GBBD: Soggy Blooms

From left to right; top to bottom: a rather damp Viola; Clematis cirrhosa 'Freckles'; Primula 'Cottage Cream'; Galanthus nivalis; Lonicera x purpusii 'Winter Beauty', Viburnum x bodnantense 'Dawn'

After the cold and snow of the past few weeks, the thaw's set in just in time for this month's Blooms Day. I reckon January's the low point of the year gardenwise, with the fewest blooms to show you, so it's onwards and upwards from now on. Most of my flowers are really just buds, as the cold weather has made them shiver and close up for survival, but even perfectly formed buds are a cheerful sight at this time of the year.

I have just 2 plants in flower, the Violas in large pots close to the house, deliberately placed there so they can be viewed easily and to get a little extra warmth. Their delicate perfume can also be sniffed when I venture outside. The other bloom is Primula 'Cottage Cream' in flower since July. Both plants are looking a little frayed round the edges after their recent wintry onslaught, but are no less welcome for that. Finally, there's a portent of what's to come: aptly named snowdrops emerging sleepily from their icy duvet :)

Garden Bloggers' Blooms Day is hosted by Carol at May Dreams Gardens.

Comments

  1. Commonweeder15 January 2010 at 16:15

    no matter how soggy or damp - you have flowers! beautiful and so encouraging. I only have ice crusted snow and a very few blooms indoors - but I have proved again that Life Will Not Be Denied.

    ReplyDelete
  2. The Constant Gardener15 January 2010 at 16:48

    huh! You call those soggy? You'll have to try harder than that. These are positively pretty, and there's more than one of them, which is better than I've managed since about November.

    ReplyDelete
  3. James A-S15 January 2010 at 16:52

    I think that is quite impressive. I had a wander around this morning and I have precisely zip,nil,rien de tout in flower anywhere.
    Although my mother-in-law's Parrotia is looking quite hot.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Unknown15 January 2010 at 16:57

    Life will Not Be Denied, as Commonweeder says. The viola is lovely, and we will get through to better days. Or so I tell myself.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Liz15 January 2010 at 18:19

    Flowers?? I'm jealous, we can't see anything here still... I wouldn't even attempt to stand on the grass becuase the snow is now ice!

    So jealous that you have flowers, even if they are soggy :)

    ReplyDelete
  6. Mr. McGregor's Daughter15 January 2010 at 19:11

    Good showing for having had such a mess of snow recently. Seeing your snowdrops makes me want to go out in the garden & dig in the snow to look at mine.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Dee/reddirtramblings15 January 2010 at 20:28

    I'm green with envy that you have any blooms. Just kidding. Spring will come to America soon enough too. Happy Bloom Day!~~Dee

    ReplyDelete
  8. Helen/patientgardener15 January 2010 at 20:46

    Better than me my garden is still covered in thick snow

    ReplyDelete
  9. Joanne15 January 2010 at 21:15

    I am so looking forward to see what pops up when this snow finally goes.

    ReplyDelete
  10. The bike shed15 January 2010 at 21:18

    Snowdrops are good but I always think Crocuses are the first signes of spring.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Rose16 January 2010 at 02:36

    They may be soggy, but at least they're not frozen! I'm surprised to see any blooms here today, VP, so you should be excited. As you say, it can only go upwards from here. Happy Bloom Day!

    ReplyDelete
  12. green seeds16 January 2010 at 09:22

    it must be a bit warmer in chippenham we only had a lone clump of snow drops pocking out of the melting snow yeaterday.

    ReplyDelete
  13. Karen - An Artist's Garden16 January 2010 at 10:33

    Onward and upward is good. Every time you show a picture of your Clematis cirrhosa 'Freckles' I am reminded that I must get one - it seems to do well for you for months at a time.
    K

    ReplyDelete
  14. Anonymous16 January 2010 at 11:24

    Yes to onward and upward. Onward was my word for New Year's at midnight, when we all had to choose one to represent our goals for the year. Your primrose has been blooming since July, outside? Wow! Our snowdrops are not even showing yet. Maybe another look for them is in order. :-)
    Frances

    ReplyDelete
  15. Carol17 January 2010 at 02:51

    I love your Viburnum photo... showing the calyx splitting revealing the lovely buds! So exciting! Ah you may be soggy but think of being covered by over a foot of snow with no promise such as your buds! Lovely!!

    ReplyDelete
  16. VP22 January 2010 at 21:49

    Thanks for all your compliments everyone! It's cheered me up no end that I actually have some blooms in my garden at this time of the year.

    I must show you one of the things I put together when planting up the garden: it's really helped to make sure we have something of interest at all times of the year.

    ReplyDelete

New comments are not allowed.

Your essential reads

That blue flower: A spring spotter's guide

Image
Spring is a prime time for blue flowers and my daily walks currently have several from the same plant family* lining the local footpaths. As I walked past the Donkey Field the other day, I overheard some children ask their parents** what the pictured blue flower was. It reminded me it's often mistaken for those other familial blues and this time was no different, as they said it was forget-me-not, instead of the green alkanet it actually is. As well as similar flowers, most of these plants are hairy in their nature, flower around the same time, and favour damp, shady places. Many of them are great for pollinators too, especially bees and this week's warm weather has certainly drawn them to these flowers. This makes it even more likely for these plants to be mistaken for each other and it's a great opportunity for me to put together a spotter's guide in case you find the same flowers on your outings. Staying with green alkanet, the key features which set it ...
Read more

Jack Go To Bed At Noon

Image
Last year this rather exotic looking flower appeared on mine and several other allotments for the first time. Having been stumped (again) by Mr Allotment Warden as to its identity, I rushed home to find out what it was. It's salsify, aka the marvellous Jack Go To Bed At Noon - named as such because its flowers always close by midday. Here you can see both open and closed flowers - making it seem even more exotic and alien than in the first picture. I think this must be the cultivated version because the flower in my Francis Rose Wild Flower Key looks exactly the same in form, but is bright yellow in colour and called meadow salsify . Its other common name is Goatsbeard, which must be a nod to the fantastic dandelion-like clock which forms the seed head. With 'parachutes' like those shown above, who knows how far our plotted plants came from. I rather like the photographic dissection of the seedhead found in this link . Salsify is edible: its lateral shoots and fl...
Read more

Red Nose Day - Gardening Jokes Anyone?

Image
The nation goes ever so slightly bonkers on Red Nose Day - hurrah! Previously, it's been very easy to join in - usually via a dress down day at work plus lots of people up to mad things at the station and in the office. Everyone smiling for once - it's a real feel good day and all in a good cause. This year's different - every day's a dress down day for me now - my friend L suggested yesterday that perhaps I could have a dress up day instead and whilst that's a good idea, I confess that ballgowns and tiaras don't really feature in my wardrobe: scruffy student's always been my favourite look. So my Red Nose Day contribution for this year is to compile a list of gardening related jokes. For each one (clean ones only please) you leave in the comments below, I'll make a donation of 50p to the cause. Here's a few for starters just to get you warmed up: Q Why do potatoes make good detectives? A Because they keep their eyes peeled. Q What did the grape...
Read more

Salad Days: Mastering Lettuce

Image
I've decided one of my salad challenges for this year is to grow as many lettuce varieties as I can, ready for the publication of my planned Factsheet* later on. The idea is to grow as many of the Tried and Trusted lettuce varieties last year's Salad Challengers helped compile, then provide a visual guide and as many lettuce facts as I can muster. So far I've found around half of those listed**. Then naturally whilst I was out searching - because such is the way with seeds - a number of other varieties found their way home too ;) A couple of weeks ago I sowed 22 varieties***. Just the simple act of sowing them has me intrigued. Why are some lettuce seeds black and others white****? They split into about half white to half black in my sample and as far as I can tell it's nothing to do with whether they're a type of cos, iceberg, or whatever. I sowed them indoors and popped them into a propagator on the windowsill. The soil's too cold outside for sowing ...
Read more

VPs VIPs: Derry Watkins of Special Plants

Image
Last week I had the pleasure of visiting Derry Watkins at her home, garden and nursery - the acclaimed Special Plants - just a few miles along the road from me. I first met Derry at one of her open garden days last year and was keen to find out more about her wonderful garden and running an independent nursery. She specialises in tender perennials and regularly goes on plant hunting trips to find new treasures, particularly in South Africa. As well as running Special Plants and opening her garden under the NGS scheme , Derry holds day courses at her nursery, hosts Special Tuesdays from April until September, lectures and has written a couple of books. How did you find your way from Connecticut to the UK? I'd started a biodynamic vegetable garden in Connecticut and we used to have people come along at weekends to help out. A particular young man turned up: he returned many times and at the end of the summer I married him. So it was all down to love? Isn't that the...
Read more

#mygardenrightnow: heading into summer with the Chelsea Fringe

Image
Ahhhhhh, that's better! I love walking through dewy grass in bare feet, not that there's much in the way of grass on my back lawn this weekend. My wild and woolly lawn has morphed into meadow of sorts this month, which even NAH admits looks attractive*. It's also proved a great source for my Flowers for mum project so far, yielding self-sown perennial cornflowers, lamb's ears, and lemon balm in addition to the blooms you can see. These originated from elsewhere in the garden, the ox-eye daisies must have blown in from the A350 nearby. * = he got very stroppy about the weeds aka self-sown foxgloves in the lawn one year, so he's come along a bit since then. Skimble's demanding to say hello to you too. He does enjoy the patio when it warms up. If the embedded video doesn't work try this link instead. The Nectaroscordum are a revelation. I planted the bulbs around 2 years ago, but it's only this year they've bloomed properly. The bee...
Read more

Make Use of Mildew

Image
On my garden patrol this morning I spotted some powdery mildew on a couple of my new Verbena bonariensis plants. I suppose it was almost inevitable as I prefer to grow my plants hard - this means no water for them unless they look absolutely desperate. This approach means plants root themselves more deeply and have a better chance of survival during spells of dry weather like we've had lately. However, it also means I run the risk of problems like today's, especially with any garden newbies planted late in the season. We've had a good drop of rain overnight, so this should help my plants survive. I'll mulch them later today to help lock in the moisture as it's water stress which encourages the mildew to take hold. I've also removed the infected leaves and sprayed the rest with a milky drink.* I'm also pleased to find there's a use for my infected leaves. Oliver Ellingham at Reading University has started a PhD - sponsored by the RHS - researchi...
Read more

The Resilient Garden

Image
  Part of Tom Massey's Resilient Garden at RHS Hampton Court I've been pondering VP Gardens a lot lately. Last year's drought conditions set me off initially, then our harsher than usual winter combined with this summer's flip and flop weather means the thinking continues. It's a huge topic which I freely admit I'm struggling to get my head around. Tom Massey's Resilient Garden  at Hampton Court recently  tackled this topic brilliantly and was a timely interlude which gave me much food for thought. There he encapsulated the detailed research he'd found which informed both his show garden and book of the same name. I think it's one of the most important show gardens I've ever seen. It's clear the way I garden needs to change so that I have my own resilient garden. I haven't worked out the exact details yet, but Tom's book plus a couple of others (see below), alongside the rainwater management handout from the show garden's  sponso...
Read more

Chelsea Fringe 2014: Shows of Hands - Episode I

Image
The gloves NAH used to build the raised bed . The effects are L to R, top to bottom:  Original photo, Warhol, HDR, Green tint, B&W, Posterize, Boost, Cross process and Sepia Welcome to Shows of Hands - my Chelsea Fringe project for 2014! As you can see I've been having a bit of a play around in Pic Monkey for my first contribution. You're welcome to join in between now and 8th June 2014. The idea behind this year's project is to highlight the tool most precious to a gardener: their hands. How do I take part? It's simple. All you need to do is take a photo of hand(s) in a gardening context and then share it via your blog or other social media (such as Twitter or Facebook), then make sure I know you've done so. I've set up Mr Linky below for your blog contributions. The Chelsea Fringe photo on the right sidebar links to this post, so you can easily find it again when you're ready to add your contribution. If you share your photo on Twitter, ...
Read more

Testing Times: Tomatoes

Image
  I've run a couple of tomato trials this year. The first is a revisit of the biochar trial with Oxford University I attempted some years ago (with a different organisation this time), and the second is a trial of a water gadget called Plantsurge which I was given to try at Malvern Spring Show earlier this year. Most of you have probably heard of biochar already and the claim that this inert, carbon-rich material can help soil fertility and plant health. The RHS information in the above link says results can be mixed, with reduced effects found in alkaline soils. This may help to explain the lack of difference I found in my previous trial as VP Gardens is on a lime-rich soil. Plantsurge is a different beast altogether. It's a strong magnet which is attached to a hosepipe as shown in the photo above. It's claimed that it softens water, with the result more like watering with rainwater. The higher nitrogen found in rainwater is thought to be beneficial to plants. Gardener...
Read more