Bloomin’ mad!
How 31 different plants are flowering in one balmy Southern garden
Here’s spectacular proof of the unseasonably mild pre-Christmas weather. every year, sarah Fielding likes to pick the flowers blooming in her Hampshire garden on December 7, turning them into a bouquet for her husband Michael’s birthday.
Last year presented very thin pickings: after a cold November, she found just nine stragglers. In 2013, there were a dozen.
This winter, however, thanks to the abnormally high temperatures, sarah has collected a record 31 different blooms.
several — such as hydrangeas, passion flowers and roses — have been flowering for many weeks, if not months. But their longevity has come as a complete surprise — just like the premature daffodils that are already being cut in fields in Cornwall to be sold in supermarkets and florists across the country.
The Fieldings also have early bloomers, including a clematis armandii, which usually appears in March or April, but has been confused by the unusually clement conditions.
sarah, from Winchester, says: ‘We’ve had so many flowers this December that my friends didn’t believe me. They were amazed.’
One flower that has never previously been in bloom at this time is a pink Cosmos, an annual that they like to grow every spring.
sarah, a retired legal secretary, and her husband Michael, who used to work in finance in the City, have lived in the property for 31 years.
Both are keen gardeners — Michael also grows vegetables in his allotment — but have never planned their garden with an eye to producing winter flowers.
‘Whatever blooms is a bonus — it’s not regimented,’ says sarah. ‘ And often they are not very impressive.’
In the past, they had a Nicotiana ( tobacco plant) in flower at Christmas — although strangely there is no sign of it this year. Their garden is in a built-up area, sheltered from the wind.
But it’s also north- facing, and in normal english winter conditions can, Michael says, be quite a ‘frost-pocket’.
Not this year, however. ‘We have only had one quite benign frost,’ he says. ‘Our birdbath did freeze over at the end of November. But, apart from that, it’s been pretty warm.’
Weather records for the Winchester area show that recent daytime temperatures have averaged around 14c, when the thermometer usually climbs only to about 9c.
sarah started her tradition of picking flowers for her husband’s birthday 15 years ago.
‘We just started noticing the winter flowers,’ says sarah, ‘and I began counting how many things were out every year.
‘My birthday is on December 3, and it’s amazing how many things aren’t in bloom then, but have come out by the time I pick the flowers for Michael on the seventh.’
They are often single blooms that she finds, lone survivors well out of their seasonal comfort zone.
Our photographs were taken on Tuesday of this week, after sarah had picked many flowers for Michael, leaving just 11 in the garden.
But sarah made a careful note of everything blooming on December 7 and we have used library pictures to illustrate the ones she had used in the bouquet.
‘They can be quite pathetic specimens, and well spread out,’ says sarah. ‘I have to hunt for them under the greenery. It makes it all the more fun when you find a treasure — I found a hidden primrose this year. ’
Opposite is the full list of the Fieldings’ flowers in bloom.