My show daffs are showing their noses
The weather recently has been very mixed, varying from mild and damp with lots of showers interspersed with some bright, cold, frosty days. The rows of daffodils in my show beds are clearly defined as most varieties are showing their noses. I’ve been able to hoe between them without fear of damaging the emerging foliage. I'll apply a good sprinkling of sulphate of potash along the rows this week. Potash strengthens the flower stems and accentuates the colour of the flowers. Inside, white bulbocodiums (hoop petticoat daffodils) are flowering in pots. I’m quite pleased with them as I grew them from seed, sown four years ago. These daffodils are grown indoors as the bulbs must be kept dry during summer months when the foliage has died down. Snowdrops are also flowering outside. I now have a good clump of Galanthus elwesii with its large leaves and early blooms. Galanthus ‘Green Brush’, bought as a single bulb in Holland two years ago, has produced six flowers this year with its distinctive green mark on the outer petals.
Iris reticulata ‘Palm Springs’ grown outside in a pot has just come into flower with dark blue petals. Other pots of iris are showing buds. The first of the primulas are starting to flower. The gold-laced polyanthus have multiple stems and will be followed by other polyanthus and primroses, which include some of the dark-leaved ‘Kennedy’ types.
Some hardwood cuttings, taken more than a year ago, have been potted on recently. These include the flowering currant ‘Elkington’s White’, skimmia and cuttings from a shrub willow that has attractive catkins.
My sweet pea seed has been sown recently and I hope to prepare the planting site during the next dry spell. I’ll dig out a trench and line the bottom of it with leaf mould
as sweet peas like to have a deep root run that doesn’t dry out in warm weather. Hopefully the bed will have settled and I’ll have the structure in place for cordon growing in time to plant them out in mid-April. Wow, three dry, mild days in a row, so I started the lawn mower and cut the back grass, or to be more honest I cut back the ‘moss’! The winter weather so far has been ideal for its growth. Still it’s green, and the back lawn looks much tidier now.