On and on the garden grows, the sky continuing to irrigate the beds and borders so that the path requires pushing through at one point. Black and white meeting across the turf…
Read moreDay 191: the usefulness of beardtongues
It took me a while to cotton on to the usefulness of penstemons (also known, rather wonderfully, as the ‘beardtongues’)…
Read moreDay 190: Spiraea japonica 'Gold Mound'
When I look after Spiraea japonica for other people, I tend to keep it fairly tightly clipped. Mostly grown for foliage rather than flowers it will happily take regular snipping…
Read moreDay 189: big plant, small plant
There’s no denying that giant scabious (Cephalaria gigantea) is a big plant – it’s right there, in the name. Twice…
Read moreDay 188: Rose ‘Lady of Shalott’ – update
Two years on and this glorious orange rose has settled in, though the short-lived perennial wallflowers that bobbed and chattered about her feet have shuffled off…
Read moreDay 187: closely planted
Following a model of close planting, or ‘cramming it all in’, as I like to think of it, can often yield a pleasant surprise…
Read moreDay 186: surprised by chicory
One advantage to being slightly slapdash in the garden (and there are several that I could enumerate, and probably shall, another time) is the gift of unexpected flowers…
Read moreDay 185: Heuchera 'Palace Purple'
Every now and then, you catch a glimpse of a familiar plant from a different angle, and it’s like meeting it for the first time…
Read moreDay 184: when weeding goes wrong
Sometimes, you can be too good at a thing. Weeding is something at which I’m deeply proficient…
Read moreDay 183: potato flower
Spuds. Earthy, reliable, decidedly subterranean – that much I think I always knew. But I remember being distinctly non-plussed…
Read moreDay 182: bedraggled jewels
Paying no heed to the grey skies, the flowerbeds are putting on a show. Given the choice I’d always opt for an overcast day over one with bright sunshine…
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