My gardening DIARY

MONDAY

Seeds of Orlaya grandiflora have germinated well and are big enough to move on. We sowed one large and prickly seed to each module compartment, which means they’re easy to pot up without disturbing their roots. There are 50 or so baby plants.

TUESDAY

No apologies for mentioning aster ‘Li le Carlow’ again. It’s unmatched in its grace and for its clouds of blue flowers. Now's the time to propagate it from rooted sideshoots or simply by spli ing clumps.

WEDNESDAY

The other name for our ‘brick garden’ is ‘the blue and yellow garden’. Like most gardens it's predominantly green but we try to restrict flower colour. Blue is the harder of the two but we've some magnificent pots of anchusa ‘Loddon Royalist’. How will they look beside camassias or should we separate them?

THURSDAY

Growing pumpkins always presents a problem since they take up so much space. We’re trying a smaller one called ‘Delica’ from Franchi Seeds.

FRIDAY

Dean has pruned our big apple tree. It is a ‘Cox’s Orange Pippin’, not the best apple for our locality but it was a gift and has now been producing quantities of fruit for 35 years. We’re hoping for beautiful blossom and a good crop.

SATURDAY

One of the many blue bulbs we planted last year was a deep blue muscari, some of which we po ed into square one litre pots. They've stood outside since then. Despite the neglect they’re flowering again. Four pots fit exactly in a window box once made for me by my friend Alban.

SUNDAY

It’s all very well being told to self-isolate and that we can all go into our gardens. Those of us who are lucky enough to have one could cut a couple of flowers for neighbours who aren’t so lucky and leave them with shopping.