garden
Latest and gravid from my small corner of suburban Berkshire . Six on Saturday . Six thing going on in the garden , on a Saturday . Join in !
1 ) Dahlias . I am a recent convert to dahlias . It is said there ’s nothing so avid as a convert and I do feel borderline obsessed by these plant at the mo . I rise a bunch from seed last year , Bishop ’s kid was the variety . These are bedding dahlias rather than the fantastic , fancy tall ones . They grew middling well , I had 10 or 12 plants in the garden the tubers of which I dig out up and stored over the wintertime . I also bought 4 new genus Tuber this spring ( ‘ Rebecca ’s World ’ , ‘ Black Jack ’ , ‘ Caribbean Fantasy ’ , and ‘ Manhattan Island ’ ) . I ’ve brought all of those intogrowthand takencuttingswhere I can . As a event I now have 18 dahlia plants of a decent sizing that I am busy hardening off , and a further 26 cuttings growing on in the greenhouse . The set off bunch are commence to show sign of flowering , which is encouraging .
I have picked up along the agency that it is a good idea to crimp out the develop tip once 3 or 4 sets of leave have developed , to promote branching and at last more bloom . Once harden off I will institute them out , although I ’m not convinced I have room for 40 plus of them . I am peculiarly look forward to the 4 new variety – I have 3 of each now thanks to cuttings , I may take a few more using foliage cuttings . Ca n’t assist myself .
2 ) Impatiens omeiana . I did not know that there were hardy officious lizzies . I blemish this one at a flora fair last weekend and was a little bit stricken by the foliage . I care the Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe and colouring of the leaf , but also the stems which are a striking violent colour .
It does n’t get very tall , but spreads over meter . It prefers the refinement too , in fact it will get scorched in full sun and sulk . I have a spot in mind , under the canopy of the cornel , in a N facing boundary line . Plenty shady enough there despite the cornel being a piffling short of stem / leaves – I pruned it pretty hard . The impatiens looks best once it has spread a small , they look gooden masse .
3 ) Border 2 – in the continuing saga of border reworkingchez nous , last weekend I jab up a duad of very scruffy thickets of evergreen shrub . These both fly into that most unloved of plant category , “ municipal car park ” .
I can only suppose I was seduced by some kind of special offer at the garden center at some breaker point in the past . They were not good shrubs , were not adding any pursuit , never beware beauty to the garden , and as such do not feature in my grandplans . A couple of hours work with a pruning byword and mattock and they are history . I ’ve weed , dug over and mulch the resulting clear area , a skilful 3 sqm , and it is now quick for planting out .
4 ) Geum – these are rapidly becoming a favourite of mine . fairly to my temporary regret , I divide my g. ‘Mrs J Bradshaw’into the smallest possibleplantlets . I will in the end get a bunch more industrial plant as a solution , but in the near term they are less telling margin performers than the original clump might have been . Still , they look well-chosen enough to flower .
I recently also aquired a enough sized Geum ‘ Hannah ’ which seems to be an orange flowered variety . I ’m not 100 % convinced that the variety is correct , I ca n’t detect any reference to it online . Anyhow , I ’ve potted it on and will plant out when it ’s replete out that pot , should n’t be more than a couple of weeks at this clock time of yr .
5 ) Lily – I ’ve no clue what variety this little triad are , they were plant a few year back before I kept any kind of record . They have cleary enjoyed the circumstance this spring as they have put on some lush growth and several flower head are in evidence . At the important risk of putting the mockers on things , I have not seen any signs of the dreaded lily beetle – they are un - munched at this point , long may that go on . If I remember rightly , the flowers are a slap-up colour . We shall see , no doubt they will make a repetition appearance here in a few weeks metre , judging by the buds , several to each plant life . I have n’t in reality accommodated these plants in the Modern borderdesignbut I ’ll exploit around them when it follow to constitute out . They are interesting enough to result well alone . I might dig up the bulbs / corms / whatevers later in the year and move them .
6 ) Linaria . This is another plant with which I am unfamiliar , although I read it ’s quite common . I picked up a couple at the plant fair . They are good little works , well grown from the look of it . One would expect nothing less from fellow members of the Hardy Plant Society . I was fascinate by the stucture and physique of the plant which looks quite architectural , I think , reminiscent of rosemary and possibly even lavender .
I will have to hold off for them to bloom to confirm the variety , it ’s hard for me to state from the foliage alone . I reckon it ’s Linaria purpurea , we ’ll see .
I ’ll be back next week with another Six next Saturday .
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