Colour after the storms
A city plot near the heart of Glasgow, overflowing with flowers, fruit and veg.
Spring colour is exploding across my garden, despite the recent snow and hail storms! Vibrant hyacinths waft their scent among emerging tulips and muscari. Fritillaries nod their chequered heads above wood anemones and icy blue chionodoxa.
Queen bees are house hunting and regularly being evicted from my unheated greenhouse, which is filled with the enticing fragrance of more hyacinths and miniature narcissi.
Recent sowings of spicy salad leaves and herbs are romping
away among healthy cuttings of
salvias ‘Hot Lips’ and ‘Royal Bumble’. Tubers of dahlias ‘Café au Lait’ and ‘Henriette’ have also been potted alongside a variety of iris rhizomes and tropaeolum ‘Ken Aslet’, which has large yellow and red nasturtium blooms. Sweet peas have also been soaked and sown.
I’ve sown some mignon dahlia seeds for the Bloom for Bees trial to determine whether different colours vary in their attractiveness to bumblebees (see www.bloomsforbees.co.uk for more details).
I also received some fruit trees
and native tree seeds from the Woodland Trust for use in our community garden at the Barrowfield Centre. The trees have finally been planted and the seeds are already sprouting in pots. We were lucky to be given over 500 daffodil bulbs and they’ve all been planted.
My community group has been busy adding currant bushes, rhubarb ‘Timperley Early’ and strawberries to our barren plot. We still have loads of wildflower seeds to sow.
My handyman and I took a car journey to Aberfoyle and nearby Loch Drunkie. The scenery is spectacular, and
the little brooks were filled with frog spawn. We also visited the former royal burgh of Culross, in Fife, which is used in the TV series Outlander. I was given some cuttings of Rhodochition
atrosanguineus and I bought a miniature cherry ‘Bigarreau
Napoléon’ in a garden centre.