garden highlights | Pullingweeds

The foxgloves are in full swing now. These useful biennials seed themselves around all over the garden. Those that are where you don’t want them to be can be pulled out easily (and make a nice clump of greenery to feed to the compost). I probably don’t ‘edit’ them as much as I should.

Here and there a white one pops up. Last year I tried to dead head the purple ones and allow the white to seed, because I prefer the white ones (particularly in the beds where I’m aiming for a white theme). Clearly, I wasn’t very successful.

You can, supposedly, tell what colour flower the seedlings will produce by looking at the stem colour (the purple ones have darker stems and veins) but this hasn’t worked for me. Perhaps I didn’t study them hard enough. The purple forms are pretty too though.

Sweet rocket (Hesperis matronalis) can self seed too. The year we grew them from seed they filled the borders, but they’ve diminished in the following years (too much ‘editing’?)

These campanulas were here before we arrived, and also seed around freely. I’m not complaining – there’s nothing like having beautiful plants for free!) Like the foxgloves, some of the seedlings turn out white. Most are in shades of lilac.

Keeping on the theme of self-seeders, we planted Phacelia as a green manure one year, and loved the flowers so much we couldn’t bear to dig the plants into the ground. They too come up year after year. The flowers are pretty, long-lived – even in a vase – and have a sweet smell like honey. And the bees absolutely love them.

On a more cultivated note, we were disappointed last year with how quickly the Allium hollandicum ‘Purple Sensation’ flowers were over. Allium Christophii, on the other hand, lasted much longer. So we bought some bulbs of those last autumn, planted them into pots (thank you Monty Don and Gardeners’ World for that tip) and popped them into the garden in spring.

Here are some more of the highlights at the moment…

*Baptisia australis* (apparently native to America, not Australia!)

Planting around the pond is filling out – *Iris sibirica*, hostas and *Ligularia dentata* ‘Midnight Lady’

*Stipa gigantea* (oat grass). Close up, you can see the pretty, tiny, yellow flowers

*Rosa* ‘Gertrude Jekyll’ – one of the best roses for fragrance

**Salvia** ‘Nachtvlinder’ – I’ve given up with ‘Amistad’, because I’ve been unable to over-winter it. ‘Nachtvlinder’ has smaller flowers, but is fully hardy

The garden moves on at pace, and I feel a weight of responsibility to try and fully enjoy each new highlight as it happens, and before it’s over without me having even noticed!

text & photos © graham wright 2024

The garden is growing rapidly now, with something new to see every day. Most of the trees and shrubs are well on the way to being in leaf, and the warmer temperatures of the last few days are really pushing things on. Around the pond, the camassias have put on a better show than I was expecting. They’re quite dainty looking plants – the ones I’ve grown before were more robust, with thick, strappy leaves. It could be that these are a different variety, or it may be because the soil we have here is thin and sandy…

These photos were taken around a week ago, and already the flower spikes are nearly finished – they don’t last for long! In just a few days they’ll have been replaced by the iris sibirica. There are a few out already, and the rest will follow soon.

These came with me from my last garden (or at least, a clump did). And those were a division from a lovely customer in Penarth. They are incredibly successful, bulking up quickly, and able to be divided within just one or two years. There are now numerous clumps around the pond, and some that have been planted elsewhere too. They don’t flower for ever so long, but the faded flower spikes continue to look good all year.

The tree peony had half a dozen blooms this year. A few years ago it nearly died, and I suspect what we have now has grown up from the rootstock to replace the grafted plant. But it’s still impressive…

After a slow start, the hostas are coming good. This is ‘Patriot’…

And this, ‘Halcyon’…

I split two of the large ferns that were here when we came and spread the offsets through the shadier spots in the garden, and they’re doing well so far…

The two Fagus sylvatic ‘Dawyck’ trees that I planted (one green, the other purple) are out, and beginning to gain some presence. This is the purple one, with the Viburnum plicatum Mariesii in full bloom behind and to the left, and a white rhododendron on the right…

We’ve got the first Allium hollandicum (‘Purple sensation) out (the rest are close behind)…

The chives are out too, and the first Eschscholzia flower…

This solitary kaffir lily (Used to be Schizostylis, now Hesperantha – thanks botanists!) seems to have got confused – it’s compatriots won’t be flowering until late summer…

And the first of the large butterflies has made an appearance. This, I believe, is a peacock…

There are other things happening, but I don’t want to overload you. Lets just say that the daily wander around the garden is a joy at this time of year (especially now the weather has warmed up).

Pullingweeds

The musings of a horticulturist

Tag Archives: garden highlights

Foxgloves

Early May Highlights