Monty’s month
In my lifetime, spring has shifted its best moments from the first weeks of May to April. That intoxicating mix of delivery and promise that comes with the blossom, tulips and electric green of the emerging foliage sings through the month like a heavenly chorus. Climate change might have shifted the seasons, and pose the greatest challenge that humanity has ever known – but it has not really changed the local, day-to-day weather, and April can still be frosty and cold. But the soil is warming up and it is a good time to drop in flowering plants to fill gaps in this season’s planting.
The writing garden in April is dominated by the ‘Thalia’ daffodils and the summer snowflake, Leucojum, but the lovely white Lamprocapnos spectabilis ‘Alba’ holds its own in that company and I try and add a few more plants every year of these and other white-flowering spring perennials to build up the flowering stock.