My gardening diary
MONDAY
Planting up some ra an containers for Alice’s decking outside her back door. There are seats out there and they get sunshine for part of the day. It would be lovely for Sydney, our granddaughter, to see flowers at first hand and to touch and smell them. Some narcissi growing in pots can be transferred, and the biggest pot will have a permanent herby planting of rosemary, lavender and thyme.
TUESDAY
A aching a few of the sunflower heads, dried upside down in the greenhouse, to bamboo canes. They’re rich in protein and finches can fly in and feed without fear of cat a ack. Thankfully, our cats seem more interested in hunting in the field.
WEDNESDAY
Sowing sweet peas from seed saved last year. There’s a lot of debate about when to sow sweet peas. Experts often advocate sowing in the autumn, but they’re often growing for exhibition. We want to grow them for cut flowers and to grow up obelisks in the border. Seed sown now should produce flowers from July.
THURSDAY
Although we take root cu ings at almost any time of year, January and February are the traditional time to take them and it’s time to take them from our pulmonarias. Not all species will work, but varieties of P. longifolia always seem to be successful. There are a couple of varieties with silver foliage. One of them, a Dutch selection from Coen Jansen, P. longifolia ‘Ankum’ has long, narrow, silvery leaves with a smart dark green edge.
FRIDAY
After all my Christmas over indulgence I need to put in some proper physical work. We practice a ‘no-dig’ policy here so going out and working up a sweat digging over the veg plot is out of the question, but there are plenty of perennials to lift and divide.
SATURDAY
We grew some splendid larkspur the year before last and used their petals for confe i at Alice’s wedding. Last year we grew them again but didn’t look after them – but we did save seed from a particularly deep blue one. They’ve been sown, let’s hope they work and that I’ll look after them.
SUNDAY
There are two climbing roses in particular that we’re anxious to take cu ings from; our lovely Banksian rose ‘Lutea’ and ‘Paul’s Himalayan Musk’. They should both grow successfully on their own roots. We use newer growth which is nonetheless rigid, in 20cm (8in) lengths, lining them up along a slit trench with a couple of buds above ground level. Ca ro l K le i n