What are you up to in the garden now?

14 comments

It’s now May – 8th, and the new border is beginning to take shape at last… despite what Mother Nature has thrown at it since December! Surprisingly enough most of the new shrubs that I kept in pots to plant out this “Spring” (whenever that really happened this year!) have survived and are now in place and seem to be taking off despite our late snow in the middle of April.

However due to the very windy conditions most of their labels had gone astray, so I’m hoping that they were planted in the correct places… I’ll need to wait and see what the leaves and flowers are like before I know for sure which are which. Though I do know that I planted Photinia “Red Robins” along the back to give some winter colour and interspersed these with Zephryn Druin roses ( Old Bourbon thornless roses) along the back fence to add colour and fragrance in summer. They had been in tubs for a few years and I thought they would do better in the ground so I’ll have to wat and see how well they take to their new home. They should get more sun and also protection from the fence, so time will tell.

I moved some of the Crocosmia ( Lucifer) from around the flowering Cherry Tree over to the back fence too, as they were over growing the tree roots where they were and really needed splitting anyway. and that has given me some front of border space there as they grow quite tall and tend to overshadow other plants. And as you can see the surrounding area has welcomed this move, with some late flowering tulips and early geraniums just showing.

Between the shrubs I have planted Delphiniums – Pacific series and they should give some colour to the border in summer. I also added new Poppies which I haven’t grown before – Welsh poppies self seed around the garden already and I also have the lovely blue poppy growing in another area which is damper and has a bit more shade and suits it to a tee. I took seeds from it a couple of years ago and they have grown also, but in another part of the garden where the conditions suit well.

This peony seems to have survived well and is better placed to be seen now that the tall trees have gone – I knew it was there before but could never see it before, it had a huge seed pod last year and I “dropped” this close by and I think it may just have seeded itself where I dropped it!

The Roses and Clematis are just beginning to head for the fence and I’m going to use a tip I saw on a DVD to help them along! (spray the wall / fence with tomorite or similar fertilizer and “stick” the growing shoots using a blob of clear general purpose silicone to the fence – apparently it doesn’t harm the plant but encourages it to develop its shoots up the fence!)
I’ll let you know how it does…

I’ve also included photos of the Rhodie which is about to flower… and the Blue Himalayan Poppy below… Also some pix of the "seeded " peony???

At last we seem to have sprung into Spring here and most of my Cottage garden Perrenials are taking off. I worked for an hour or so yesterday on the path at the back – I’m trying to grow some alpine type plants around the stepping stones there, an idea I saw on a Geoff Hamilton DVD, but I need to find low growing plants that like some shade as the path is on the North side of the garden an shaded for at least part of the day!

Any suggestions or ideas are always warmly welcomed!

• 8 May, 2010
• 1 like

More blog posts by clematisa