Variety of colour still on show
Grows a huge variety of spring bulbs in his Northern Ireland garden.
Ipicked the last of the apples in a hurry when storm Brian was forecast. They’re cookers and they’ve been stored in a box in the garage. These apples will be used for cooking until well after the New Year. The storm wasn’t as bad as predicted and with the help of an 2.4m (8ft) escallonia hedge, the garden still kept quite a lot of colour.
The dahlias hung on up to the frosts, with collarette dahlia ‘Don Hill’ producing a late flourish of dark red flowers. Others were useful for cut flowers for the house. The last of the annual
poppies still sported a few blooms until recently, while a self-sown nasturtium appeared with yellow flowers with orange-red blotches. I’ll wait to see if it produces any seed.
hriass poerotidduiscseimd its usual display of bright orange seeds. They must be viable, as I find seedlings growing in lots of different places in the garden!
I seem to have two different varieties of nerine, a pink and a darker pink (almost red) one that seems to flower a week later than the lighter one.
I have a few autumn crocuses, too. Some are in pots and others have appeared in the garden. They must have survived in discarded compost from pots. Their blue flowers are welcome.
In the cold greenhouse, a few self-sown rebutias are in flower. They’ve managed to germinate and grow on an aluminium bench where some debris has collected against a sheet of polystyrene insulation. A lithop has also produced a starry, yellow flower.
Some Christmas cacti in the greenhouse have flowered after producing their telltale small buds. Geraniums are also still in bloom and the cuttings I took in early September are rooted and have been potted on. The valotta bulbs (Scarborough lilies) are still producing flowering stems.
I acquired a few more daffodil bulbs at our local gardening group’s auction. These bulbs have been planted at the same time as my first daffodil flowers of the season have opened – courtesy oNfaar cbiesasuust iful white huylbbroicdowdihuimch is in a pot in the cold greenhouse.
Last year’s leaves have been removed from the compost bin and dug into the soil in the vacant plot where the daffodil bulbs were lifted last June. This leaves the bin free for this year’s fallen leaves.