Guilty Pleasures

It's just too tempting...

Every supermarket you go into, they're stacked up almost immediately inside the door.

Your conscience says, "Walk on by.  You've come in for Fair Trade bananas, milk and the usual yellow label bargain hunting expedition.  Don't fall for the marketing ploy!"

"Everyone else is buying them," says the little demon on your other shoulder. 

"It isn't something you need.  You'd be letting yourself down."

"You know you want to!"

"But it's totally against your principles.  You'll die of shame if you run into someone you know at the checkout."

"They're on a multibuy special offer.  You know you can't resist a bargain!"

"You won't enjoy them.  You'll be anticipating something really tasty and you'll be bitterly disappointed.  Shop-bought new potatoes are never as tasty as your own home grown ones..." 

You did know this moral dilemma was about potatoes, didn't you?

Our trusty Sarpo Miras from last year actually lasted until just a couple of weeks ago when we roasted and ate the last few.  If the first earlies had developed properly, we shouldn't even have been contemplating buying taters. 

But there's only so long I can get by getting my carbs from pasta and rice; by mid June I crave new potatoes.  Usually, I can dig my own from the back garden and have them on the plate within half an hour.  Delicious!

Much as it pains me to admit it, I have had a complete disaster with first early potatoes this year.  I've never had a total 'fail' like this before.  I don't know whether the weird weather is to blame, or buying 'bargain shop' seed potatoes rather than sourcing them from a reliable supplier, but none are anything like ready to dig and in fact they appear to be giving it up as a bad job and just fading away.  You can't entirely blame them.

In short, we had dud spuds.

'Highland Burgundy Red' and 'Ratte' (this year's trial variety) second early seeds spuds

I'd be lying if I said that this year has been anything other than disappointing generally on the fruit and veg front so far.  The weird weather has been taking its toll on everything except the slugs.  It appears that no plums have set.  Carrots, swedes and parsnips have been sown twice and either not germinated or vanished completely on two occasions now.  There were five spindly spears of asparagus, fewer than last year when I had hoped we'd actually have a usable crop this year.

Who ya gonna call?  Blightbusters!  'Sarpo Mira', 'Sarpo Axona' and 'Blue Danube'

Fortunately, down on the allotment, the second earlies and main crop are still looking good (all from reputable suppliers) although the weather conditions suggest it'll be time to mix the Bordeaux Mixture soon and that even the 'blight busters' will be put through their paces this year.  The onions and garlic look fine too.  The broad beans are a bit 'could do better', but at least they've formed pods.  The peas are a lost cause.

Jon at the allotment - 2nd early and main crop spuds, plus onions and garlic all doing well.

Meanwhile, back in the garden, blackbirds are decimating the redcurrants before they are even ripe. Ironically I think this is because last year they finally worked out that whitecurrants weren't unripe redcurrants after all; they had previously assumed they were and left them alone. Now it seems they think the unripe redcurrants are ripe whitecurrants! 

That's blackbirds for you; they sing beautifully but they aren't all that bright really.

I made the mistake of planting out some courgettes on one of the dry days last week, thinking they would get off to a good start with the forecast of some warm, wet weather.  They were clinging to life rather precariously yesterday, before the horrendously heavy rain this afternoon.  I don't know if I can't bear to look...

Still, at least no-one's worrying about a drought any more!

Happy Memories

Classic Dutch landscape near Appletern Gardens

There is no good news from the garden this week.  The early summer perennials that were making a brave show in the front garden have been battered virtually horizontal by several days of heavy rain and some winds with more than a hint of October about them, which is a great shame as the oriental poppes were looking particularly fantastic. 

It is tempting to give the whole lot a slightly belated 'Chelsey Chop' and see what comes back later...

I fear for the later summer perennials too, as the foul weather has made short-lived blue goo of my eco-friendly slug pellets, allowing the massed mollusc armies to feed mercilessly on Helenniums and Rudbeckias alike.  They have also done for the second sowings of carrots, parsnips and swedes in the veg patch, the slimy little scumbags.

So let us turn our eyes from the catalogue of disasters on the home front and instead consider some gardens at the peak of perfection, returning to the Netherlands trip at the beginning of May and some pictures from glorious Appeltern.

Wonderful water feature

Unlike the foul and filthy weather that battered us at the Floriade, we were blessed with warm sunshine for our visit to these fabulous show gardens.  It was a shame, therefore, that after being frozen the day before I had erred on the side of caution and put on two pairs of socks!

Pergola and interesting shadow effect

The various gardens at Appeltern showcased both innovative and traditional design styles and were beautifully planted, a contrast to several of the Floriade gardens.

Sculpture and simple design

They are continually maintained and improved by the companies who use them to show off their hard landscaping materials, sculpture products or plants, so there were some areas under reconstruction, as well as an entire section of very avant garde schemes.

Great combination of black and blue

There were also plenty of examples of the dense, naturalistic planting that characterises Dutch New Wave garden design, with the last spring bulbs dotted amongst emerging summer perennials.

Landscape in minature

Many gardens made interesting use of water, sometimes mirroring the dykes that criss-cross the Dutch landscape.

The islands and pond are both slightly offset, giving this garden a more dynamic feel

Ponds came in all shapes and sizes, but almost all had been colonised by noisy brilliant green frogs!

Amphibian residents

There were some intriguing uses of certain plants as well.  Bamboo, generally used as a tall, architectural plant for impact or screening appeared in several gardens as a low hedge or clipped into boxes.

Bamboo boxes

 Interesting effects using structurs and shadows were also visible thanks to the sunlight, that we would have missed on a dull day.

Sculpture and shadows

It was easy to spend the six or so hours that we had exploring the many gorgeous gardens, but luckily there was also a superb self-service restaurant where a particularly delicious apple cake was available, so we could rest weary feet and discuss our favourite plants and gardens.

This beautiful Cornus was a star of the show

So, we've got the inspiration - we just need the weather to get out there and make it all happen!

It's a jungle out there!

Nothing like good gardening weather to put a halt to the blogging, and at last there was a smattering of such at the end of May.  So we went narrowboating...

I'm sure any gardeners reading this will be entirely familiar with that strange way that being away from your garden effectively messes with space-time.  While you're at home, plants grow in normal time, with little change from one day to the next.  When you're away, even if you don't travel faster than light speed, back home 'garden time' speeds up.

We left home about two weeks ago with the garden very much in mid-spring mode, with tulips and forget-me-nots the stars of the show.

Tulips - and not from Amsterdam....

On our return there was not a tulip to be seen, the forget-me-nots had run to seed and the aquilegias had made a concerted bit for world domination, taking over the front and back gardens and making aggressive forays into the vegetable patch.  Needless to say, there is not a trace of germinating carrots to be seen down there and the cats have decided that the cabbage bed provides excellent WC facilities.

Cottage garden chaos in the front garden

The arches and pergolas are festooned with long dreadlocks of disorderly new Clematis montana growth and the 'Sealing wax' climbing rose has sent up great long spiney shoots as if on a mission to keep Sleeping Beauty and her prince apart.

Overgrown arch and seedy forget-me-nots

So it's all in need of a serious hair cut.  Unfortunately, the weather has turned autumnal now; initial pruning was curtailed when it occured to me that up a metal step ladder wielding metal secateurs was a bad place to be with "thundery showers" as the weather forecast, but I'm glad I've managed to take some of the excess off with high winds now the forecast.

At least if it's rubbish weather for a few days, I should get chance to update the blog and put some more photos from Holland on.



Inspiration

It's fair to say that when one of your room-mates greets the day with the words "Did any of you used to watch Tenko?" you're unlikely to be in particularly luxurious accommodation.
 
In this particular case, I was sharing a room with five other 'ladies of a certain age' and one younger colleague at the Stayokay hostel near Arnhem in the Netherlands, as part of a study tour group from Reaseheath College, visiting the ten-yearly Floriade festival and the gardens at Appeltern.  To be fair to the Stayokay, the Tenko reference was a bit unfair as there was plenty of food and if anything the guards could have been a little more vigilant as our male colleagues awoke on the last morning to find an additional unscheduled guest occupying the spare bed in their room!

'Butterflies' at the Floriade

Unfortunately we had pretty poor weather on the day we visited Venlo where Floriade was taking place and in fact it appeared that the site had been hit by similar cold and wet weather to that which has plagued the UK this spring.

The exhibition was not quite as I had expected; I was expecting more conventional 'show gardens' of the type we see at Tatton Park, rather than the large scale planting schemes, large pavillions and conceptual gardens, and some things that were, to be honest, just plain weird!

Flowers in the rain at Floriade

There were some glorious examples of mixed tulip and perennial or spring bedding planting in a range of colour schemes.

Spring bedding

One excellent feature was a cable car running north to south across the huge site.  The rain rather spoilt the view from this, but it was the best way to give a sense of scale - the shot below shows just one huge glasshouse pavillion which was full of fantastic floral displays. 



From the cable car

  

 This huge pavillion really was truly spectacular, but there were also some things that were surprisingly odd.  One stand which we expected to have real tulips in looked more like the hold of the wretched spaceship at the beginning of Alien:

Knowing what happened to John Hurt, we left quickly without getting too close...

Appeltern was an entirely different experience; a vast array of beautiful show gardens under a clear blue sky and on a mild spring day.  Unfortunately, having been pretty chilly the day before, I erred on the side of caution and kept on my 'Darth Vader' boots and two pairs of socks, so didn't enjoy the fine day quite as I should.

There was a lot to see, so I'll write that up as a separate post shortly.

I also have a decision stillto make regarding future study at Reaseheath since, against my gloomy predictions, I managed to pass all of my RHS Level 2 exams again and, ironically, got the best results for the final paper (89%) which was the one I was certain I had completely flunked.  The big decision is, do I do the much-praised RHS level 2 'Practical' or go on to Level 3?  Either is an option, but I keep changing my mind! 



Staffordshire Spring

No sooner do I complain of constant rain than there's a brief break in the clouds, enabling me to scamper (if someone of my size can truly be said to 'scamper') out into the back garden to snap some photos.

It's a real pity that there has been quite so much heavy rain since I invested in a lot of jonquil narcissi for the herb garden area and hoped to be able to enjoy their fragrance while working outdoors during the spring.  Instead, the only way to appreciate them has been to pick a few stems to bring indoors.



Focal point at the moment is the 'Doyenne du Comice' pear tree that I am rather proud of having trained and pruned to rather a nice 'festoon' shape which enables it to carry a good crop and look ornamental at the same time. In a little while there should be contrasting pink blossom on the crab apple behind it.

I put some tulips, bought as a special offer, into pots around the patio and herb garden this year and they seem to have escaped the worst ravages of both the weather and the slugs so far.

The back garden tends to be at it's best between now and the end of June though I hope that some extra planting last summer to add astrantia and penstemons to the borders might extend the season.  It's just a shame that the last time we were able to sit out in it was the end of March before most of these plants were in flower!

Drought conditions? I don't think so...

It's almost the end of April and - shock, horror - I still have most of my potatoes to plant and a lot of work to do in the garden and on the allotment.  But not right now, because the ground is just too wet.  It's ironic that with hosepipe bans in force around the country, rain is stopping me from doing any meaningful vegetable cultivation, but that's the way it is!

Meanwhile (exciting news) I do have a proper commercial garden project in hand and it's a real challenge for me as my clients' taste in garden design is very different from my own, with a keeness for specimen plants, clean lines and formality rather than my cottage garden chaos look.  My mission is essentially to get these playing as team rather than just being outstanding individual talents, hence the nickname 'the Manchester City Garden'.

There is also a wish to encourage more wildlife into the garden, so I'm trying to identify well-bahaved and structural plants that also bring in the bees and butterflies.  Sedums look like a good choice at the moment.

Fortunately the garden in question has raised beds and flagged paths it is workable in all weathers, so hopefully more can be done between the showers during the coming week.  Whereas at home, it looks very much like rain continues to stop play...

Beautiful Bodnant

No posts for a while must surely mean one of two things.  Either I have been busy working hard in the gardens of eager customers, or...

That's right, we've been on holiday.  We had a few days over in Snowdonia celebrating Jon's birthday, which was one of those significant ones.

There's a lot to do now that we're back and the weather has decided to be unpleasant again and so rather than try to write a long descriptive article about the glorious gardens at Bodnant near Llandudno, I thought I'd see if a slide show could be attached as an alternative...

http://www.flickr.com//photos/30634865@N03/sets/72157629751705485/show/

Hope the link works - if so, enjoy!