May | 2021 | Davids Garden Diary

The garden is suddenly exploding into life thanks to the warm and wet conditions we are currently enjoying. This shrubbery with Viburnum plicatum and Euphorbia palustris make a fine show.

This Anthemis punctata softens the path edges and looks lovely backed up by the dark leaved Physocarpus ‘Diablo’. For a Mediterranean grey leaved plant, it certainly loves the rain!

Erysimum variegatum looking a bit straggly after the winter but flowering and sending out new shoots to flower later in the year. Reliable, bone hardy and easy from cuttings to replace these short lived perennials.

The alliums are a bit later this year but now about to burst into flower.

Geum ‘Totally Tangerine’ which seems to like its partly shaded position between the Philadelphus and the Thalictrums.

Finally, the first flowers of self seeded Hesperis matronalis ‘Alba’ which was originally grown many years ago from seed and now pops up wherever it feels like it. The violet version seems to have disappeared and just the white ones remain. The clove sweet fragrance on a warm summer evening is everything you could want from a scented plant. Mainly pollinated by moths I believe but enjoyed by many other pollinators too.

Enjoy your weekend

David

It has been so cold here in the Cotswolds that we still have the central heating on! Never known a cold spell last into early May before. Everything is at least three weeks behind where it should be at this time of year. This Euphorbia cyparissias doesn’t seem to mind the cold and is adding colour to an otherwise green scene.

The recent late frosts have killed all the emerging Wisteria flowers! Despite the plant itself being totally hardy, the flowers are not and are easily damaged by cold winds and frost. I am bitterly disappointed as it is usually a highlight of early May for me.

The Camassias have not performed as well as usual this year with far fewer flowers. I will feed the bulbs for a few weeks before the foliage dies down and will then lift and divide them because it may be due to the bulbs being too congested. The brown leaf tips are worrying too. Perhaps a lack of nitrogen??

This Genista ‘Porlock’ is probably an escapee from a local garden and is actually in the hedge outside my garden but it is so beautiful I thought it was worthy of showing in the blog. Obviously a member of the pea family by the labiate flowers, it is a type of Broom with a faint but pleasant scent. I might see if there is an ‘Irishman’s Cutting’ I can take!

It has fascinated me that some plants always flower before others of the same species. This Aquilegia next to the house wall is the first to flower every year, weeks ahead of all the other hundreds in the garden. No logical reason why it should but it always does.

Years ago, I discovered Bowles Golden Grass, Milium effusum ‘Aureum’, in a local garden and the kind owner dug up a piece and gave it to me. Slowly but surely it has colonised several areas of the garden but in a good way. It likes the shady spots in amongst other plants, below trees and bushes, where it lights up the gloom with its bright yellow leaves.

I kid you not, this Erysimum ‘Apricot Twist’ has been in flower constantly for 12 months! I cut back some of the straggly growth in February and the new shoots are flowering alongside the flowers on last year’s growth which shows no sign of slowing down. These plants literally flower themselves to death over a couple of years or so.

Have a great weekend

David