GARDENER'S WORD

They might call this anemone 'September Charm' but it's flowering tall and proud in my garden right now, late July.   I was a bit worried as earlier in the year I had a bit of a shuffle around in my garden, transplanting perennials to more suitable positions so that the tallest are towards the climbers on the fence.  I have the Cherry Red phlox towards the back of my south facing border and moved some penstemons to the back too, but this year anemone 'September Charm' grew very big, into a bush more than 2ft (60cm) high - and that is just the foliage.  Lately it has sprouted tall stems and now, as the grand finale, it is displaying a fabulous show of pink blooms with golden centres.  Wow!  And another plus, it's a pollinating insect magnet. Anemone 'September Charm' 29072016 Bees love anemone September Charm .  Save our bees . Anemone 'September Charm' 29072016 Below: Anemone 'September Charm' and the Cherry Red phlox last ye...

Despite so many dull and rainy days so far this summer, so relatively few summery days when it has seemed like the sun is throwing us crumbs of sunshine just to let us know that it's still there, my tomato plants are providing fruit and ripening.  Of course, I give them a helping hand of feeding with a liquid tomato feed (I've used Doff this year) and picking many of the tomatoes just before they ripen, bringing them indoors to finish ripening.  I believe that picking them a little early gives the ones still on the bushes a chance to develop, and the flowers to provide even more fruit.  Although for a while I thought I wasn't going to get any tomatoes at all despite the hundreds of flowers, it seems, fingers crossed, that all is going to be well.  So far I've picked a good two or three pounds of tomatoes which isn't a lot from three large bushes but it's more than I had expected.   Tumbler, Tumbling Jester, and Losetto are doing just fine and not a sign (to...

While there have been a number of successes in my garden this year, as there always are, it feels at times that the successes are being outweighed by the disasters.  After growing the Prunus avium 'Stella' cherry tree for three years it succumbed to a bacterial disease common on fruit trees .  Instead of destroying it altogether, I have chopped the tree down to a stump, sealed the wound, and am hoping for the best; the best being that the stump will turn out healthy shoots and I can grow the tree espalier style.  I'm hoping but not really very confident about this happening as I think the bacteria may have gone right down the trunk.  I could cry.   It's gone from this: Prunus avium 'Stella' Gisela 5 - April 2014 to this: Prunus avium 'Stella' diseased tree cut back to a stump A few short weeks ago I bought a miniature apple tree with two types of apples on it : James Grieve and Cox's Orange Pippin.  It was grown by  Coronet ...

I bought three cyclamen plants a short while ago, in three different shades of pink, which I am growing in a terracotta bowl on my outdoor marble table.  I've never had much luck with cyclamen in the past, drowning them with kindness, and so I have the bowl in a sheltered place near to the east facing wall where it gets partial sun and is protected from heavy rain by the awning overhead, even when the awning is closed).  I water the plants from below when they need it.  The bowl is standing on a small upturned plant saucer within a large saucer.  The idea is that if we do get torrential rain that hopefully the plants will not end up drowning in a saucer full of water.  Anyway, I noticed that the flowers attract pollinators.  Cyclamen flowers are a little unusual in that the petals fully reflex as they open from the bud.  That makes it easy for the bees to access pollen. Bumblebee on cyclamen flower To keep the cyclamen plants flowering, you n...

You know, I've so many plants in my small garden that I cannot remember planting some of them.  Jasione laevis 'Blue Light' (otherwise known as Sheep's Bit Scabious - what an ugly name!)  is one of them.  I've a feeling it's something I picked up along the way this spring, but maybe not.  Anyway, it was a lovely surprise seeing it growing, pushing up buds on tallish stems and then bursting into a blaze of bright blue.  They really are dazzlers.  The flowers are about 4cm diameter on stems sticking up well out of the way of the foliage.  Such eye catchers.  The pollinators love them too.  Think bees.  Love bees.  And the harmless hoverflies too.  Jasione laevis 'Blue Light' Jasione laevis 'Blue Light' The flowers have pink pollen.  You can see it in the photographs.  Aren't these flowers something special?  I think so.  Hoverfly dining on the pink pollen of Jasione laevis ...

I keep writing about Polka raspberries, every year I think.  I can't help it, they are so reliable.  We've had such a prolonged wet winter and and such a lot of dull days and rain this spring and early summer that I didn't know what to expect from my Polka raspberries canes.  In the last few days though I have picked three bowls full of them at a weight of about 1.5lb of raspberries per bowl (excluding the bowl).  I eat them with my cereal and with cream for dessert.  Polka raspberries freshly picked 10 June 2016 These have grown on last year's canes Around flowering time, and there were lots of flowers despite the rain, I noticed that rust disease was starting once again and I picked off many spore carrying leaves, removing infected leaves from the top downwards and destroying them in order to try and stop the disease from spreading.  Apparently raspberries are prone to rust disease and so it should come as no surprise if you discover it. ...

I mentioned in two previous posts that I had bought three carnivorous indoor plants the other day while mooching around the greenhouse of the Royal Horticultural Society shop at Harlow Carr, near Harrogate.  While the idea of them being carnivorous is reminiscent of The Little Shop of Horrors and the most famous carnivorous plant of them all, the Venus Flytrap, my three little plants— Drosera capensis , Drosera capensis alba , and this Sarracenia smoorii, below—are really quite pretty. Sarracenia Smoorii, a pitcher plant Sarracenia smoorii has a different way of feeding than the Drosera capensis. Find out more detail about Sarracenias here (Wiki) Growing Sarracenia (carnivorousplants.org) As these are bog plants, I have placed my three specimens together in a large plant-pot saucer. Sarracenia Smoorii (left),  Drosera capensis Alba (front), and Drosera capensis (background)

Yesterday I posted about Drosera capensis Alba , a sundew, where you can find a link and comments about caring for this plant.  Today this is a red version of Drosera capensis which I bought at the same time.  In the bottom image you can see clearly that a tiny fly is held captive by the sticky tentacles of one of the plant's leaves.  Bear in mind that the plants are only small right now and the leaves, from which the tentacles grow, are only about 2cm in length.  Drosera capensis Believe it or not, the colours in these images have not been digitally altered.  I took them on my living room window bottom and the green of the lawn outside the window has been picked up. Drosera capensis with captive fly

I was mooching yesterday, as I so often do, at the Royal Horticultural Society garden centre in Harlow Carr, in the greenhouse section.  I was admiring the cacti and the succulents, then spotted a group of little carnivorous plants right next to them.  Morbid carnivorous plants may seem, these were quite pretty and so I bought three different ones.  Drosera capensis 'Alba', as you can tell by it's name and images below is a whiteish version in the Drosera capensis family.  Now, I didn't buy them just for the look of them.  I often get those pesky little aphids and midges and fruit flies in my home and while I leave small spiders that make webs up near the ceiling, they don't always do a great job of it.  So.  So, I bought the carnivorous plants.  I get home, look for the little flies and find virtually nothing.  I go in the garden and look for aphids.  Nothing.  When was the last time I didn't find aphids on any of my plants?  ...

It's a funny thing but when I took a photograph of Penstemon 'Heavenly Blue' last year the flowers were actually much more blue than this year.  The flowers started off looking quite pink and now are a mixture of pink and blue on the same flower.  I expect the elements (we've had a lot of rain) and soil (I've put down general fertiliser, National Growmore 7-7-7, this year) have something to do with it.  Bees are so cute and Bumbles are my favourite.  May they forever visit my garden.  Bumblebee on Penstemon 'Heavenly Blue' You can read more about growing Penstemon 'Heavenly Blue' at this (internal) link.  Note that although I mentioned I only had one plant, I now have two and they look great.  This plant has an upright habit but spreads out on stems which lay across the top of the soil and form roots.  It's not invasive but is so easy just to divide and replant. Save our bees.  Grow plants which attract pollinators, including bees an...

Every now and then (ok then, quite often) I spot a must-have plant and even though I have absolutely no idea how I am going to find a space for it, I just had to have this buddleia today.  Buddleia Davidii Nanho Blue has such bobby-dazzler flowers, a lavender blue with an orange centre, that even the lady at the sales counter remarked upon it, as did the lady in the car park before I could even get it safely tucked behind the seat of my car to bring it to its new home.  I'm glad I grabbed it when I did from the Royal Horticultural Society display at Harlow Carr because there was only one of them.  Buddleia Davidii Nanho Blue 01072016 Apart from the attractive blue panicles which will attract butterflies and other pollinators to my garden from June to September, this deciduous buddleia also has a relatively compact bushy habit (approx 150cm x 150cm - 5ft x 5ft), the stems are a maroonish red, the leaves greyish and pointed.  Its ov...