Six on Saturday

Posted on April 27, 2024 by davidsgardendiary

I went to upload new pictures into my WordPress media library this morning, to find I had reached the 6gb limit and have to upgrade my plan to be able to continue with my blog! That is going to be expensive and I have to judge whether it’s worth it. The alternative is to free up space by deleting dozens of photos in my media library, but if I do that the pics will disappear from the past posts in which they featured. Sneaky! So I have no choice but to select Six photos from this time last year while I decide what to do. If anyone has any bright ideas or hacks to increase my media library, do please get in touch asap.

Meanwhile, the Wisteria sinensis ‘Prolific’ is now in full flower and looks exactly like this pic from this time last year. The scent is overpowering and I am grateful to Mother Nature for keeping the late frosts away so I can enjoy the wonderful flowers and fragrance.

The Iberis sempervirens or Perennial Candytuft, is shining brightly in the sunshine and billowing over the low wall and down the steps as intended. This makes a pleasant change as most of my plants turn out to have different ideas to what was intended!

The hybrid bluebells are back! I thought I had managed to remove all the bulbs last year but obviously not. They are growing in the gravel margin up against the wall of the bungalow so there is no soil at all. I removed the gravel, sifted through and removed dozens of bulbs, but just as many have returned!

Clematis ‘Guernsey Cream’, a Group 2 variety, is now flowering with it’s unusually separated flower petals like a cartwheel. I find it a rather weak grower and nowhere near as abundant or vigorous as the Group 1 types I have, ‘Wisley Cream’ and C. cirrhosa ‘Freckles’, but it provides some colour in a dark corner while I am waiting for the roses to bloom.

I am pleased to say that all my dahlias survived their winter hibernation in the shed and are now romping away. The tubers were stored in Strulch, a lightweight, dry, mineralised straw which I use to dress the Tradescantia beds in the Spring, and it seems to have been an ideal product for the purpose. Now potted up again in JI No.3, watered and snuggled up in the greenhouse until mid-May when they will be put in the ground. I nip out the tops at this stage to keep them shorter and bushier. It holds the flowers back slightly but there are more of them eventually.

Finally, a warning about this grass, Milium effusum ‘Aureum’ or Bowles’s Golden Grass, which I first saw at one of the many NGS garden openings we have in Gloucestershire in May & June. The owner said it brightened up dark corners and “gently spread around”. On that basis, I purchased a small pot and placed it in a dark corner, from where it has decided to “gently spread” to every corner, crack and crevice in the garden! It is rather beautiful, and does brighten up dark corners but it also seeds like crazy, You have been warned!

I apologise that these are not photos from my garden this week as is the SoS protocol, but I am hoping normal service will be resumed next week. There is a lot of gardening photography coming up! If any of my followers are WordPress experts and can offer any advice on my current dilemma, I would be grateful to hear for them please.

Have a great weekend

David

Six on Saturday

Posted on December 2, 2023 by davidsgardendiary

The annual dilemma. To lift, or not to lift, that is the question!

Very often, at this time of year, social media gardening forums are full of questions about overwintering dahlia tubers. I love dahlias and have grown them for many years. They are great value for money, have almost unrivalled flower power, particularly if regularly deadheaded, and come in every different size, shape, style and colour, including their foliage. BUT, what is the best way to keep the tubers from turning to mush over winter? Leave them in the ground and hope? Leave them in the ground, mulch them and hope? Lift them and wash them, don’t wash them, dry them upside down in a warm room, a greenhouse, a shed. Or just pot them up and keep them in the shed or garage? I have tried them all and can honestly say that I don’t know a sure-fire way of getting them through the winter with 100% success. It depends on many factors!

So, I am trying something new! This week, I have dug mine up, washed most of the soil off (they were wet anyway!), dried them upside down for a few days on the greenhouse staging covered over with fleece, and then placed them in big pots filled with Strulch mineralised straw. It is recommended to use vermiculite, newspaper or compost, but as I had an open bag of Strulch which is dry and inert I think it should do the job well. The pots are now in the shed under two layers of fleece which should keep them dry and frost free. It may or may not work, but it is no better or worse than other methods I have tried!

This Green Woodpecker is a regular visitor, mainly due to the number of resident ants in our lawn. He was there for over an hour on Thursday, poking his long beak into the grass and sucking up his sparse meal. How such a large and beautiful bird survives on a diet of ants I don’t know.

Side shoots doing well on the Sweet Peas. Growth will slow down dramatically now that the colder temperatures have arrived. They will just sit there and ride out the winter without any further attention.

The messy greenhouse is now full, mostly of Tradescantia hybrid seedlings I am hoping will produce interesting, and potentially new cultivars in the coming years. They are totally hardy but don’t like to get too wet so they will avoid the worst of the weather in the cold greenhouse.

Talking of unique and interesting cultivars, this is a Chrysanthemum rescued from my Grandad’s garden when he died in 1987. I have tried to find it’s name but to no avail. So, I offered it to a local nursery who kindly named it after my Grandad. Chrysanthemum ‘George Simons’ is now in their catalogue and is apparently very popular, just like he was!

It’s been too cold for any real gardening this week, just weeding, mulching and digging up dahlias! Stay warm and have a great weekend.

David

Six on Saturday

Posted on July 17, 2021 by davidsgardendiary

Absolutely delighted with this self sown hybrid Dahlia which has just come into flower. A seedling picked at random from one of last year’s pots of overwintered tubers. It looks good enough to be a named variety so I have called it ‘Radiant Heat’ !

I have been very impressed with these Calibrachoa this year. I have given up on the big blousy trailing petunias in favour of these mini ones and they have proved to be a great success in the baskets.

There is no blue quite like this chicory, it is unique and very easy to place. It combines well with most other colours and is tall and statuesque, a good 2m and still growing. The flowers close at night so I assume it is pollinated by bees and other day flying pollinators. It is certainly a popular pit stop in our garden!

The heat on the patio was intense this morning, reflected off the stone walls and paving, but the roses, nepeta and veronicas are revelling in it. I will be on a 2 hour watering session this evening though. Good opportunity to combine with a cold glass of Sauvignon blanc I find!

There has been some recent debate on forums about the virtues, or otherwise, of Agastache. This ‘Liquorice Blue’ has been with me for years and is a valuable addition to the early summer border but some people say it looks like a weed, having nettle-like leaves and relatively insignificant flowers, For me, its value lies in its attractiveness to pollinators, particularly bees, which find it irresistible.

Just one of many roses gracing my garden at the moment. The air is filled with scent and the sound of buzzing busy bees. This one is ‘The Generous Gardener’ which has the most wonderful pink buds opening to creamy white flowers and a delicious citrus scent.

Finally, (and I know it is the seventh image!) is the evergreen Agapanthus africanus which has only just come into flower, 6 weeks later than usual. Summer has finally arrived!

Have a great weekend

David

Six on Saturday

Posted on September 5, 2020 by davidsgardendiary

Here in the Cotswolds we are still blessed with good weather and after the recent rains we now have warm sunshine which is promoting new growth and repeat flowering.

Most of the perennial wallflowers have finished and been cut back but Apricot Twist just keeps going. Difficult to place and a bit sprawly in habit but delicious nevertheless.

The first of the Kaffir lilies are appearing and will continue right up to December if it stays mild. It’s the strong winds they don’t like and soon become tatty. I have acquired two more varieties this year, the pure white ‘Snow Maiden’ and ‘Pink Princess’ which I am hoping will flower this year.

This shrubby Salvia is one of my favourites and has been going strong for many years in the well drained sunny border. It is cut back hard each spring and responds with 18″ of new growth and months of pale cream petals from pink blushed buds and a dark, sometimes almost black calyx.

No, not mustard and cress, but thousands of white Foxglove seedlings in the ground beneath the mother plant. This has happened all over the garden this year but, sadly, they will have to be reduced considerably leaving just a few to mature. For some odd reason which I cannot fathom, white Foxgloves do better here than pink ones and although some do hybridise, I always have patches of pure white ones.

This purple Honesty was given to me by a friend this year as I wanted to establish some in the wilder parts of the front garden near the road. It was spectacular in flower and is now hopefully seeding itself around to give me lots more in the future.

This Nine Bark is rewarding me with more lovely new red growth despite having been moved twice this year! It went from small pot to big pot to garden but didn’t lose its stride. A good ‘doer’ as they say.

One more for luck. This Dahlia has been an absolute bee magnet since early July and shows no sign of slowing down. Moist rich soil has produced six feet of growth and dead-heading produces non-stop flowering.

That’s all for this week. I hope you enjoyed my Six this Saturday. I will enjoy reading what others are up to.

Good gardening

David

Six on Saturday

Posted on August 29, 2020 by davidsgardendiary

Tradescantia x andersoniana ‘Concord Grape’

Those who have read this blog recently will know I have developed a strong liking for Tradescantia virginiana and T. andersoniana hybrids like this one, ‘Concord Grape’, which is one of the most popular and easily obtained. Easy to grow too, almost any soil will do as long as it doesn’t dry out. It’s not fussy about position although prefers dappled shade.

Tradescantia x andersoniana ‘Gold Mound’

They all have these bright yellow anthers which are very visible on the flowers which open in the morning and are usually gone by lunchtime, particularly in sunshine. The strappy mound of grass-like leaves can be a bit untidy but you can’t have everything!

I don’t think anybody will be surprised to learn that in an RHS trial, dahlias were found to be one of the most pollinator friendly plants but that the single flowers were better than all the others and particularly favoured by bumble bees. This hybrid in my garden is covered in bumbles all day long and is worthy of it’s place in my garden for that reason, mongrel or not.

Hydropod cuttings update. Most of the cuttings I have propagated in the Hydropod have done well and gone on to make sturdy little plants. Some have even flowered already like this Salvia microphylla ‘Red Bumble’. The standout winners though have been Penstemons, Erysimum and Diascia personata.

The Alstroemerias are still going strong and producing more flower stems despite the change in the weather. These flowers opened during the torrential rain on Thursday so are not looking their best, but they are still quite stunning set off by their dark foliage.

Not much of a picture I know, but a bit of an experiment for me, rose cuttings. My climbing David Austin rose ‘The Generous Gardener’ was ripped off it’s trellis by high winds and snapped in several places so had to be cut back. I think it will re-grow but, just in case, I thought I would try my hand at some cuttings. This is the recommended ‘Gardener’s World’ method so I will report progress in due course. It may take a while!

Never one to shy away from problems in the garden, this just shows that even the toughest of shrubs can die on you for no apparent reason. This Cotinus coggygria ‘Royal Purple’ was coppiced for several years until I decided to allow one leading shoot to grow into a main stem to form a small tree. It looks like this was a mistake! Most of the new growth has turned brown and has died. The fresh new growth from ground level is fine so it looks like it will have to be coppiced again next year.

Let’s end on a high note, the pure white Japanese Anemone which is well behaved in my garden, unlike the pink ones which tried to take over and had to be forcibly removed. The dainty white ‘Honorine Jorbet’ enjoys a dry shady north facing spot where little else will grow and shines out even on the darkest of cloudy days.

That’s it for this week’s Six on Saturday.

Enjoy your weekend

David