Sunday 1 May 2011

End of Month – April


I’ll spare you the ramblings about how fast the month has passed… It has, however been a strange old month, indeed a strange winter/spring! Heavy snow, then Snowdrops in January, next to no rain at all in April and now we’re well into our summer flowering plants with Roses breaking open already and Alliums filling the borders.

And on to the photos! Ok, so the borders are coming along nicely, although I do think perhaps I have sown seeds too late and ought to have done it earlier considering how quickly everything has been growing. Reality is, I couldn’t get it done due to Uni commitments. I now have lots of seedlings coming up in a couple of borders; next I need to sow some in the front garden too.

I have also noticed an incredible number of Bees around so far, most of which are all very small; and I believe to be mining Bees (sadly not the Blue ones I had last year), and I have seen very few Carder Bees so far, when normally they are one of the most common. I think perhaps the sharp increase in these small mining Bees is due to me providing them a log and soil pile, I hope it’ll also attract plenty of Beetles.

Another photo of this lovely Aquilegia again…

Geraniums in the front garden are flowering, just waiting for Wargrave Pink to bloom in the background, normally these two bloom together… Been a strange old spring this year!



Centurea is also getting ready to bloom, the Bees love it.

A plant I got to go in the hanging basket… Sorry I don’t remember its name now… Very pretty though!

The Bluebells are stunning as always and they’re bulking up nicely; it’s taken them around 3 years to finally begin naturalising and we’re getting numerous stems from the one original bulb.

Wheeeee, Clematis Marjorie is opening! She’s doing very well this year, I have way more blooms on her and lots of nice fresh growth.

Roseraie De L’hay will not be long, I cannot wait for her blooms… The perfume is so amazing and flowers are huge.

The Sweet Rocket won’t be much longer either, this is the first year I’ve grown it and can’t wait to see what its blooms will look like.

I really love this self-seeded Aquilegia, its colour works very nicely with the Alliums too – and it’s almost the same height!

Allium ‘purple sensation’ or ‘aflentense’ just breaking through its skin

This one doesn’t appear to be getting much pigment, I wonder if they sent me a white one by accident…

And now we’ll move onto wider views of the borders… be warned, some are not so pretty, but then that’s the point! They’re works in progress.

The cherry border, I’ve done so much here… you would not believe how much different it looks compared to last year. I need to work on the year-long interest, and the right side was only recently opened up further with the removal of a Clematis. And in its place I planted Foxgloves, Dicentra, Primula and Hellebores. I also have Foamflower and a new Fern to add.






This is an area I’m struggling to get to, what you can’t see is the pile of concrete posts and wood in front of it! As you can see the Dandelions are having a great time… You might be able make out the little Fuji Cherry that was pretty much killed by workmen, it does still have some branches though and may recover from its beating, I bought another one anyway and may plant it next to it.

This is the ‘new’ border – really need to think of a name for it… It isn’t new anymore! So far things are growing very well. The Asters are already quite tall…

And here’s a few slight further to the left and you can see another lovely pile of concrete posts and wood… I have to be very selective with my photos!

Monkshood looks well on its way, the border behind needs lots of work done to it but right now it’ll have to wait until I have the spare time.

These seedlings have ended up clumped together, I only sowed them the day before we got all that rain, so I think it washed them all together… Lol, this is going to be fun!

And the Forget-me-nots, see the seedlings to the bottom left of the Blue one?

And we’ll finish with some more Alliums… Plenty of them to see!

And another selective shot, where the dead Rosemary bush is revealed in the background…

Actually, this border is going to be a let-down this year, two Foxgloves have died plus one of my Black Hollyhocks and it also looks like the larger one, which was growing has given up… So I need to find something else to plant in their places. I do have black Hollyhock seedlings, which I hope will flower this year (they were started last year) in the other side of the border but the plan was for them to even it out by repeating the Black… Soooooooo, urm…. Yeah, I’ll have to think/find something else!


Copyright 2011 Liz.
All rights reserved. Content created by Liz for Gwirrel’s Garden.

7 comments:

Kyna said...

Our spring's been weird too. Too many damn tornados. At least it's not as hot as it was by this time last year.

Beautiful pics!

Liz said...

Hi Kyna,

I hope you didn't suffer any damage from the Tornados? Or that any friends/chucks relatives are all ok.

It's been unusually warm and very, very dry here for the past month or two now; I've heard March was the dryest March for 50 years, now April most definitely has to break that record too.
The temperatures are creeping up again and I'd estimate 20+ in the garden today... Not massively hot, but certainly warm.

ShySongbird said...

I enjoyed that very much Liz. You certainly have worked very hard and I am impressed with the obvious amount of thought and planning which has gone into it all.

I can't get much at all to grow near my Cherry tree but I assume you have done a lot of soil improvement?

April certainly was a strange month, it is so dry here. We didn't have the rain you mentioned, indeed I can't remember the last time it rained here!!

Beautiful photos Liz!

Cheryl said...

Hi Liz, the weather has been so topsy turvy I don't think the plants really know what they are supposed to be doing. At the rate my garden is blooming there will no flowers in the summer. It is pretty crazy, if you ask me.


I love marjorie....she is just so pretty. Isn't it great to watch a plant increase in size and produce more blooms year on year.

Sweet rocket is a personal favourite of mine. It just seems to appear in this garden.....I really love to see it.

Some of my alliums have survived rabbit damage, so hopefully I will be able to enjoy a few of them.

Your gardens are doing well Liz....look forward to your summer images and all your space holds.

Liz said...

Hi Jan,

I'm glad you enjoyed it, we still have a long way to go yet - especially with the space where the summerhouse was. It's still a massive eyesore but I have begun to plant climbers against the fence now, then I can begin laying barkchippings down and getting the space tidied; that is once I have my essays out of the way!

Actually I haven't done anything near the Cherry.... Mmmm perhaps I ought to have?!! Haha. The soil under it is actually very good, one of the few nice areas of the garden and it's always an absolute pleasure to dig - which until this year all I've ever done is weed the area because there've been few plants in there. I have laid Bark, and need to add some more.

I just hope the rain doesn't all arrive in July and August as it did last year... Grrrr. Although if I'm honest and a little mean... I actually hope it does, because then I'll be able to get on with my dissertation and won't be distracted by the lovely sun! :)

Liz said...

Hi Cheryl,

Indeedy, I saw your photos and cannot believe you have poppies blooming already. Eeeek, I do hope you have something blooming by June because at this rate there may not be much left. Although you might get some repeat blooms from Clematis, Astrantia (if you have any) and other plants.
I'm glad to hear some Alliums survived, I have lots here and actually my next post will feature some :)

I love watching things grow, sometimes it's very difficult to believe just how much things have grown without you realising it.

I've just been out to water everything, and this afternoon we've moved the raised veggie bed and planted the Peas... I know it's still early but the peas have flowers on already and they're still in their tiny pots so they really needed to get in! The Toms also really need to be planted, and I'll probably do it sometime in the next week.

Anna said...

As you say Liz it's been a strange old year and hard to believe it's still only early May. Enjoyed your end of month view - it's all looking most floriferous.