New photos

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My husband spent some time this weekend removing our daughter’s old swing and sandpit from her play area in preparation for a new swing going up.

I took the opportunity of taking some photos of the garden without the swing in view – it looks so nice without it! Shame there’s another one being delivered this afternoon!

I was unhappy with the back border once last year’s summer plants had died down. I’m not very good at judging how big things are going to grow, and I ended up with some things crowded together but with other areas being completely bare. I also lost a few things, such as a couple of lupins and scabius that succumbed to mildew, I think, which left more spaces.

So I decided to have a little re-jig and wanted to create a base of evergreens, with some deciduous and some spaces for summer colour.

Existing plants that I left in include a choysia ternata Sundance in its pot, a ribes and a couple of hostas – these are all in the left hand corner of the border:

Then along the back there is a viburnum, and another – enormous – hosta which I adore:

… then a photinia red robin in the centre of the border, a griselina and a box shrub at the right hand side. There’s also some montbretia and crocosmia Lucifer in between.

There are a couple of perennial dianthus:

… and a beautiful princess lily that comes up every year at the front centre (unfortunately not yet in flower but which is a lovely pale peachy shade):

To add to the existing plants, I have now planted a few euonymus emerald n gold:

… and a couple of euonymus emerald gaiety:

an escallonia laevis ‘Gold Brian’

… and a spiraea ‘Golden Princess’.

I’ve planted two geranium macrorrhizum for some ground cover, a potentilla fireball mixed:

and a new scabius Ritz Blue because I love scabius and wanted to try again.

I also planted a Heutuynia donated by my dad although after reading some info on GoY about how invasive it is I’m thinking of taking it out again! I do love it though so may put it in a big pot:

In between all this, I put in a couple of marguerites:

a couple of pink and blue isotomas (never had these before):

… along with a few nemetia (forgot to photograph these!), and dotted wherever I could squeeze them, some pot marigolds:

… and geraniums grown by my dad.

I think that’s the lot! I’m bound to have forgotten something. Here’s the resulting whole border.

Anyway, I’m pleased with it so far. I think I’ve probably planted far too much and it will all get very crowded, but I hate to see bare soil and can’t resist popping something else in wherever there’s a space! I’m now looking forward to seeing the flowering plants burst into bloom, hopefully, to add some colour to what looks like a very green border.

One thing I’m not too happy with, and that’s the red robin.

I only planted this shrub last year and am happy with its growth – although it suffered some frost damage which is why it looks a bit peaky – but I think it makes the back of the border look dark and quite spooky! It’s quite shady now under the trees, and I wish I’d planted a nice bright shrub that would stand out and brighten things up a bit.

I have another red robin at the side of the play area which is about 8 feet tall and is higher than the fence on that side, which is only 5 feet. When the sunlight shines through the red growth, it looks absolutely beautiful – here’s a pic, the red robin on the right hand side.

However, the smaller one against the taller back fence doesn’t get the sunlight shining through it and consequently looks a bit dark and spooky I think. I don’t want it to get taller than the fence.

I can feel another project coming on … and possibly another blog, the search for a brighter shrub! (Any excuse, eh?) Watch this space.

• 14 Jun, 2010
• 6 likes

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