Month: June 2018

The rose shown on the other page was a climbing rose.

Every day, more and more roses appear.I won’t say all colours but several shades of red , pink and yellow. The white roses , very few are still on the way whils the blue rose bought in Altamont is opening. Most of them are red now, not affected by the rain or black spot, Evelyn fison or Irish wonder. Also in the page is the perennial Sweet Pea.

Rita Dowling gave me this lovely plant years ago and I cannot remember the name. I think it is Australian but not sure about that either. Any help would be so kind. Thank you so much

I enjoyed meeting my garden.ie friends so much yesterday that I have resolved to try harder to put up a few posts!
Rosa ’Bantry Bay’ is doing its thing on the sunny side of the front garden

Centaurea, geraniums and evergreen hellebore on the shady side.

Foxgloves are just hitting their prime in the back garden. i grew digitalis ’Alba’ from seed this year.

You can’t beat geum ’Mrs. Bradshaw’

‘Tumbling Tom’ tomato in a window box and my herb and veg patch

We bought this little bench for the garden and its great. But the problem was that the grass was growing up around it and it was just too awkward to keep it all tidy.

So we decided to make a little area for it to stand on and the grass won’t need cutting nor will it grow around the legs of the bench. And it adds to the garden too 😉

 

With all the amazing weather its great to get up each day and see blue skies and know the day ahead is going to be fantastic. I think this week we are in for a change though…..so Gerry said on RTE last night! SIGH!! but hopefully only a small blip….we get spoiled when we have this constant good weather…but we do deserve it.

The garden is looking great these past couple of weeks, although very VERY dry in places and plants are falling with exhaustion and lack of moisture. But a little watering here and there and they are doing much better.

I think the harsh Winter and late snow have had some great impact on the plants. Maybe Im wrong but with that combination and the beautiful sunshine now, flowers in my garden have never looked so well. Clematis for example are flowering like mad! My Rose bush, ‘for your eyes only’ is laden with buds and flowers……Hardy Geraniums are laden with flowers, my Geums are flowering like mad…even the Tree Fern is green and lush already…..maybe just a coincidence but really everything is looking amazing.

Really delighted with how its all looking now though……and hopefully we have lots more good weather to come so we can enjoy the fruits of our labour…so to speak 😉

Well with Tipp Hurlers now out for the year Iam sure the garden will benefit . I ve so many new plants in pots it’s getting crazy . My Bee friends keep bringing plant swops to our Tuesday night meets! Shouldn’t complain really. My 2 year old bamboo is sprouting some nice new shoots and I am wondering can I prune back some older tatty ones . Do I cut to the base etc ? The wrens nest was discovered indoors in a coil of hanging cable ! No one noticed until the parents began feeding chicks . Weather meant to change a little from Thursday on . Less watering hopefully

I was afraid the text would disappear if I tried to put them together.

Many thanks to Terri for organizing this lovely get-together. A small, select group gathered in the car park, chatted and did a great plant swop, and thanks to everyone I got plants from. Then we had lunch in the Castle Hotel with lots more conversation, and then to the Castle where Adam met us.
I think we all really enjoyed the tour he gave us, explaining what they have done, and why, and what they’re going to do. He also told us about plants they have gathered in places like Vietnam which are endangered in the wild but are now thriving in Blarney. I must say I found it all fascinating, so thanks a million Adam!
Hazel, we were so sorry you and your sister couldn’t make, due to car problems. I hope it’ll fixed soon, though not soon enough to meet us unfortunately.
So thanks again, Terri, we really appreciated it.

A few photos taken this morning. More peony buds about to open, Sweet William looking a bit leggy. I wonder if I should have pinched them back to make them bushier?

I’m just back from a short berak in Kerry – my first time round the Ring of Kerry and the sun shone for the whole time! So while I was away my daughter minded house, cat and garden and even found time to take some photos! I really like when I see my garden through someone else’s eyes but I’m not sure that this view of what should be the reasonably orderly “Hot Border” is really looking like a wilderness! However I would draw your attention to the stately Cirsium Rivulare Atropurpureum appearing head and shoulders a

bove everything else – this came as a tiny seedling from Hosta (Margaret) from Cork when I first planted up the Hot Border in 2011 and it did manage to produce one small flower that year but then vanished amidst the over enthusiastic poppies. Last autumn I culled the poppies and spotted what I thought MIGHT be the leaves of the Cirsium so I gave it a little more space and kept the fingers crossed! So after 7 years in hibernation she is finally doing what she was intended to do! Thank you Margaret!

Was in for two swims today. I don’t stay in that long but it’s lovely. Didn’t get muchance done but satisfying.put in 17 incarvillea so am hoping. While doing so i managed a good bit of weeding. Bog has grown madly. I met three French men who informed me mine was a jardin sauvage! But they like gardens to be sausage so they approved! I got the beans in and they seem ok. I put coleus into my patio pots. A simple solution which gives me time for other things.

Well we certainly have been enjoying summer skies these past couple of weeks. Such a joy after the long winter and the plants are putting on fantastic growth.  Geranium ‘Summer Skies’ has also appeared right on time for early June. It’s taller than ever this year and one of my favorites in the garden.

Ps I wrote the text first then inserted photos but they still came out on top  Anyone know why / how to fix before publishing?  I’m using the mobile

 

Now that Scrubber is getting the hang of it prepare to be bored. He is tentatively venturing into vegetables and has cabbages broccoli cauliflower peas spinach leeks broad beans lettuces all I must confess put in as plants! Well I had to start somewhere. And roses are just on the point of blooming and irises are out and I bought a lot of incarvillea in BLOOM AND HAVE TO GET them in yet. Got in the ferns.

Big disapointment most of my gladioli bulbs were in mush. Hadn’t put them away carefully.

Colour coded

Woodland

Afternoon all and haven’t we a lot to sing about.

The weather hasn’t been conducive to journal writing, but isn’t it just wonderful, i just love the heat.

The first photo today is of a flower truss of the species R.wardii Ludlow & Sherriff.

Next up are the flowers of Kalmia angustifolia rubra, this is a great shrub.

Next up are two Paeonias, P.bowl of beauty and P.moon of Nippon.

Finally for today the lovely flowers of the hybrid R.tortoiseshell orange.

I hope you all have a lovely weekend.

Last night I managed to do a journal and put up a photo and just as I was about to press the button MY computer crashed. I tried again but wasn’t allowed in. Tried four times. Then realised this morning I hadn’t logged out so was in all the time.   Bbuutt at least I’m learning from my mistakes.

Well,  the recent weather has been so good for the soul. The only thing is, I don’t have as much time in the garden as I would like. Dad is now in a home as he can’t look after himself, and doesn’t want to be living alone. So visiting him is taking up quite a bit of time.

I’ve been keeping on top of weeding, and tidying up pots of stuff that hasn’t made it through the long winter. But the recent growth in the garden has been phenomenal. Busy with cosmetic surgery as I have my sister visiting from Canada, and another one from Tralee, this week. So the garden needs to have a bit of the ‘wow’ factor. Thankfully neither of them are gardeners.

On Sunday morning I noticed a heron in the garden. Of course as soon as I went to the patio doors, he took off. But since then, I’ve noticed that the Lower Pond has been pretty much void of aquatic activity. I’m fearing the worst, I know. But I’m also hoping that the heron just scared the fish down to the depths. Time will tell, but I’m not hopeful. Either way, if they ended up in the Heron’s tummy, I’ll get some more. I feel that a pond just HAS to have fish.

The garden isn’t looking too bad at all, and today I was delighted to see my Rogersia ‘Hercules’ flowering away down at the retaining wall at the Upper Pond. I do love that plant.

Happy Gardening, folks!

Maybe I ve missed something? I’m thinking of just bringing a few things on spec. Is anybody else bringing anything?

Ive noticed that lots of people have decided to abandon the site now. Some make an effort now and then, which is great, but others who would have been very regular, have decide against it. Its such a shame. But in fairness I can understand that too.

The issue with the photos seems to still be a problem, which of course was our only main gripe on the old site. Having to turn the laptop, or phone upside-down just to see some photos…… So a new site was set up, more up to date and still we have that same problem!! No email notifications, no previous journals, all photos are gone, no more chat option, and really some are finding it frustrating to handle the whole thing….. I thought by changing the site it would be more slick, more showy, more user friendly, especially considering the age group that used the site in the first place. I think if its not rectified soon you will lose the few that are using it.

I try to visit it as often as I can but to be honest Im bored with it. There was a time it was the first place I would go to in the morning to catch up…….Now I go to the home page and see some journals and those Ive commented on before I have to go into each one just to see who said what and then when you go in you see oh no one has commented…such a waste of time. You can chose comments on the right hand side, but what relevance is that, some you don’t see anything and end up in their profile. Surely the email option can be sorted for this problem. These are just everyday things you expect from a website when you have interaction with others.

So come on lets get this sorted out soon…..I appreciate it takes time for these things to happen but seriously……….Facebook is looking more inviting every day…………

 

It’s just too much bother

And Scrubber is soo oo fed up!

I plant the former grass verge outside my house, rather than having to mow it. I planted grape hyacinths which come up each year.

But then this bulb joined them – did a bird drop a seed? I thought maybe it might be some other variety of hyacinth none of the images look like this. It reminds me of a pale blue cauliflower, but somehow I don’t think ‘caulis’ grow from bulbs.

 

To day was in my opinion the most enjoyable day this year. while we may have had slightly higher temperatures, the relative humidity was quite low at about 20% compared with 60% on other days. The temperature was about 24 C. While a certain amount of time was taken up in the greenhouse with tomatoes and other indoor plants, a considerable amount of time was spent in the rose beds and I suppose on account of the good temperature, the roses are making very good progress. I have had a lot of weeds in the same beds but one bed is great and the second has half of the weeds removed. I had to leave the garden between 4 and 5 p.m. I got at the second bed again but after tea had a meeting and so the work in the garden had to end. No photos to day but should have some to morrow.

Just a few from about the garden today . I was beekeeping and gardening so a mixed bag . Bloom was great, my first visit . Next time I’ll take a gardener for company though !! Too many food stall and such though I think

Just spotted these this morning, all self seeded and just

happened to be beside each other.

Having been to Bloom on Thursday, Jimmy had mentioned that he wouldn’t mind going this year! ……..

As my ticket was a birthday present and his was a free ticket, we ended up just buying the one, which was ok…..so off we headed again early Saturday morning. Again it wasn’t as busy as I had expected and rain was forecast, which of course never materialised.

It was great to just walk around and not be pushed and shoved around. I had seen a couple of shrubs and trees that took my eye on the Thursday so we headed to Newlands and saw a lovely Viburnum ‘Kilimanjaro’. This was one  that is very similar to what Monty showed on Gardeners World, this one being somewhat more compact and smaller.  It has beautiful white blossoms on arching branches which resemble the wedding cake tree. It turns a beautiful shade of rich orange and red in Autumn  with red berries.  So this was one purchase.

The other was the lovely Cornus kousa ‘Bodnant’ This one was everywhere in the Show Gardens of Bloom and it is stunning. The leaves look like they are hanging down and it has lovely creamy star like flowers on it. The leaves turn a reddish purple colour in Autumn with deep pink berries too.

We planted the trees into the circles in the back of the garden and in time these will look just stunning when in full bloom but also in Autumn too. Really pleased with these. Here are a few photos.

Its hard to see them in the circles are the other plants are growing at an alarming rate, but the photos really do not show them off properly but you get the idea. Im delighted with them!