Tuesday 7 June 2011

Oh-so much to do


Things are getting rather tall these days… the Aster and Aconitum are now taller than me, and the Angelica isn’t far off!

Work is needed here, a lot of things have died over winter… My Gauras, Verbena Hastata and Bonariensis, a few Bergamot, Scabious…. Oh, and the two black Hollyhocks! So in all there’s a lot of gaps which need filling.

And the Cherry border has been flattened by the big fat wood pigeons… I’ve had to place rose cutting around to stop them ruining my plants… Not happy. I will move the feeding station so there’s no reason for them to patrol.

Is this a Honey Bee?

The white Clover is blooming, but there’s far less this year than last… It’s likely due to the very hard winter and then very dry spring. We’ve lost a large area of it, but hopefully it’ll expand over the coming weeks.

Love this Salvia, it’s so nice!


This Nasturtium has been given its own hanging basket, I’ve never seen these deep red blooms before, but I think it’ll be very pretty indeed.

And finally, some shots of the Angelica…


For some reason it's very yellow when I thought they were meant to be creamy/yellow/white?



I do like the purple of the Geranium in the background...



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

12 comments:

Barbara said...

I'm also intrigued by your dark red nasturtium. Do you know the variety name? Yes - lots to do right now. I just completely filled our compost container on one morning alone.

Liz said...

Hi,

The Nasturtium is 'Black Velvet'... Hopefully you'll manage to find some near you!

I managed to do some planting yesterday but still have pots and pots of plants waiting to go in...I think I'll resort to planting them where ever there's space soon.

Donna said...

I love the jumble of flowers..they all work in a very delicate picture that is like a vase of fresh picked blooms...as always I love to stare at the incredible pictures....breathtaking...

Pauline said...

I agree, so much to do and plant and the ground is so hard from lack of rain. My plants will have to wait a bit longer until we have some "proper" rain. Like your dark lupin, lovely contrast to the planting round it.

Cheryl said...

Hi Liz,

I have lost so many plants, and strangely I have not seen any clover in the lawn yet. My grass was full of it.

I think that is a honey bee....looks like one to me.

The nasturtium is lovely....I like those really deep coloured flowers.
The rabbits have eaten mine this year! Grrr.....

I love the primula....I treated myself to some this year, couldn't resist. I bought mine from Dobbies.....Yes, Dobbies one has opened thirty minutes from my home, so thought I would go and take a look.

Angelica?? Hhmmmm. It does not look like angelica.....when you break a leaf off, does it smell like angelica???
I am confused. Perhaps I muddled seeds, or you did, I don't know....how very odd. The mystery continues.....Ha!!

Reminds me of my Dad last year....he sowed beetroots and ended up with radishes????

Liz said...

Hi Donna,
I prefer to see lots and lots of plants, I guess you could call me a cottage gardener, seeing gaps is against my nature, I want to feel that everything is alive and taking over :)

Liz said...

Hi Pauline,

I did some planting a couple of days ago on the upper tier where the summerhouse once stood, and cutting back the weed membrane to allow me to dig revealed quite a surprise - massive cracks in the soil. However once I dug past the top crust the soil underneath was actually beautiful. I'm sure that the previous owners when they landscaped the garden cut off the top layers of soil to produce tiers which had been beautifully maintained and left us with awful orange clay. I know the original owner of the house (there's only been three of us) used to keep a veggie patch so you'd think the entire garden would have amazing soil... So frustrating. Anyway the newly planted plants should grow very well :)
We had a lot of rain yesterday evening- almost like a Monsoon! So everything has been well soaked.

Liz said...

Hi Cheryl,

Did you enjoy your visit to Dobbies? I'm going to stop going to mine now that I've discovered some RHS registered garden centres nearby that I'd rather give my money to; however Dobbies is useful as it has some good deals like the recent 4 plants for £10 and I wish I'd picked up more Bonariensis than I did... Grrrr, big mistake! But in general the plants are very expensive there and they don't have the native species like fox and cubs or bird's foot trefoil that I'd like to get.

lol I don't know what Angelica should smell like I'm afraid, so can't use that test. I've never bought any seeds that are similar to this, and I labelled the pots the seeds were in when I sowed them... But do you have anything which looks similar that you could've mixed it up with??
Now I've looked at images of it more closely yeah it isn't the same... The stem of my plant is ribbed unlike the round Angelica, the leaves also seem to be different. But I wonder what it could be? I had a look at Hogweed as apparently its flowers are more flat... But that doesn't seem to fit the bill either.

Actually the blooms look exactly like Dill! but the leaves are completely wrong. You did give me some dill, but the seed packet is still closed.
Looking at this diagram, the petals even curl back... http://www.outsourcincal.com/MDF/Spices/images/dill.jpg

I've taken some photos of the leaves and will post them soon to try to solve the mystery!

VW said...

Prettiness. My delphiniums usually tower over me by this time of year, but everything is delayed. Hopefully they'll get there soon. Love these different colors of nasturtium available now - creams and cherry and deep burgundy.

Curbstone Valley Farm said...

At least it's your flowers that are tall! For me it's my weeds! ;) I love the rich color of the nasturtium bud. I planted a dark one called 'mahogany' this year in the herb garden, but it's not quite blooming yet. Your bee looks like a honey bee to me, although I know that some of the bee-mimics are very convincing.

ShySongbird said...

I'm really intrigued about the supposed Angelica Liz, I do like a good mystery :)

Not much rain here still and what we have had has been rapidly dried up by persistent winds.

I too lost my Verbena Bonariensis during the Winter again. However I will try it for the third time :)

ShySongbird said...

Hi again Liz :) As I said I am intrigued by the 'Angelica' and was having a look around and wonder if it could in fact be Fennel... just a thought.