The garden in June

Kari-Astri Davies is inspired by umbellifers, finding a place for pink and finishing planting her summer beds

HEDGEROWS ARE THICK with creamy plates of elder flowers. On a dry day, I will pick some of the sweetly metallic-tanged heads to make elderflower champagne. In the garden, a chorus of chiffchaffs proclaims from on high. This warbler’s proud, but rather monotonous, song often dominates the garden soundscape in summer.

Umbrella-like clusters

Last June, I went seeking inspiration from umbellifer doyenne Derry Watkins. Her nursery, Special Plants, is located just outside Bath. Clutching maps and information on feature plants looking good in June, our group was released into her garden to wander at will.

In a sunny, raised gravel bed, European native perennial Laserpitium siler, an almost shrubby-looking umbel, with flattened, glaucous leaves, was accompanied by striking shaggy-headed, metallic-blue Eryngium x zabelii ‘Jos Eijking’. Lavender flowered, self-seeding annual Tragopogon crocifolius punctuated billowing masses of delicate-leaved

Ligusticum lucidum. Astrantias, also in the umbellifer family, included a deliciously dramatic stand of ‘Gill Richardson’, named for the Lincolnshire plantswoman who originally made the selection.

Angelica sylvestris ‘Purpurea’ added dark lushness to fresh-leaved borders. In Allium Alley, it was combined with pops of lilac Allium cristophii and the just-going-over, green-spoked heads of allium ‘Purple Sensation’.

Subtly planted, shaded border combinations, backed by physocarpus, euphorbia, grasses and ferns, included bronzy Bupleurum longifolium, belled Mathiasella bupleuroides and the shiny fern-like leaves of Molopospermum peloponnesiacum. Tall, wavy, yellow-flowered Heptaptera triquetra also caught my eye: I have failed, so far, to grow this plant from seed, unlike Laserpitium siler, although it has not found its ‘happy place’ in my garden yet. Many umbel seeds should ideally be sown as they ripen; the pots overwintered outside in a cold frame for good germination.

Pink in the garden

The word ‘pink’, when used to describe a colour, is said to derive from the dianthus; either referring to the ‘pinked’, or jagged, petal edges or to the central eye they often have. The flowers of Dianthus plumarius, the wild parent of many garden pinks, vary from dark pink to white. If asked whether or not I liked pink flowers, my answer would be: “Not really”. But when I started to look around the June garden, there was a fair amount of pink on display. In the cutting patch, Paeonia lactiflora cultivars flowering in succession include delicate pink ‘Catharina Fontijn’, darker ‘Monsieur Jules Elie’ and mauvey-pink stalwart ‘Sarah

“And I will pu’ the pink, the emblem o’ my dear, For she’s the pink o’ womankind, and blooms without a peer”

Robert Burns, ‘The Posie’

Bernhardt’. A blowsy single, possibly ‘Nymphe’, cerise with a golden boss of stamens, adds fizz to the rose bed.

Not all my roses are intense reds: I have boldly pink ‘Madame Isaac Péreire’; shell-pink damask roses ‘Jacques Cartier’ and heavily scented ‘Kazanlik’; prettily pinked-petalled ‘Fimbriata’; and the palely flushed, repeat flowering climber ‘Blush Noisette’. Elsewhere, bright pink-flowered, tenderish evergreen Geranium palmatum adds an exotic touch, while the startling black-eyed, magenta pink Geranium psilostemon envelops all in its path.

Sweet peas in the cutting patch have to incorporate pinks among the pastels. This year’s picks include ‘Gwendoline’ and bi-coloured ‘Promise’. Later, crinum, vibrant nerines and asters will carry splashes of pink through into autumn, so I suppose pink does have its place.

Beds and borders

This month, I am finishing planting out summer bedding plants. In the main border, these include tall, white antirrhinum ‘Royal Bride’, Limonium sinuatum ‘Iceberg’, Ammi majus and Nicotiana alata. I will also plant nicotiana along the pergola path for evening scent. In the south-facing raised borders, heliotropes, tender pennisetums, begonias and fuchsias will mingle with dahlias, eucomis and gingers overwintered in the ground.

n“There are birds and there are flowers The fairest things that be— And these great and joyful dowers, Oh! ‘they all belong to me’”

Eliza Cook, ‘They All Belong to Me’

Left to right: Picking sprays of grape-scented elder flower; bold astrantia ‘Gill Richardson’; sea holly mixed with Ligusticum lucidum; pops of allium ‘Purple Sensation’ backed by euphorbia.

Kari-Astri Davies started gardening in her twenties with pots of roses, geraniums and sweet peas on a parapet five storeys up in central London. She’s now on her fifth garden, this time in the Wiltshire countryside. Inspiration includes her plant-mad parents, as well as Dan Pearson, Beth Chatto, Keith Wiley and the Rix & Phillips plant books. Kari describes her approach as impulsive, meaning not everything is done by the book.

Left to right: A head of laserwort seedcases, Laserpitium siler; planting and watering beds in the June sunshine; mauve-pink ruffles of peony ‘Sarah Bernhardt’.