My gardening DIARY

MONDAY

I remember Tulipa clusiana ‘Cynthia’ as being soft pink on the outside of its petals and pale creamy yellow within. Labels must have become mixed up between this and another tulip with the brightest yellow interiors. Fortunately, I planted the right tulip, the real ‘Cynthia’ in a tree pot lowered into our copper cauldron.

TUESDAY

Our purple-leaved bird cherry, Prunus padus ‘Colorata’ has never had a better spring and is smothered with sprays of blossom. The brick paths below its branches are dusted with the pink confetti of its fallen flowers.

WEDNESDAY

Erysimum ‘Bowles’s Mauve’ is most gardeners’ go to perennial wallflower with its robust habit, glaucous leaves and scented, lilac flowers. Late spring is a good time to increase it by striking short sideshoots taken with a heel and trimmed with a sharp knife or from terminal shoots.

THURSDAY

Sowing purplesprouting broccoli seeds both directly in short rows in one of our big veg troughs and in a half seed tray. Almost all brassicas seem to germinate rapidly at this time of the year and the seed sown in the greenhouse was up within a week.

FRIDAY

One brood of blue tits seem to already have fledged, there’s a lot of tweeting and fluttering around. The birds seem emboldened by the advancing years and slower responses of our cats, Sylvie and Sylvester.

SATURDAY

Cuckoo flower, milk flower, lady’s smock – there are so many country names for Cardamine pratensis, which shows the fondness we have for this meadow flower. It’s just come into bloom in the field alongside us.

SUNDAY

Planting out Euphorbia myrsinites, a delightful spurge from the sunny slopes of the middle east. Its sprawling, sinuous stems have evolved to hug the ground, creating their own shade.