Promise of spring blossom
The twinkling Christmas lights are now well tucked away for another year and I must admit the early darkness of winter days and the changeable weather makes gardening a little frustrating.
A ‘me to me’ present of a duo, bare-root plum tree (with a free duo apple for my daughter) gave me a good gardening fix as, with a little help from mycorrhizal fungi, they were potted into John Innes compost. The promise of spring blossom is just enough compensation for cold hands! At the moment, the back garden is at its scruffiest, with a good few hours tidying up needed. Even so, snowdrop and daffodil growth is quite evident, but my eye was caught by a splash of orangey-red at the back of the pond, as Iris foetidissima (the stinking iris) displayed its berries. In the front garden, the Ginkgo biloba, grown espalier-style, is showing off its winter silhouette.
In the greenhouse, pots of hyacinth and daffodil are responding to the extra protection inside and potted up strawberry runners, having had their cold spell outside, are now on the bench, which should bring fruiting forward by a few weeks. Because of problems with fuchsia rust over the last few years I’ve discarded my old plants and have decided on a fresh start – new plants will be bought in spring. The only survivors are the standards, which will receive a routine, systemic fungicidal drench. I’ll start growing new standards in the spring, and if rust still persists, I should be well on the way with replacements.
Together with a general tidy up, an enjoyable job for a milder day is to prune the mature, fence-grown, climbing rose. It takes quite a time but is very therapeutic!
The herb bed (really that should be the mint bed) still needs a complete overall so there are plenty of opportunities to continue working off any festive excesses.
One important job has been done – the damson has been warned about its fruiting! Two years ago a good response to my threats produced a reasonable crop, last year I forgot, and the result was no crop. This year, let’s wait and see!