It has been a busy time both in the garden and with family.
We grow peppers in the green house, both chilli and sweet.
Did you know that you can keep the plants overwinter and treat them as a tender perennial?
We managed to keep several this year, 5 sweet peppers and 1 chilli (see below) and so have a head start with some in flower already, way ahead of the ones we are growing from seed.
Peruvian lemon drop chilli, new growth (March) on last years plant.
The plum blossom has been out for several weeks now. Today the pear blossom came out.
The trees look wonderful covered in the flowers and the Grenadier apple has just started to open.
Unfortunately there is a frost due tonight, -2 degrees, I hope the blossom will be ok.
I have covered some more vulnerable shrubs with fleece, these are hardy shrubs but now the buds are opening they can be killed off by a heavy frost, but not much you can do with a full sized tree.
Also in flower today is the lovely white honesty and the Rosemary bushes are covered in honey bees.
I came across this plant several years ago and was fascinated by its almost pre-historic appearance. It was growing in large swathes in woodland, wonderful. I wanted some of them.
They are quite expensive but I found one when visiting RHS Wisley , Trillium kurbayashii.
Speckled leaves and lovely maroon flowers.
I decided to plant it in a pot and place the pot under a tree as it dies right down in winter and I did not want to loose this precious plant. It also prefers slightly acidic soil which we do not have.
Over winter the next year a small shoot appeared out of the soil, I covered the pot with chicken wire to stop the pidgins nibbling it and the squirrels from digging it up. The flower spike and leaves came up in February.
It is very slow growing and this year, after 4 years it had 3 flowers.
I think it will be many years (if ever) I get the carpet of Trillium I wished for.
At this time of year there are still plenty of fresh vegetables in the garden to eat.
The freezer is still stocked with strawberries and other soft fruit for putting on the breakfast porridge, gooseberries for puddings and beans to have with dinner.
The storage shed still has a few apples left, potatoes, onions and garlic. We ate the one remaining squash last week.
From the garden we are eating overwintered celeriac, leeks, beetroot, carrots and winter cabbage. The last red cabbage was cooked at the weekend and the sprouting purple broccoli, one of my favourites, despite the problems in the very dry summer, has managed to supply us with a few meals this month.
The Swiss chard has perked up again as it does in early spring so a few more meals there before the weather really turns warmer and it goes to seed.
Then the first “new” harvest of the year, forced rhubarb. Beautiful bright pink stems which cook to a lovely pink juice. We cover a few of the rhubarb crowns with forcing pots to encourage these lovely pink stems. After one picking we remove the pots and let the plant recover and it produces more stalks later in the next few months.
Beautiful, Blackthorn, Blossom for the Bees!
Not actually in our garden but over the wall in next doors garden, a bit of borrowed landscape. But we can enjoy the sight and sound of the blackthorn blossom from our garden.
Walking past the blossom a loud buzzing sounds indicates that the honey bees are enjoying an early season feast.
There are other plants in the garden which also provide the important food for not only honey bees but bumbles and any others that are around now, especially since we have had a few very warm days.
The sarcococca that I mention in the last blog is still flowering and full of bees on a warm sunny day. Also the dainty yellow flowers of winter flowering Jasmine nudiflorum
In flower too are Felicia Peteolaris
…and Clematis Wisley Cream is still flowering
Helebores are still in flower.
Several years ago I was at Pershore college in February.
Walking through the grounds I smelt a wonderful, heavy scent. Looking around I could not see any flowers that could be producing such a strong smell, everything was just evergreen leaves.
I asked the tutor who showed me a mass of evergreen foiliage beside a wall and it was sarcococca confusa (sweet box). The small white flowers were almost invisible but were definitely where the scent was coming from.
They were selling small cuttings so I bought 3 of them.
Planted beside the front path they are now well established and the wonderful scent can be smelt 10 or more metres away as we walk down the path.
A few years later I was given another sarcococca, this time hookeriana, slightly different with flowers tinged pink at the base, longer, thinner leaves and slightly bronzed stems rather than the green of the confusa.
And the bees love the nectar at the time of year.
Also in the front garden providing winter scent and colour is Daphne lovely little pink flowers and another strong scent in February.
We do not cut down all the perennials in late autumn but leave many of them until the spring.
This provides several benefits to the garden and environment.
Birds eat the seeds from many plants including echinacea and phlomis.
The “dead” flower stalk can help protect the new shoots that emerge in the spring before all the cold weather has passed. It also provides a shelter for many insects to spend the winter including ladybirds.
The garden keeps height and structure through the winter to compliment the evergreen shrubs and spring bulbs as they start to appear.
A touch of frost or a covering of snow makes for a wonderful addition to the garden in winter.
Being in the middle of England we escaped the worst of the snow of the last few days, but we may get more later on!
A hot dry April and there is a lot of blossom on the trees and bushes. The weather has been dry and not too windy so hopefully the pollina...
