Ravendale House » the flower garden

Go With The Flow

Cloudybutnice — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 06:45:42 +0000

If the last 13 years have taught me anything at all, it’s that you should work with nature not against it, particularly if like me, you’re a lone gardener most of the time, who is no longer in the first flush of youth.

We brought hundreds of plants with us when we moved here. These are just a few of them.

All had been lovingly cared for during the move and stored in a friends garden. On their arrival in Lincolnshire they were carefully planted out and recorded in my gardening book.

The idea was that this book would track and record the progress of the new garden, a bit like ‘The Country Diary of an Edwardian Lady’ but it soon became clear that this was going to be a task too far. What I’d failed to realise was that Edwardian ladies had staff, I don’t.

After the first couple of years a lot of the plants had died anyway. This could have been due to a variety of reasons, not least incorrect soil type which is how we lost our azaleas.

All the lovely primulas we put in Flower Bed 1, all gone. With the benefit of hindsight we should have planted them in the ditch where the ground doesn’t dry out in summer.

Anyway, loss of plants, the sheer size of the garden and the volume of work involved in just keeping it ticking over, meant that the penny soon dropped. Forget the book and stick to growing things that like it here.

So that’s why today I’ve been collecting seeds. Rudbeckia and Cosmos both do well here. As do Lupins and Larkspur. For some reason I can’t grow Hollyhocks or Delphiniums, though I have tried several times over the years.

Geraniums grow like fun and seem to stand the harshest treatment. Crocosmia ‘Lucifer’ was doing OK until last winter which was just too cold and took out some of my plants. That’s why today I’ve just collected and sown 48 Lucifer seeds.

Add to these dahlias grown from seeds like annuals, bright red pelargoniums over-wintered in pots in the conservatory, ‘Sylvia’s Sunflowers’, monada and nasturtiums, it’s not a bad selection to build on. Each time I find something ‘new’ that likes it here it will go on the list.

One plant that does really well here, and which I’ve tried to love over the years is Achillea ‘Gold Plate’ commonly known as yarrow. Sadly I just don’t like it. There were 2 huge clumps of it in Flower Bed 1 and today I ruthlessly dug them out.

Next year the space they’ve left will be full of Cosmos, and I can’t wait. I grew some from seed earlier this year and they are pretty as a picture even now. So I’ll be sowing even more in Spring so that Flower Bed 1 can benefit from their long lasting blooms next year.

Even when you love it, gardening is hard work, so why make it any harder.

A Will To Live

Cloudybutnice — Mon, 26 Sep 2011 07:14:50 +0000

Many years ago, when the plant buying part of our gardening bug was at it’s height, we bought 7 azaleas in the sale at a local garden centre. It was before we moved here so must have been over 13 years ago.

We bought them, primarily because they were cheap, in fact if memory serves me they were £1 each. Admittedly they weren’t in the first flush of youth, you could tell that from the faded plant labels, but what had we to lose apart from £7?

We re-potted them, as they were severely pot bound, and brought them with us when we moved, and as you can see despite their age and long journey they were flowering their socks off.

After digging the new flower beds we planted some of the azaleas in the garden, thinking, amongst other things, how nice it would be for them to spread their roots at long last.

Sadly things didn’t quite work out and they all died. We had asked our then neighbour shortly after moving in what the soil was like. She had said it was ‘neutral’, which it isn’t, it’s chalky and the azaleas hated it, we should have tested it ourselves. Lesson learnt.

That left us with 3 still in pots, a red one, a pink one and a white one. These continued to flower beautifully each Spring, but because they only had a short flowering season I kept them in the area by the shed for the rest of the year.

The white one was a bit bigger than the other 2 and lived in a big pot near the hedge. I can’t quite remember when, why or how but at some point I gave up on it. The red and pink ones came out each year as normal, but I’m ashamed to say the white one was neglected.

After the last exceptionally cold winter everything looked grim including the 2 azaleas, so after they had flowered in Spring I decided to give them a severe hair cut, it was make or break time.

The red one seems to have responded favourably, the pink one doesn’t seem to have responded at all. The jury’s still out, but I won’t be holding my breath.

At the time I pruned them I did cast an eye towards the white one. It’s pot was over grown with thyme and Herb Robert in fact apart from some dead branches you wouldn’t have known it was anything but a pot of weeds and I made a mental note just to dump it on the compost heap when I had a moment.

That was 6 months ago and yesterday I finally got round to doing it. Imagine my surprise when I discovered the white azalea was still alive. How could this be, I hadn’t watered it for years. Perhaps it had put it’s roots into the soil because the pot was broken, but no. Despite the broken pot it’s roots were still all together in a tight ball over-run with the thyme and Herb Robert.

It’s at times like this I get a bit fanciful, and I decided that a plant of such a great age that had endured such bad treatment, yet still refused to die, deserved a break, not to mention a huge amount of respect.

So I have re-potted it, pruned it gently and watered it well. I now intend to have this white azalea flowering it’s socks off again in Spring along with the red one and hopefully the pink one too. Watch this space.

Nostalgic Nasturtiums

Cloudybutnice — Sat, 03 Sep 2011 19:14:41 +0000

I seem to have been travelling down memory lane a lot recently what with teenage holidays in Wales and Sunday School concerts. I suppose that’s one draw-back of growing older, your single track road turns into a 3 lane motorway of memories to choose from.

Not that reminiscing is a bad thing, in fact I quite enjoy it occasionally, though nostalgia isn’t what it used to be. (Sorry couldn’t resist that, the old ones are still the best.) Anyway, I can’t look at a nasturtium without thinking about my grandad.

He was a kind, gentle man whose arm was wounded quite badly in World War I. He and my grandma were married for just short of 60 years. My grandma actually died the night before their Diamond Wedding Anniversary.

Too late to notify anyone, the morning brought cards and bouquets of congratulations including a telegram from the Queen. The following day brought more flowers and cards but this time of sympathy for our loss.

They lived in a small back-to-back terrace. I can still remember going with my dad in winter to put a tilley-lamp in the outside loo to stop the pipes freezing. All they had was a small yard at the front.

I don’t know if my grandad was a frustrated gardener who longed for a garden, or whether he was content with his lot, I was a bit too young to wonder such things. However, he did grow nasturtiums and, I think, antirrhinums.

As a small child I liked the nasturtiums as they attracted caterpillars that I could collect in a matchbox. I’m not quite sure what I did with them after that. I also liked to collect the seeds which were like little green jewels. I don’t remember allowing them the luxury of ripening.

Today I grow nasturtiums primarily to keep the black fly off my broad beans. Previous years this has been most successful, but for some reason failed miserably this summer.

Nasturtiums thrived, broad beans had lots of black fly. Not that it seemed to hold them back, as I was able to harvest another bumper crop for the freezer.

I cleared the bean plants away ages ago, but the nasturtiums remain, and what a pretty and colourful sight they are too. A much underrated flower I think. Easy to germinate and grow, they produce an abundance of seeds to sow for the following season.

Of course you can buy packets of seeds with interesting names, but how much more fun it is to sow your own and see what develops. You might produce a real corker and it doesn’t cost a penny.

Here is a selection of my favourites.

Please excuse the weeds, buttercups and nettle, haven’t got round to weeding these beds yet.

This yellow one is very sweet, I doubt they come true from seed but I’ll definitely be saving the seeds for next year.

A Tale of Two Sunflowers

Cloudybutnice — Sat, 20 Aug 2011 15:37:44 +0000

Well, to be more accurate, it’s really the tale of about a dozen sunflowers, but 2 different varieties.

Every year I grow regular sunflowers for fun, I like to see how big I can get them (yes, I know I’m like a big kid). One year I grew one that must have been 9 feet tall with a flower head the size of a dinner plate. I have a photo of it somewhere, but just can’t lay my hands on it at the moment. I’ve never been able to better it.

So this year as normal I sowed a few seeds. They germinated readily, grew enthusiastically and I ended up with 3 plants about 6 feet tall. No drama, no crisis, just sunflowers.

At the beginning of the year, my gardening chum, Sylvia, had given me some sunflower seeds that she had collected from her own plants last Autumn. She didn’t know the variety, but said they were ‘many headed’ unlike mine which are just single flowers, so I decided to give them a go.

I sowed some of them, but germination was poor so I sowed all the rest. In the end I had about 8 viable plants. I tended them carefully along with my other seedlings and when the time was right planted them outdoors along the front of the house, with a trellis for support.

I protected each of them with a Schweppes cloche, and tied each individual to a small cane until they were tall enough to reach the trellis, then proceeded to water them regularly along with my other stuff.

What followed was an uphill struggle. They just never seemed to get going, not helped I have to say by the strong wind that seems to have been blowing all year. To say they looked sad was an understatement. There were some days when they looked dead, and on occasions I came close to giving up on them altogether. How glad I am that I didn’t.

All of a sudden they seemed to get into the way of the game. Almost overnight they went from poor, sad looking specimens to healthy plants. They did still suffer from the wind, and I seemed to be forever tying them up, but I’m so glad I persevered with them.

They certainly are a lovely colour, a sort of primrose yellow, these photos don’t really do them justice.

Even now if it’s very sunny they go a bit limp, but a good watering soon perks them up. I’ll be saving my own seeds this year, to sow next Spring. At least I know what to expect next time.

Brighton Heads

Cloudybutnice — Sun, 24 Jul 2011 11:12:33 +0000

Don’t you just love ‘em?

A Lovely Old Acer

Cloudybutnice — Fri, 08 Jul 2011 11:24:21 +0000

In 1986 we moved into our first house that had a proper garden. It had belonged to a keen lady gardener who had sadly died, and we bought the house from her son.

In the course of getting to know our new garden we discovered an acer growing in deep undergrowth at the bottom of the lawn. Presumably at one time it would have been in the open, but time and neglect had taken their toll. It was weedy and pale and never going to do anything left where it was.

We dug it out (not an easy task) and placed it in a rather nice pot, then stood back and waited to see what would happen. To our delight it rallied and once more became a handsome, elegant plant, and is still doing well.

How old it was in 1986 I have no idea, but that was 25 years ago, so we reckon it could be as much as 40 or 50 years old. It moved with us to our present home and has pride of place in the middle of the lawn.

It survived last winter’s freezing temperatures, but it’s new leaves got caught with a late frost for the second year running, despite my best attempts to cover it up.

Fortunately it seems to have the ability to start again, and is now looking as lovely as ever as you can see.

Dahlias

Cloudybutnice — Fri, 01 Jul 2011 11:13:47 +0000

Here’s a good wheeze which I got from my good gardening chum, Sylvia. Sow dahlia seeds in Spring and treat them as annuals. Pity it’s taken me all these years to do it!

I sowed the seeds in mid February and they germinated easily. I’d just bought couple of packets ‘off the shelf’ at the local supermarket. They were assorted ‘Pom Pom’ and ‘ Dwarf Mixed’.

In mid May I nipped out their growing points which, along with regular dead-heading, should ensure a mass of flowers over the next few months

I decided to plant some of the ‘dwarf mixed’ in pots and have the rest dotted around the garden. Sadly a late frost ruined most of those in the garden. My own fault really, I was so busy covering everything else up that I forgot about them.

The pots were in the conservatory and so survived, and what a splendid pot they make too. I thought I’d lost the heuchera at the front in the harsh winter, but as you can see it has survived and is once more a handsome plant.

I’m so pleased with the results that I’m going to sow lots more next year and have loads of colourful pots. I intend to bring the pots indoors during winter, but I don’t hold out much hope for the ones I leave outside. Sylvia says they can survive if the winter is not too harsh.

Either way I’m really pleased with the results and already looking forward to next year.

Garden 2011 Pics

Cloudybutnice — Mon, 06 Jun 2011 09:09:44 +0000

Thought it was about time I posted some pictures, just to show this year hasn’t been all gloom and doom in the garden.

This is the front garden looking from the side of the house.

This is a campanula that seeds itself freely throughout the garden, so I don’t know the variety.

The postman often practices his golf swing when he walks back down the drive to the gate, so we call this ‘The Fairway’. Interestingly I spent years trying to keep the drive free of weeds. In the end I gave in and just let the grass grow, and now it’s better than the grass on the lawn!

Finally Helianthemum ‘Wisley Primrose’

A Sunflowers Story

Cloudybutnice — Tue, 10 May 2011 07:21:50 +0000

Isn’t nature a wonderful thing? If I was ever in any doubt, what happened yesterday would have changed my mind.

The discarded seeds from the winter bird feeder have been germinating for a few weeks now. Some are obviously undesirable or in the wrong place so they get pulled out. Others I give a chance to grow if only to see what they are.

There was one particular seedling, a sunflower, that was growing in a nick in the patio right in the middle of the conservatory doorway. Obviously it couldn’t stay, so yesterday afternoon I dug it out.

It didn’t take much ‘digging’ and it came out with a surprising amount of root and soil given it’s circumstances, and I planted it in flower bed 5, next to another I had dug out of the border a few days earlier. I watered it well, put a make- shift cloche around it, and then to be honest forgot all about it.

When I was doing my evening watering I remembered it. Oh dear, what a sorry sight. It was completely limp, lying down, looking very sorry for itself. I was sure it was dead. It would never come back having got into that state.

Even so I gave it a good drink, said a few words of encouragement and went indoors.

This morning to my amazement it is stood up and looking like a sunflower again. Isn’t nature wonderful.

Another Casualty

Cloudybutnice — Wed, 20 Apr 2011 09:57:31 +0000

You don’t realise how big something is until you come to cut it down. The old tree was a good example of that, but this time I’m actually talking about my buddleja globosa which is another casualty of the harsh winter.

Fortunately it is not all bad news. Whilst the branches are all dead, there is new growth emerging from the base. Fresh new leaves, so, as long as I’m patient it will come back.

I only realised the problem when I was pulling out some goosegrass, as if I needed another job to do! Anyway off I went for the loppers and began to cut.

There are now huge piles of branches in the drive and I still haven’t finished. I’ll have to take a saw to some of the bigger ones. It’s much too hot for this kind of work, you’d think it would be much colder, after all it is coming up to Easter.