April bloomers

It is Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day over at Carol’s May Dreams Gardens, a whole month has passed since last time, where did it go? Here in London we have had all sorts of gardening weather, mainly dry and fine although cold, but the last week we have finally got a bit of the long awaited rain. Not enough to call off the hosepipe ban that was introduced on the 5th April though, rumours say we might be stuck with the water restrictions the whole summer.

So much has happened in my garden the past month, some flowers have come and gone, some has just started to emerge. I still wait for some plants to stick their heads above the ground or put on leaves, probably due to the rather cold weather we have had the last few weeks. But let’s get on with the list, I have lots of photos for you today :-)

Narcissi Pipit is a late version of daffodils, some have yet to open on my shady side. Here they are next to Tulip 'Purissima', also a later version than my other tulips, the pink and the red ones, which all have finished flowering by now.

Narcissi, Pipit close up. They are advertised as sweetly scented, I must admit I don’t like the scent at all….I think it smells like cat wee!

Tulip 'Purissima' close up, they really are pure white.

I promised you more flowers of my rhododendron Christmas Cheer last month, but the flowering is almost finished, the plant decided to put all its effort into growing new shoots instead. This rhododendron was a new purchase last autumn, and will take a few years to become an established plant. It can reach 2m in width and height after 15-20 years.

Here is also a newcomer to the garden, I have two and I haven’t even found a permanent home to them. This is Euphorbia amygdaloides 'Rubra', not really a very showy plant, but still quite striking when it gets a bit bigger. It can reach a height of 1m after a few years and mine are destined for the shady corner under the big conifer.

My ballerinas are still flowering, Trillium cuneatum is the name of these beauties.

The mice in my garden are growing well, Arisarum  proboscideum, or 'Mouse Plant' as most people will know them as.

The camellia is still flowering, the first flowers opened on 19th February, and there are a good few weeks of flowering left, that is quite a long flowering period for a camellia I think!

The Loropetalum chinense, new in my garden last year, is flowering again, despite flowering last November!

And here is a teaser for you for next month, Lily of the Valley. I started with 6 plants I got from someone as suckers 8 years ago. Since then I have dug up and replanted suckers every year and I have them in 3 different areas of the garden. I have no idea how many I have in total but there must be well over 100 plants! I love these tiny flowers with the sweet scent, a true spring flower and lovely as cut flowers in a vase.

The woodland corner in my garden is continuing to develop. I am quite chuffed that it actually has turned out exactly like I wanted! First I had cyclamens through the winter, then white crocuses, then blue, then came the anemones in between the crocuses, and now finally the Arisaema amurenses have entered the scene. This is a plant in the ‘Jack in the pulpit’ family and I got one tiny plant 8 years ago. It grew in a large pot and self seeded prolifically, so much that when I replanted the corms last autumn to my woodland corner I think I must have had 70-80 corms of various size.

Only the larger corms flowers, but I have found lots of leaves from the smaller corms so they seem to have tolerated the move well. Give it another 5 years and this area will be covered with arisaemas every spring! I have put together some of the photos I have taken from the woodland corner and made a short video. It starts in January and ends a couple of days ago and shows how this corner has developed after I redesigned the garden last autumn. The video is best viewed in 720p and in full screen, please adjust your settings for best quality. Any annoying ads can be removed by clicking the X inside the ad.

And lastly, my cat hasn’t been here for ages! I thought it was about time I showed some photos of him again, as he is my companion whenever I am outside in the garden. He usually finds a sunny spot to lie and relax, but will come and get a stroke and a cuddle now and then.

Isn’t he cute? :-)

So that was my garden in mid April 2012, so far a quite average spring despite the relatively mild winter we had – nothing very early and nothing very late. I still have hellebores and one sarcococca flowering, my roses are in bud and the lilies are on their way up. My rhododendron Dopey has fat buds that might open soon if we get a bit of warm weather and the dregea sinensis has tiny leaves and flowers emerging. Isn’t spring a great time! Until next time, take care.