07 Saturday Jul 2012

Posted by marytheherb in Gardening, Pond, Vegetable gardening, Wildlife

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frogs, slugs

You may not have believed my last post when I commented on the disastrous vegetable situation this year so I am posting some pictures of the damage, almost entirely due to the slugs, although pigeons are not wholly without blame, and the weather started things off badly and ensured the plants were poor specimens and ready to be attacked. (Click on the first two photos for larger slugs!)

Broad bean brunch

Radish relish

Pathetic peas

Calamatous cabbages (note potato intruder)

Paltry potatoes

I have been fighting a brave battle on the strawberry front and we have had plenty of lovely fruit, but yesterday’s rain re-inforced slug numbers and I am giving up there too.

I suppose I should say that I don’t use slug pellets because we have a couple of ponds and there are loads of frogs hopping about the garden and they come first. Frogs are having a hard time over the planet and I am trying to make their lives as easy as possible here, so I suppose there will be the odd year when I really pay for that strategy.

Looking forward to next year now. It can’t be this bad can it?

Can you identify the hardy geraniums?

14 Thursday Jun 2012

Posted by marytheherb in Flower garden, Gardening

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Hardy geraniums

At this time of year our main border would look pretty bare without the wondrous hardy geraniums to add colour at the front of the border. Up above, the self-seeded aquilegia and welsh poppies and the reliable red valerian are performing but they are not enough on their own. We have six geranium varieties and I have had difficulty identifying some of them. These days I keep a record of new plants but years ago I didn’t. I would be grateful for any identification of these lovely plants.

Probably Geranium x magnificum

We have two pink varieties. Both have quite small flowers and one has curved-back petals. The latter will flower throughout the summer.

Our white geranium looks very much like G. Kashmir White and very pretty it is too, shining out from the shade.

All these geraniums have been divided and spread around the garden, but G. x magnificum is definitely the most successful. Lately I have added Geranium macrorrhizum ‘Ingwerson’s Variety’ and Geranium phaeum ‘Album’ in another border where they are doing well in their first year.

After this flowering I will trim them back and hope they will flower again later in the year, allbeit not so prolifically.

Roses, roses, roses

11 Monday Jun 2012

Posted by marytheherb in Flower garden, Gardening, Uncategorized

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Roses

Unknown rose with wonderful scent possibly from the County Series

When I was young I really disliked showy flowers like roses, tulips, and peonies. But now I love them, especially roses. Unfortunately the list in this garden is not as extensive as I would like because I can’t think of new locations for them. Most of our roses are climbers or ramblers.  We have Cecile Brunner (climbing), Madame Gregoire Staechelin (known as Spanish Beauty), the strong rambler Frances E Lester which I have located in entirely the wrong place, Adelaide D’Orleans charming us over the rose arch, New Dawn which I pruned in spring and has masses of buds, and Wedding Day growing up the fence and into a cherry tree.
 

Frances E Lester

A real favourite English Rose is Harlow Carr. It performs so well all summer and the smell is divine. There is little Hampshire from the County Series, another star performer. I couldn’t resist the rose from my native county. Little White Pet was not happy in a slightly shady spot and I have moved it into full sun so hopefully it will do well this year. A kind friend who was clearing out her very fine garden gave us four roses last autumn. Two are called Cottage Rose and I have no idea what the others are, it will be interesting to see.

Harlow Carr

Perhaps not quite so beautiful, but excellent value as they flower most of the summer, are three little patio roses I grew from seed about 10 years ago. They are getting quite bushy now and will suffer severe cutting back from time to time.

Just by the front door is a wonderful yellow rose with a fantastic scent and glossy foliage of a disease free nature. Next to it is an Iceberg and it is such a pity they are so vulnerable to black spot. The final rose, a hybrid tea, also given to us, is High Sheriff. The flowers open out a beautiful burnished orangey/gold and age to a salmony pink.

Herb garden in May

22 Tuesday May 2012

Posted by marytheherb in Gardening, Herbs

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Comfrey, Rosemary, Sweet Cicely

At last some warm sunshine for the plants to enjoy, not to mention me. Most herbs put on a good spurt in the spring and are good value when other plants are just getting going. Sweet Cicely is up early and flowering prettily in May.

Sweet Cicely in May

The scent and flavour of the plant are aniseedy. The leaves are beautifully soft and fern-like. You can use the herb to reduce the amount of sugar needed in stewed fruit such as rhubarb and gooseberries. Unfortunately once it has gone to seed it is not so attractive but by then other herbaceous plants take over in the border and you could chop it down and allow new leaves to develop. It is easy to grow provided the soil has moisture and there is some shade. The seeds seem to germinate better if they have a period of very cold/frosty weather in the ground, so sow them in autumn.

Another star at present is comfrey. This is the dwarf comfrey and it is covering the ground very fast but is also looking pretty.

Dwarf comfrey May 2012

Last, but definitely not least as it is my favourite herb, the rosemary is looking very good. Here is Rosemary ‘McConnell’s Blue’.

Rosemary ‘McConnell’s Blue’

This is a lovely prostrate rosemary with quite bright blue flowers and it seems to be very hardy. Rosemary excels in the qualities of aromatic herbs, wonderful, healing scent, fantastic culinary qualities and its beauty during the flowering period.

Herb plans

07 Monday May 2012

Posted by marytheherb in Gardening, Herbs

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plug plants

Herbs

I am trying out growing on plug plants with a view to selling them, somehow, when they are large enough.  I bought 90 plug plants from Norfolk Herbs and they are fine, sturdy little things. This is an experiment as I have no idea how quickly they will grow to a reasonable size.

Herb plugs growing on

 I am aiming to produce 18 large pots with 5 herbs in each and will do a couple of assortments:

basic i.e. rosemary, thyme, curled parsley, sage, mint;

type 2 – Prostate rosemary, golden marjoram, french parsley, thyme ‘Silver Posie’, lemon verbena;

type 3 – Apple mint, purple sage, french parsley, tarragon, lemon thyme.

I am hoping it won’t be too difficult to sell just 18 although I also have some of my own cuttings and divisions to sell to add a bit of variety. It may well be that they won’t grow large enough this year and I will have to keep them for next year, which is not really a problem.

Any tips on selling plants locally would be gratefully received. I get the impression from talking to some people that selling in a small way is not any easier than a larger scale operation and that if I really want to do it I should think bigger but as I said this year is very  much experimental. Having mentioned my plans to a few people I already have a few potential customers.

This week in the garden – 5th November 2011

05 Saturday Nov 2011

Posted by marytheherb in Gardening, Pond

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Although we have had some desperately needed rain this week there has been ample opportunity to get into the garden and the rain has made the heavy clay much easier to work.

At present I am working on the ‘east border’ next to a large row of hedgerow trees – ash and field maple. This area is in the shade for much of the day in summer and autumn and it is essentially dry shade. There are some very difficult weeds here, mainly tormentil, which certainly lives up to its name, but also a lot of ivy and invasive grass.

Some of the plants are doing well but are smothered in weeds, e.g. sedum, golden marjoram, lysimachia. Sweet cicely is also happy here. So I will probably dig everything out and put back anything that I can rescue from weed roots. I am edging part of the border against the path with a very pretty Bergenia ‘Overture’ – beautiful magenta flowers. I used not to like bergenia but in a large garden where effective groundcover is required it is a really useful plant. This year another bergenia has flowered well from August until now, although it usually flowers in April.

I have bought and planted a couple of geranium macrorrhizum and a heuchera. I have also bought a number of crocus Chrysanthus ‘Cream Beauty’ some Narcissus cyclamineus ‘Reggae’ and Erythronium ‘Pagoda’ that will go into the back of the border around a newly planted hazel cutting. Since this will not nearly cover the area I will be infilling with as many divided hardy geraniums as  I can muster and moving pulmonaria seedlings from anywhere I can but mostly from here.

Another bed was a mess of convolvulus and jack by the hedge but the bergenia and pulmonaria have provided fantastic ground cover very quickly.

Last weekend we cleared out the larger of our ponds. Usually one of us falls in but this year we seemed to manage ok. We were clearing out stratiotes and glyceria – I wish we had never introduced the latter. The water lily, which is really too large for this pond, can wait another year before we lift it out and, I hope, get one that is a more suitable size.

Plant of the month – October

The prize has to go to this rambling rose. Its performance is usually poor, being highly susceptible to mildew, and the flowers are often dried up looking but in October, following a severe cutting back, it has been very pretty. It is looking even better now.

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