A month ago, on March 11th, I noticed the first of the fritillaries to open in the woodland, just one solitary flower.
Fritillaria meleagris.
Time for the Fritillaries to take Centre Stage.
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Tagged bulbs flowering in april, Fritillaria meleagris, snakeshead fritillaries, Spring bulbs
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A Sudden Fall of Snow?
No, not really, just a mulch of very white chippings on the alpine scree! Hopefully they will tone down as time goes by and not be such a startling, bright white. Old plants had spread too far, some killing off tiny, precious treasures that had been living quite happily for years, so replanting was necessary.
Alpine scree.
The Woodland in Spring.
The difference in the woodland at the end of this month is the change of colour from the white of the snowdrops to the yellow and white of the narcissus. When I went into the woodland to check that everything was ok after storm Katie paid us a visit , a few days ago, the only damage I found was that a honeysuckle up one of the oak trees had blown away from the tree and was lying across the fritillaries. Thank goodness no damage was done to either the honeysuckle or the fritillaries and the honeysuckle is now safely tied back in place.
Primroses are everywhere and increasing year on year.
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Tagged Spring bulbs, spring flowers, woodland ephemerals, woodland flowers
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My new Meconopsis bed.
I think I mentioned a while back that 2 Cotoneaster shrubs that had formed a hedge in the back garden for the last 25yrs, had suddenly, for no apparent reason, died.
Dead Cotoneaster.
A few weeks ago,while we had a spell of dry weather, I made a start on sorting the border out.
Bath Bulbs.
The bulbs in the little tin bath that I planted up in the winter has just about reached it’s peak now, with I think, all the bulbs flowering.
They started flowering at the beginning of March.
New foliage for Garden Bloggers Foliage Day.
While looking round for interesting foliage this month, it seemed as though the garden was static, at least in the foliage department, as it seemed very similar to last month. Even though we’ve had some sunny days, we have also had a lot of frost most nights, which might have had an influence on whether new leaves open up or not.
Viburnum plicatum Maresii
Lots of new buds on the viburnum, leaves as well as flowers, soon we will have the horizontal branches adorned and it will look beautiful.
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Tagged coloured foliage, deciduous foliage, evergreen foliage, foliage, foliage for March, spring foliage
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March blooms for GBBD.
At last we have had a run of sunny days, which has dried the garden out a lot and brought on lots of the flowers that had been just sulking with the cold weather. Spring is in the air, the grass is growing, the birds are singing and collecting moss from the lawn to make their nests, and I am in the mood for gardening once more, stretching my muscles, ripping out yards of ivy, cutting back dead stuff and pruning like mad!
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Tagged flowers for damp soil, flowers for shade, March bulbs, March flowers, spring flowers
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Sleeping soundly.
The sun came out, so yesterday I was digging over what will be the new meconopsis bed. I have mentioned in the past that 2 cotoneaster shrubs had died and left a large gap in the border in the back garden. I was digging out more ivy and brambles, then I decided to have a change and started to clear away all the soil and leaves round the stump of one of the dead shrubs, hoping to reveal the roots so that I could start attacking it. I was using the big garden fork to do this when all of a sudden, there was a spherical ball of decaying grass at my feet.
Masses of flowers at Dunham Massey.
I had the choice of where we stopped on the way home after our weekend away and chose the National Trust property Dunham Massey, which is between the city of Manchester and the peace of the Cheshire plains. and not too far from the M6 motorway which would bring us home once more. The 18th Century house became the Stamford Military Hospital during the 1st World War and was used for the war wounded. I had read that they now had a winter woodland garden, so it seemed just the place for us to visit.
Masses of tiny narcissus!
This was the sight that greeted us as we entered the woodland area. The garden was only started 5 years ago so someone has done such a lot of planting. This area used to be the pony paddock in days gone by when there were children living here. Continue reading
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Tagged Dunham Massey, National Trust gardens, trees with winter interest, winter bulbs, winter flowers
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Hellebore Heaven.
We were up in the North West last weekend for the undergardener’s cousin’s 80th Birthday. Unknown to me, the undergardener had googled “Hellebores” and found the National Collection of Hellebores was just off the M6 Motorway in Staffordshire and convenient to where we were heading. You don’t always get it right when you google an address…….
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Tagged Hazels Cross Farm Nursery, hellebores, Nation Collection of Hellebores
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