In a Vase on Monday - In drought times

Hydrangeas are definitely a shrub which does well given the weather we usually have with a good down pour every few days.  Since until 12 o'clock today when we had a five minute shower, there has been no rain and wall to wall blistering hot sun, for several weeks.  

One of the shrubs in the garden getting the odd bucket of water has been a hydrangea. Three stems of a pink unnamed hydrangea were all the better for having a soak up to their blooms in a bucket of water.  These make the central part of this arrangement.  

Two other plants that are coping well with no watering are the Origanums, and these ones were cut from  Origanum 'Emma Stanley'.  The arching stems from Pseudodictamnus acetabulosus, and a third additional element are the stems from Hylotelephium  erythrostictum 'Frosty Morn' left over from a previous arrangement.

I mentioned in my SOS post a couple of weeks ago that I ought to take a few cuttings of Origanum 'Emma Stanley' and to bring on fresh growth I have cut off all the old stems, so in addition to this vase and a vase full which are being dried.  It is the new growth when growing vigorously that I shall use for cuttings, and also hopefully there will be a good later season show of blooms in the gravel garden, The long curving stems of Pseudodictamnus also make very good drying material.

Together with several keen gardeners, I am linking in my arrangement of home grow flowers to Cathy's post on 'Rambling in the Garden'. 

 

Six from my Garden - 12/07/2025

With the drought and wall to wall sunshine for several days, the garden is really taking a battering with things such as rose petals becoming desiccated within a day of opening.  I remember 1976 and I think this is harsher, but perhaps it is because I am further south than I was then.  It is really getting hard to find six plants that have not capitulated or that I can't bear to show.  There are others who live perhaps under more benign or with a much higher water table, they of course will be showing a more interesting array of plants and like me will be linking their posts to Jim's for these ruminations called Six on Saturday.

1. The Eryngiums seem to be showing their best colour this week with Eryngium Silver Ghost turning a good silver after looking somewhat greener a few weeks ago:

Eryngium Silver Ghost

Here in the bright sunshine it isn't dramatic as it is late evening, and with the hot nights, we have been sitting out late when the silver leaved plants show up nicely.

2. Over on the side of the seating circle the steely blue of Eryngium Planum Tetra Petra, is the best it has been for some time.

Eryngium Planum Tetra Petra

3. All sorts of bumblebees and flying insects and butterflies have been flying in the garden and availing themselves of nectar and pollen.  

4. Last week I mentioned the surprise and joy of finding a little frog.  Yesterday morning early when I went to remove some pots from a large deep tray where they had been taking up water overnight, I was even more surprised to find this toad.  This time I had my phone to hand.  This is the first time I have seen a toad in this garden.

5. This low growing creeping plant has also been a godsend for the pollinators and makes a nice addition to the edge of the gravel garden.

Phyla nodiflora commonly called Turkey tangle frogfruit

6. When one sees an unusual plant it registers somewhere deep down.  I admired this plant in a new acquaintance's garden several years ago when she had not long taken over from a person I happened to know from dancing. Again a couple of years later, whilst on holiday in Wales this plant situated in a  Japanese garden once more drew my attention.  This is the picture I took then in The Botanic Gardens of Wales.

  

I since got to know Kate and we visited each other's gardens a number of times.  She remembered my mentioning this plant, and just before she uprooted and moved away, with her car full of last minute packing, she turned up with a few small pieces.  It was touch and go but I am delighted to say that given a larger pot and quality compost, the sun and a little watering seems to have brought them to the point where I dare describe them as small flourishing Toona sinensis 'Flamingo' plants.  The other name for these is Chinese Mahogany.

Toona sinensis 'Flamingo' starter plants

It grows to be a big tree, but I shall hopefully keep it within check.

Decorated Focaccia

 Within my WI we have a crafty group that meet each month, and our leader suggested that I do a demonstration of a decorated Focaccia.  

There are loads of eye candy type coverings on the internet, and our leader already tried an instant shop bought focaccia mix.  We ought to have a proper base!  Yesterday I had a trial run at home, and just wanted to try to see what replacing half of the flour with sifted wholemeal flour would produce.  

Decorated and ready for final rise

I didn't quite get the process right as there were not the "consistently inconsistent bubbles", probably dimpled it too many times, but it was very light, delicious.  Anne said she would be alright with just white flour, so I shall be taking two batches of dough on Tuesday for the ladies to decorate.

Out of the Oven

Everything else was in accordance with Jack's recipe and technique.  The focaccia was cut up and filled as in a sandwich with home made pesto, and sliced ham to take to an Italian picnic today.

From my garden, Six things this Saturday

It is the start of another month and although this year I had not planned sufficiently for good summer displays, I've managed to find Six things from the garden to note down.  For much more summer colour and plant related things, a bunch of us gather under Jim's wing and cogitate over our gardens.  You can either just hang over the garden fence as it were, or you can join in with musings of your own, guidelines are on Jim's post. 

1. Last year in September I brought back a few plants purchased from Derry Watkins of Special plants.  One was a small plant then, but just look at it now.  I took a couple of cutting in November, and these together with the original are in the one pot.  This is Pelargonium 'Salmon Angel'. 

Pelargonium 'Salmon Angel'

Behind it is the pelargonium which was given as a plug plant by my gardening club last year which we were to grow on and bring to be judged at the summer party.  I can't remember the name, but it does go quite well with 'Salmon Angel'.

2. These next couple of weeks will be taken over with our shed refurbishment.  It is amazing how the years have flown, it is eight years since it first went up, plants have had to be moved from along the edge and the shed shelf. On the end of the shelf was this white Pelargonium,  again another plug plant from our club for growing on. I have been careful with this, as I hope to go to the Summer Party this year. 

I always feel a little discombobulated when there is disarray, whether it is when the house is being decorated or something like this is taking place.  The pots have been dotted around the garden. Mr S is very competent and also has sourced a membrane that has a twenty year guarantee, rather than just replacing the felt roof.  It will be an upgraded shed, with stainless steel hinges etc, but at the end I shall get busy with the brush and give it a coat of paint inside and out.

3. I looked at the mess of the border now that the poppies are well and truly over.

Over the last two early mornings, I have been out there cutting them to the ground, keeping some stems to use in dried arrangements, and the rest were cut with short stems and put in a large bowl, ready for harvesting the poppy seed which I use in my bread. The bed is looking much better now, and no doubt I shall show it again in the forthcoming weeks.

4. I just couldn't resist another Coleus when I went up to the market on Wednesday. Whilst the shed is being refurbished, they have been moved to sit by the willow.  The growth on Flamethrower Serrano in the foreground has been prestigious, and it has already been moved up a couple of pot sizes.  I planted 'Coral Candy' bought this week in a larger pot straight away. When we were at Dunster Castle recently they were edging the tropical themed beds with Coleus 'Skeletal' with what looked like hundreds of plants, what a show that will be.  I had Coleus  'Skeletal' envy! I am on the hunt for that one, is not a trio after all is a better show than just two?

However the most exciting thing is that when I went down to check the names for this post, a little frog jumped out.  What excitement, with such a rush of endorphins, it is making up for my worry over the lack of rain.  We haven't had a frog in the garden for years. In this hot dry weather it must have been attracted to the damp around the pots.  The large pot at the back is on feet, so there is always a cool and damp place guaranteed there.

5. Summer time is not all about sitting back and enjoying the colourful displays!  I had been meaning to do this job for a few weeks: repotting up young cyclamen that I have been growing from seed from the Cyclamen Society. Now the job has been done, they sit under the blue bench in a relatively cool and shaded situation. Maybe one or two will flower this year.

Cyclamen repotted.

It is also time for me to spread a mulch over the ground where the Cyclamen hederifolium in the garden, they are waiting on some rain to send up their flowers, so I had better get on with that job next week. I have been meaning to mulch that area for a couple of years, but there is a small window to do it in, as that is where early spring bulbs are situated too.

6. I have been buying the odd packs of small plants from the stall within the Bishop's Palace - simply to support them I tell myself.  Although it says things like Antirrhinum it doesn't give the cultivar, but am I embracing the real 'Cottage Garden' ethos, when planting just bits that become available?  It was when planting these early yesterday morning that I experienced the hard clay phase of our garden.  With water and compost I managed to make a planting hole suitable to take what is only a little more than a seedling, quite different to the large Antirrhinum which I saw recently at Waitrose, fully in bloom, looking like they were ready to plant out in some Hampton Court Palace Show garden.  I did however prepare a good large spot for them to grow into. It also made me realise that the roses could really do with a good watering.  They are very slow to reflower after their first flush, but I do have one flowering stem.

Rose Home Florist Timeless 'Charisma'

This morning any rain is amounting to a very light mizzle, just enough to make a glass surface such as our conservatory roof damp.

In a Vase on Monday at the end of June

The heat is damaging the plants in the garden and the scorching sun is taking its toll too.  An early spell gardening at around six this morning meant I was able to pick a few stems of the hydrangea before they start to flop. For other fine arrangements from garden material do go over to Cathy's post.

  

To give you an idea on how hot and dry it is, the washing dried in two hours!

The Hydrangea was first cultivated in Japan and flowers during their rainy season of June and July and etymologically hydrangea stems from the Greek words for water, hydros so fitting  since hydrangeas require constant moisture to stay happy, healthy and blooming. And spare waste water goes to them every few days.

Hylotelephium  erythrostictum 'Frosty Morn', aka 'Alison's sedum' by me since the first plant was given to me by Alison who used to contribute to IAVOM.  It certainly is a cool looking plant, with its cream edged thick waxy leaves. The blooms are still at the tight bud stage, and may not open. Another IAVOM gift from Cathy, which I love is the Persicaria Red Dragon, and to finish off the arrangement, I have added some poppy seed heads.

Bugs and plants in the garden - 28 June 2025

 The year is trotting along, and I am already noting that I didn't quite plant the right things at the right time of the year, but hey ho, there is next year to plan for and I am already doing that. For all sorts of sensible gardening observations, many can be found on Jim's post and others that put links within the comments section as I am doing. 

Six things from my garden this week:

1. Origanum Emma Stanley is certainly my favourite and trickiest decorative Origanum, and once again I ought to take have taken a few cuttings well before flowering  It is a delight in the middle of the gravel garden, but I wonder if the soil there is a little too poor.  I have given it a bit of a liquid feed. I bought it five years ago from Pottertons, but he is no longer offering it for sale, so as insurance I shall be taking a few cuttings, when hopefully there is a flush of new growth after I have cut a few of the stems back in three or four weeks time.

Origanum Emma Stanley

Origanum Emma Stanley Closeup

2. Chrysanthemum Chatsworth, which was left in the ground over the winter wasn't told that Chrysanthemums usually flower towards the autumn, it has been in flower now for a few weeks, and has already featured in one of my In a Vase on Monday. I have already started also to harvest all those poppy seed heads before they start to scatter the seeds.  I left far too many, but they are over some cyclamen and I want to get into that space to spread some mulch.

Chrysanthemum Chatsworth

3. At the top end of the gravel garden well just within the border the hot dry weather hasn't phased the Pseudodictamnus acetabulosus. Beth Chatto gives an excellent description.  

This is the patch in another bed where I pushed in some stems last autumn. Already some of this clump has been promised to a neighbour.

Close of the flowering branch, here are the bracts the little purple flower is a great favourite of pollinators.

4. The clematis Clematis 'Purpurea Plena Elegans was almost overcome with blackfly a few weeks back, but thanks to a league of ladybirds they are now under control.  I was looking at the different types, and this week saw a new one amongst them:  form of Harlequin Ladybird:  Harmonia axyridis f. conspicua. 

Harmonia axyridis f. conspicua

5. Having seen 'Venus's navelwort', now hang on to that name, which is in fact Omphalodes linifolia, a few years back, and having been luckily given a little plant this year by Alison, I decided to allow it to seed, and have just harvested  and placed them in paper envelopes. I couldn't work out what exactly was the seed, and tried to look for it on the internet. Hands up who thinks the seeds look like little navels?

Omphalodes linifolia seeds

I've read various sowing regimes, from sow in the spring after frosts etc.  I have sufficient seed to carry out my own trials, all of which will be direct sow in the ground, as I understand they do not like disturbance.  Perhaps if I stagger the sowing, I would be able to have different patches of plants flowering at different times?

6. Difficult to photograph and especially this week when we have had some usual winds is Dierama 'Snowbells'. Also called Angel's Fishing Rods...fishing for what though? Compliments perhaps? Each morning I tell it how beautiful it is and wonder at the same time whether petals will emerge from the straw like calyxes further down the stem. 

Dierama 'Snowbells'

I was just looking back on my posts from 2023 when it was the year of fasciations...non so far to report this year. If it is too hot to sleep and you wake up early, the nicest thing is to get out there early as I did this morning and do a little gardening....then come in as I did this morning to a delicious breakfast ready made.

Chatsworth and Indian Summer together for a Mid Year Vase

I just didn't know where to start.  I could have given you pastel colours, but after a very hot and sunny few days, it seems richer warmer colours suit my mood, even though it is nearly 10 C cooler than it was only a couple of days ago. I myself find hot weather difficult to cope with.

This lovely spray Chrysanthemum now in its third year, is proving quite hardy in my garden.  It is listed as Chatsworth (21c) on my invoice from Halls of Heddon, under the heading Garden and Exhibition Sprays. On checking their latest on line list it is (U21C).  I have no idea what this numbers after the name signify. Since it started flowering a couple of weeks ago, for a Chrysanthemum it is really early flowering, and the first in flower in the garden. 

The stems are longer than this, but I didn't want to sacrifice the display and snipped a couple of pieces high up the stems towards the back, of course just above a leaf from which more blooms will emerge.

The Astrantia 'Indian Summer' has given many stems so far this year. Also in the vase is a long stemmed dark Origanum.  It has no name and is probably one of those seedlings which I consider to have great merit.  A few poppy seed heads, and dark Astrantia again with no name given to me by friend Hilary, add a little further interest.

I am linking in this arrangement under Cathy's In a Vase on Monday post.    

Six on Saturday - 21 June 2025

This regular slot showing Six things from my Garden links into Jim's post, and with several followers I shall be linking this post there.

 Its been hot, with at least a couple of 'Tropical Nights' and I shall launch this week's offering with a couple of plants which are more than happy with the temperature but also need watering.

1. As I mentioned last week, for this year, there is a little potted homage to Great Dixter, going on by the shed. I went out with a friend a couple of weeks ago and ended up at a fund raising plant sale, finding there just the right plant to add to the grouping. All around me when I was growing up, were Cannas, there were green leafed ones and darker red leafed ones, with a limited range of flower colours, but never a stripy one that I remember.  I myself am completely new to growing Cannas, so it is going to be a learning curve.

2. This is the other plant that I knew from when I was young. Last week when the shed shelf with its succulents were the topic, Fred and another asked about this plant.

Bergera koenigii more easily remembered as the Curry Leaf Plant

No Mauritian curry would be complete without the wonderful fragrance that a few curry leaves impart to a dish. Our cook, gardeners or neighbours were forever raiding our clump of curry leaves..  Even a dish of dhal is elevated by the addition of a little oil in which some garlic, spices and curry leaves have been heated through and used to finish the dish just before serving.  It has two types of feeds: a winter and a summer citrus feed.  In the winter it makes a fairly elegant plant on the kitchen windowsill. I bought it at the local food festival in 2022, when I spied just a couple of plants on a stall selling a large variety of chilli plants. 

3. Low growing plants work well softening the gravel, in the absence of any lawn, they form green areas without crowding out the longer views of the garden.

4. Following on from the the curry plant neatly, may I show this lovely 'aromatic' plant which is on the right on the picture above. This is Chamaemelum nobile 'Flore Pleno'.  I love its scent, and even  in the non flowering state is sweet smelling when crushed.

For when I am not in the garden, there is always a good or charming book on gardening or plants to hand.  On my bedside table I currently have Roy Genders's 'A Book of Aromatics' published in 1977.  What a charmingly written small book this is, and full of history of the use of Aromatics across the centuries as well as horticultural tips.  

5. Also this week, another of aromatics looking good is this low growing creeping thyme. When we first laid out the garden, the delineations between soil and stone were crisp. With time and the movement of stones onto the garden by worms, and soil onto the stones by birds, the edges are getting blurred, but planting these low growing herbs and plants to keep the separation is part of the evolution of the garden.

6. Another little low plant is filling the evening air with its fragrance is Daphne x susannae 'Cheriton'

Daphne  x susannae 'Cheriton'

On the warm evenings even when there is hardly any light left in sky, walking around the garden is a great way to wind down, I pause and breath and take in the scents, and as the light was almost gone last night, I suddenly realised just how late it was, for last night was just about the shortest one this year. 

We now need a good few hours of rain....

Six things to note from my garden - Six on Saturday 14 June 2025

Mid June, and thankfully we have had some rain, but also plenty of sunshine.  Since it is Saturday, now is the time to post six things from my garden, which is being linked into Jim's post.  So for even more garden musings do go over and enjoy.

1. Following on our visit to Great Dixter, I decided to pay homage to Christopher Llyod, or at least that is my excuse for picking a bunch of plants I had been fancying growing for a number of years. Great Dixter is well known for the collection of plants individually grown in pots amassed by the front door.

Gazania Frosty Kiss

This plant is what my dearly beloved describes as a clown's or magician's prop, which opens up when they pull it out of their sleeve, it is totally over the top and only opens when the sun is bright. The other two plants which I picked up quickly from the same market stall were ( was Lantana Bandolero Orange and Coleus Flamethrower Serrano.  My parents used to grow these types of plants, and I remember the smell of the Lantana hedge along the board boundary to their house.

2. Up on the shed shelf, even the succulents etc have been appreciating the showers we have enjoyed this week.

3. Once I have a plant that I love and does well in the garden, I am drawn to spotting them, and if in the right place, ie I can ask or buy another different cultivar, then I do.  In this way I now have several different Rodohypoxis.  They are currently on the garden tables in pots.

Rodohypoxis on garden table

After being kept dry overwinter in the shed as recommended, I gave them a water, and when they started to shoot divided them up.  Over the few years I have done this, and I must have forgotten than I had put some into the gravel garden and that I ought to have lifted them if following the advice of keeping them dry during the winter.  This little plant proves that for my garden, even with all the rain we had earlier in the winter, the Rodohypoxis can be left out all winter. 

Rodohypoxis growing in the gravel garden

4. Another plant in full flight in the gravel garden is Saxifrage Southside Seedling.

5. Photobombing as it were the above two photography is Hypericum polyphyllum grandiflorum, which is ready early morning for the visiting bumblebees.

6. Another poppy which I had been lurking in my seed box for a few years has come up, it is almost black.  I've lost the seed packet, so no name. Again early in the morning full of pollen and ready for the bumblebees.

Last week I showed a poppy casting its sepals, and people asked what it was like fully open....

In a Vase on Monday

When I posted my Six things from the garden on Saturday, someone mentioned how early the Fuchsia was.  We have a sheltered garden and this Fuchsia is not cut down to ground level, with the growth from just the top of thickening four foot stems cut back in March,  with new growth since then. I am perhaps trying to grow thick trunks over the coming years. 

Phalaris arundinacea, and the strickling white Zantedeschia aethiopica or Arum Lily, which all grow close together.  In the middle of the vase and also under the foot of the old elephant are some foliage from a new 'unnamed' Gingko which I picked up at 'Rocky Mountain'.

The vase was prepared yesterday ready for ladies from the WI coming over for Knit and Natter.  When I first suggested such a group, there was such a response that several groups were set up to accommodate the numbers as there was not one home who could hold so many.  I think there are five groups altogether.  The groups are very inclusive and for some it is just an opportunity to have coffee or tea, and companionship.  This morning first thing, I made a really lovely Victoria Sponge with the best of strawberry jams home made on Friday from delicious Cheddar strawberries, and some ginger and spelt biscuits, made yesterday. 

The creator of this weekly sharing of flowers from the garden is Cathy, and when I post on Monday I link into her blog.

In the garden: Six on Saturday at the start of June 2025

What a change in the weather and light conditions from just a few weeks ago.  We were away house sitting for a son of a friend.  Wow their garden was huge, but I hope I left it in good condition. As well as being cooler with rain, we have had some unusual winds here. For insights into what several gardeners and plant enthusiasts are writing about this week, the place to go is is 'Garden Ruminations', where Jim is the custodian of our weekly musings.

1. Early morning is the time to catch the poppies about to cast off the outer sepals and then unfold their creased chiffon like petals, the pale early morning light enhancing the ethereal look, and their grey green glaucous foliage. 

They are coming up all over the garden, but are easily removed.  I will keep a few plants up until I can harvest the seed heads, which I enjoy arranging and also save the seed to use in my bread making.

2. Over in the gravel garden this small low growing Teucrium pyrenaicum, I acquired last year, is one the bees just love.

Teucrium pyrenaicum 

However it was too early to catch the bees visiting, they are rather later rises!

3. Over towards Gooseberry Corner, the gooseberries are doing their thing, and we have already had a good picking from Gooseberry Invicta, but this picture is from  Gooseberry Hinnonmaki Red. Its berries are much smaller than last year, probably due to the very warm and dry months, but we are now into a much cooler and damp period, so maybe the more immature berries will swell a little.  So far the squirrels have been completely content with eating all the apples on D'Arcy Spice, but there are only two or three left and I may be in for a shock one morning to find the berries stripped!

Gooseberry Hinnonmaki Red

4. I'm not going to mention scent from roses as the ones in the garden here pale into insignificance compared to the ones at Sissinghurst, which we visited last week.  However there is perfume coming from the Valeriana officinalis, which has self seeded itself towards Gooseberry Corner.

5. The clump forming Phalaris arundinacea probably needs to be reduced this year, but for now it makes a lovely addition setting off several plants, such as the white arum and darker plants behind.

6. I kept the thickening long stems in a pollarding fashion and all the green is this year's growth.  This is a hardy Fuchsia, name unknown, and it has now been in flower since first weeks of May, but is now forming a colourful pop up against the garden/cemetery stone wall. 

I have mixed views regarding the various gardens we visited, but gradually thoughts about my own garden are readjusting in light of what I saw. Hopefully during the week, I shall get to upload a few of the pictures I took along with some thoughts in a few posts.

Flowers and Books

 Although I have been somewhat lax in joining the rendezvous for In a Vase on Monday, that is not to mean that flowers have not been cut and arranged.  They have however been just simple affairs, and could not be called 'arrangements' in any sense of the word.  The vases  just hold a few flowers which have either caught my attention, or needed to be cut as part of the management of the garden or plant.

In the first instance below, this vase has been sitting on the mantlepiece for a number of months.  This is a rather special vase to me and the twigs picked up from under a road side growing tree after the storms earlier this year.  They are from The Alder Tree and although bearing both male and female catkins on the same tree, these little cone like fruits are the remains of the female fruit. I am often pulled towards monochrome arrangements and this has to be a favourtie at the moment.

I'm a little behind in linking in my reading and the best book that I have read for a very long time, and a good pairing for this arrangement of the Alder, is How to Read a Tree by Tristan Gooley, of which this is an excellent review.

How to Read a Tree by Tristan Gooley

For my next arrangement only picked earlier today it is roses, stems from a couple of the Rose Home Florist Timeless Collection. No greenery seemed to match the rich green of the healthy leaves, so none was chosen. 

To go with this arrangement 

This was one of the two books we discussed at our last WI Book Club lunch meeting.  I quite liked this book, and felt the style and perhaps simplicity implied to me that it would be the second book the main character Marianne Clifford would write especially as it is written in the first person.  I would give it a four out of five, but would quite surprised that few others in the group liked it at all. 

With having to clear a bed of old growth partly to mulch and to allow new growth to emerge for another wave of flowering, I just popped a few saved stems into a little vase.  Blue and white make for a nice combination and up close the structure is exquisite. White  Centaurea Montana Alba and the Scabiosa 'Butterfly Blue.

The second book we discussed was There are Rivers in the Sky by Elif Shafak.  What a beautiful book, and a great story linking people across different eras, backgrounds, and continents.  Our group apart from two who gave up about a third of the way in, really liked it, and with their encouragement, those two were encouraged to persevere and it will be interesting to hear how they got on at our next meeting. 

There are Rivers in the Sky by Elif Shafak

Some time ago I enjoyed meeting Elif Shafak, and also hearing her at a book presentation at Kenilworth library, and have read at least two of her books.  I really would like to read more of hers.