With long gardening days ahead as the clocks change this weekend, we can see weeks and months of daylight in which to get done everything needed to make the allotment and garden look interesting and tended. I can feel the energy levels increasing and I'm itching to get on with the jobs I've been delaying like planting onion sets. Why do I buy so many? I spent a morning this week visiting a local garden centre and came away with two very pleasing purchases. The first some very bright red polyanthus which look a bit rain battered after yesterday, but are still looking good on the table outside the kitchen:
I also bought this beautifully patterned Phormium which although pot bound and looking a bit grotty is perfect for propagating
The Primulas are looking beautiful just now, I'm a bit of a collector, this is Hall Barn Blue, I'd thoroughly recommend it.
And more frog spawn, I'm going to do a bit of research into dates frog spawn is laid. Last year I had several clumps laid around 22 February. This year several clumps around 23 February, and almost a month later more spawn. What's going on? I noticed there's lots being laid in a pond at Intel HQ just now as well.
Hyacinths are a bit naff outside, but in profusion they look good I think, I have planted those given as presents outside together.
Lastly it's Solandella flowering time, here's the beginning, more next week of course!
So that's my six, I'll go and look at
The Propagator's choice now. Click on the link if you want to see how #SOS is done properly. Meanwhile have a good week, with restrictions lifting slightly, we can meet in each other's gardens if there aren't more than six from two households. Yay
Soldanella is an unfamiliar plant to me. I looks great. The primulas are fabulous intense colours.
ReplyDeleteYou've just reminded me of the onion sets I put in the shed a couple of weeks ago and forgotten about. They're not going to grow very well in there.
Thank you, it's Soldanella, not Solandella!! It's a great plant, flowers reliably at this time of year, has wonderful skeleton seed heads if you don't cut them off, which I tend not to do because I like them so much. It seeds quite politely into nearby pots, and they take a while to flower, maybe 2 years. Primulas are gorgeously bright. I'm gradually getting onion sets into the ground.
DeleteYou're chancing it, saying Hyacinths are naff outside. I agree though, and remember some years ago seeing a more natural looking pink flowered form that I never took a note of the name of at the time and have been unable to track down since. They don't have so many rivals amongst bulbs for scent. I must check whether my Soldanella has flowers coming up, there was nothing when I last looked.
ReplyDeleteThat's the thing about gardening isn't it? We can form quite fixed ideas about things and then express them as though everyone feels the same. I have quite a few hyacinths outside in one area, they do smell very strongly and are good for children to sniff. My Soldanella flowers come fairly quickly, so do go and check.
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