Month: March 2017

I promised to show a photo of R.taurus when it was in full flower so here it is. It is a very impressive hybrid and gets nicer by the year.

R. dora amateis is another very reliable hybrid which flowers excellently year after year.

The third photo is of Prunus kiku shidare sakura (Cheals weeping cherry), which is also in full bloom.

It’s time for the Tulips to take centre stage now that the Daffs are coming to an end. Don’t have names for these ones. But they came from Dad’s garden. And when they flowered for him all those years they were always yellow. But some of them are coming up with the odd streak of orange throughout them. I wonder is this as a result of an annual top-up of ericaceous soil into what I originally called the Acid Triangle. 

A number of the same Tulips are planted in the North-facing Border and have always come up yellow so far.

Well, the days are getting longer now and its good to see flowers and leaves appearing again. I have a photo here of miniture daffodils just after a fresh shower of rain, they look good in a nice pot too. The others are Castlewellan Arboretum and Park with Mourne mountains as a back drop. My gardening days are put on hold for a while now as I had an operation on Monday. I am a bit sore but it will heal in the coming weeks and will eventually get back to normal. Plenty of time to catch up with all those gardening books now. 

Three nice little Persicarias sneaking out from the undergrowth at the moment. Who needs flowers when you have such great foliage.

Well it is a lovely mild day here and the tulips in the cottage garden are making the most of it 

Species Rhododendrons can be slow to flower, so when flower buds appear for the first time there is a great sense of anticipation and excitement.

R. oreodaxa var fargesii is in the garden since late 2012 and has quite a few flower buds, the one shown is the most advanced.

I have R. roxieanum var oreonastes since late 2010 and I adore the foliage of this species so much that I have three others of its close relatives in the garden as well. No buds on those as yet, but there is one bud on R. roxieanum var oreonastes.

Another species I adore is R. niveum which is in the garden since late 2011. From my research into this species I have found that the flower colour divides opinion down the middle, some people love it and others hate it. I will be able to decide for myself this year as it has a few flower buds and I will be most interested in the opinions of my garden.ie friends.

So there you have it, there will be shouts of joy over the next couple of weeks emanating from this area of East Limerick and they may be loud. Earmuffs optional.

I wish you all a lovely weekend.

I was out for about an hour and a half today and just before I cam in I looked back and down and it struck me how very beautiful my Bottoms looked in the Spring light! They seem to spread far and wide and give a whole new expanse to what was just a lot of wild flag leaves-very few flowers and masses of Himalayan Balsam. Now there are daffs and some Fritillaries and lots of rosettes of primula Florinda and shoots of purple loosestrife and loads of Astilbe-pink and white (Thank you paddy and Mary) and some irises (thanks again!) and lots of Dogwood siberica and lots of Viburnum Opulis and three Swamp Cypress and daffs and a shuttlecock fern from Headgardener and red lobelia leaves coming and two bottlebrushes and …….

It makes for a whole new exciting start to spring. The Rhododendrons have started and a purple Azaelea is beginning to colour further up the Scrub-about five bushes of it so that will be splendid and today I cleared a few handfuls of grass and saw that five Japanese painted ferns are coming along nicely underneath the two Tetrapanex so is it any wonder Im wonderin’.

Unfortunately my old Berberis Hedge was badly hit by those cold winters a few years ago and next job and a huge one is to clear where it is gone and pull out all the old stuff and the branches I stuck in to stop cattle, Luckily a good friend is coming to Fence off where the hedge is gone and reinforce the other places. Ill try to save any resprouting stuff and there’s a lotof good hedging still in it but there promises to be a lot of digging and uprooting and replanting. I think Ill just use hawthorn as I have a brilliant hedge of that but wont be able to get that in until next Autumn.

I put white pansies into my small urns on the wall thinking they would be elegant but they just looked dead white rather than shimmering so I bought another tray and put in dark blues as well and it helped.

I lost a lot of heathers on a slope under the pine trees and I have replaced them (foolishly) a few times. Now instead I am trying small conifers and I must say I prefer the effect. Blues and greens and golds and different habits as well. Hope it work. Put in  thuga Rheingold today and a Juniper there’s about ten of them in by now,

Glad I got that done as theres so much to do re the hedge and also the veg beds now de dandelioned!!! Im determined to eat from my garden this year.Cant seem to download pictures for some reason. They werent pictures of my Bottoms!