I've just taken a stroll round the garden to see what's blooming. It's drizzling and 4.0 degrees C outside, and most of them look as if they wish they hadn't bothered.
The display of Hamamelis x intermedia is coming to an end. The red ones are lasting later than the orange and yellow, having opened after them, with the variety 'Rubin' the last. The hazels are showing what genetic variation there is in the wild population, as some still have bright yellow catkins while others are going brown and shrivelled. Daphne bholua 'Jacqueline Postill' still has plenty of buds, and the white form hasn't really got going at all yet. The Viburnum x bodnantense 'Charles Lamont' has flowers open, but the overall effect is a bit pink and brown. The Ribes laurifolium is still blooming, but I think that whatever animal is terrorising the back garden has had a chew at it. Mahonia japonica is flowering quietly in its corner. It got rather overshadowed last year by a rambling rose that is supposed to be growing up a tree, but instead flopped around and over the mahonia. I have a feeling I shall be returning to the question of training roses up trees.
Shrubs that are new blog entries for March include Corylopsis sinensis var. sinensis, whose yellow flowers are just opening. This suffered dieback last winter, but seems untouched so far this one, despite it being colder. Maybe the fact that the deepest frosts came before Christmas this winter helped, if it is less vulnerable to cold damage when still tightly in bud than when the sap is rising. I think it is going to be far too large for the space where I have put it, and I wonder if I can trim the tips back after flowering. I don't think the books recommend this treatment, but Chris Lane says it works for witch hazels, which are not supposed to like being pruned. We visited Cornwall a few years ago, and I noticed how many of the gardens had terribly tall specimens of Corylopsis, with bare trunks at eye level and the flowers carried way above our heads, so some pruning to keep new growth coming low down might be a good idea.
There are a few flowers on the winter flowering cherry, but I'm sure that when it comes into leaf there will be a mass of dieback. The water table has risen under it and it's sitting far too wet. I've been eyeing up possible spaces for a replacement in the front garden. Pieris 'Katsura' is opening its dusky pink buds like giant heather bells as if nothing had happened, which is surprising and delightful after the winter weather. I've a feeling the frost danger for pieris is to the emerging leaves more than the flowers, and the flowers were still in very tight bud when the worst of the weather came. No flowers on the Edgeworthia, though.
At ground level the hellebores are looking good, the Lady series and their offspring in the front garden and assorted hybridus forms and their seedlings in the back. A yellow form that has not been so vigorous is doing quite well this year, with several nice solid butter-yellow flowers. H. x ericsmithii is flowering profusely, with petals of yellowish cream with pale plum backs. 'Pirouette' was a new purchase last year, and has made a chunky plant so perhaps it is a good doer. It is a pinky plum with a formal double centre, and I planted it partly for its own sake, because it is very pretty, and in the hopes of some exotic babies in that part of the garden. It got rather shaded last summer as a shrub rose leant all over it, but seems none the worse for the experience. New hellebore varieties are so tempting, but not cheap, so I tend to try just one the first year and see whether they seem to have a robust constitution in a garden setting.
The primroses and polyanthus are starting to get going. I love the wild yellow primroses, but like the pink ones too, and the more highly bred polyanthus, which I have in soft and strong yellow, and all shades of pink from pale and grubby to magenta and purple. Some were from an alleged woodland walk seed mix, which came less true to description than any other seed I've grown, and some particularly vigorous yellow ones in a good clean shade of dark lemon were half price at B&Q. The violets are starting bloom under the roses, my ambition being to cover the ground entirely with them and other ground cover so that there's no room for weed seedlings at all. The white bergenia has two flowers on it, and not as many leaves as it should have, so something is eating it. Driving back from Colchester today we passed a mass of a pink flowered variety, which reminded me how full and lush bergenia should be looking at this time of the year, if it is happy. There are a few pulmonaria flowers out, in mid blue, bricky red, and a good red-blue with bright violet and purple overtones. The pulmonarias started out as named varieties, but over the years self-seeding and the destructive effects of birds and animals on stick-in labels means that I don't know what most of them are.
The snowdrops still look good from a distance, but close up you see that they are starting to go over. There are some flowers of Cyclamen coum, but not great sheets as I would like. I plant a few more each year and they gradually spread and bulk up. Something has dug up the majority of the crocus bulbs from the borders, though not so far from the grass. I need to go over the borders and smooth down every last hole and scuffled area, then inspect them daily for fresh signs of digging to work out how often whatever it is comes. We tried the trail camera on one badly affected bit of border one night, but didn't photograph anything. It has been set up on that area again for tonight, and we'll see what we get.
The dwarf iris have just gone over, but Iris unguicularis is still sending up new flowers.
No comments:
Post a Comment