After weeks of winter maintenance in the garden, one-off tasks like pruning fruit trees, repairing and cleaning water-features, fishing leaves out of the lily pond (multiple times), fishing leaves out of, well, everywhere (multiple times), not to mention days spent discovering hidden rot in the greenhouse, this has been the first fortnight of ‘proper’ gardening.
I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I’ve really quite missed the incessant weeding, the incessant mowing and the incessant watering of an active growing season, aurally fed by a daily diet of the Today programme and BBC Radio 4 Extra whodunnits.
And, despite a run of frosty cold or misty damp mornings, by coffee time it’s been quite warm and layers have been shed during the day for the first time. And good weather is set to continue…
A good place to start the day has been the greenhouse, which by 9.30am is reaching a pleasant 15-20 degrees C. Not that there’s much in the greenhouse at present, if you discount the 25 or so pots of agapanthus quietly overwintering there. Agapanthus seem to do rather well with us - it all started with a small hand-tied bunch of rooted stems, a gift from the in-laws returning from Madeira c.20 years ago. I know, I know, we wouldn’t do that nowadays but in those days, you visited the market in Funchal on your last day and felt honour-bound to come out with something. Well it was either the agapanthus or a stick of sugar cane (why?), a bunch of strangely small bananas or a piece of scabbard fish, a local delicacy and somewhat of an acquired taste. I’m glad the agapanthus won the vote.
Anyhow, the current agapanthus population, all descendants of the aforementioned bunch, have had their annual primping, dead-leaves and old flower stalks removed, as well as a surprising amount of small overwintering slugs attempting to hide between the leaves. I’m not sure slugs really like agapanthus, other than for board and lodging, but they have been evicted regardless. Well, the ones less proficient at self-concealment anyway. And each pot is now receiving its fortnightly feed of high-potash tomato food, hopefully to trigger bud development, with a view to putting them out on the gravel beside the goldfish pond in early May when it warms up a bit.
Meanwhile outside, it’s been a dry old Spring so far, which has made weeding easy and walking on the borders forgivable. We’ve started to gently pick them over, removing obvious weeds and hoeing mats of garlic mustard seedlings where we know nothing else is about to emerge. We’re not too clinical though, we are definitely in the ‘garden with weeds’ category and some are positively encouraged! What’s not to like about dandelions?
The borders are really on the move now, and it’s exciting to rediscover old friends emerging, whilst celebrating that at least some of last year’s new plantings have also come through the winter. Solomon’s seal and snakeshead fritillaries have been snaking their way out of the ground like a hatched clutch of baby serpents. Hostas are starting to stick their noses above ground like myopic moles, and peonies, both herbaceous and tree, and acers are starting to push out their wonderful, often red, cut-leaves whorls of fresh greenery.
And I’m so pleased the Mecanopsis blue poppy babies I planted out in the autumn are pushing out their dew-catching furry leaves to join their parents. We have started a new colony in a shady area of the north border, which is south-facing, so time will tell to see if they do as well as their parents in the north-facing shade border on the other side.
And this week’s nature note? A peacock butterfly in the spring border beside the summerhouse, feeding on the Primula denticulata. This old trooper has made it through the winter, so must have found a safe space to hibernate. Hopefully he or she will find a mate soon…
Gail
A lovely read, Beautiful photos of plants in The Gardens progress into Spring .....bathed in golden sunshine