From T shirts back to winter jumpers and a gardening coat and I’m still cold when I go outside! I managed a bit of gardening yesterday, cutting back and weeding in the back gravel area so that I was sheltered by the house from the freezing cold north wind but even so had to give up when my fingers were numb, in spite of gardening gloves! I also managed to take a few photos which are as follows for my six……
No 1 Berberis
In the front by the garage is quite a large Berberis bush which is keeping all the bees happy, if they venture out in the cold wind.
No 2 Primula Guinivere
Looking lovely at the moment on the rockery and in the bog garden is Primula Guinivere, just love the colour of the flowers and the contrast with the purple leaves.
No 3 Epimedium
Just starting to flower is Epimedium Amber Queen by the archway into the woodland. The one in the woodland isn’t any where near flowering yet, in fact I think it got caught by frost a while back. Amber Queen is such a superb plant, it flowers for ages and ages, doesn’t seem to want to stop once it gets going.
In the woodland is Epimedium x warlayense, always the first to flower for me.
No 4 Cyclamen repandum
Cyclamen repandum has done better this year than last, but still not spreading like C. hederifolium unfortunately. Maybe I need to clear more space around it and give it a nice mulch for the seeds to fall into.
No 5 Fritillaria meleagris.
Couldn’t do a post and not include the snakeshead fritillaries could I ! I think they are at their best at the moment, but I don’t have as many white ones as usual this year.
No 6 Anemone blanda.
In a sunny spot in the woodland are a few Anemone blanda, nestled between the huge roots of one of my chestnut trees. They are increasing year on year, so if I’m patient, I might have a drift in a few years!
Those are my 6 for this week, a week when we have really gone back to winter. The other day we had horizontal snow whizzing past the window, it didn’t come to anything thank goodness, the sun then came out and melted anything that had dared to stick, but even so it must have been a shock for all the flowers that had been tempted to open.
Many thanks go to our host Jon The Propagator, do pop over to see what else is going on in the gardening world, you might be surprised!
