The garden in May and June
Kari-Astri Davies is welcoming seasonal visitors and dreaming of a summer garden of peonies
The swifts are back! A skirling squall of cries announces their arrival as they take advantage of a southerly airstream to sweep up the country. I shade my eyes to watch them flying high against the blue, blue sky. Arcing and swirling, their sharp dark bodies flash silver in the sunlight. On the final leg of their 7,000-mile trip from Africa, their appearance is a sign summer is on its way.
Orchidaceous observations
Now is the time when orchids come into their own. I have a so-so relationship with indoor varieties, finding they linger on for a while after flowering and then die. My sole survivor is a cymbidium with small green flowers. Its pot is currently suspended in an old apple tree for the summer. A nip in the air apparently helps cymbidium to initiate flower production so it’ll be brought back inside in early October. British wild native orchids hooked me as a child. My first encounter came rescuing some common spotted orchids, Dactylorhiza fuchsii, from a building site in Kent, although it should be noted digging from the wild is illegal. The leaves of this orchid are spattered with black spots, hence the name. Flowers come in various shades of pink and white, most have darker pencilled markings on each petal. In the wild it can be found in a range of habitats, including short-turfed chalk downland, old hay meadows and semi-shaded roadside verges. D. fuchsii is generally easy to grow in the garden. A species of lady’s slipper orchid, Cypripedium reginae, has deigned to flower for a couple of years. It was purchased in a garden centre sale as an end-of-season brown stick, at the bargain price of £10. The cheaply rouged trout-pout of the flower’s lower lip could be said to be slightly grotesque. Many more refined and prettier cypripedium are available, but at a price. Currently this orchid is in a plastic pot dug into the ground, which stops the mole ploughing through. Growing in the original nursery compost, at some point I’ll have to pot it on as it’s expanding, producing three flowers last year. Hopefully it’ll continue to thrive in new quarters, as these plants can be finicky. The showy thin-lipped flowers of the terrestrial orchid genus epipactis stick out from, and are loosely arranged up the stems. The first specimens I saw as a child were marsh helleborines, Epipactis palustris, growing tall in the dune slacks at Shell
“No price is set on the lavish summer; June may be had by the poorest comer.” James russell Lowell, ‘The Vision of Sir Launfal’
Island near Llanbedr in Wales. My battered copy of Fitter and Blamey’s book Wild Flowers attests to the find with a blue biro circle around the name. Several UK suppliers offer Epipactis gigantea or chatterbox orchid. Opinions vary as to whether it requires sun or shade but most agree it needs moist soil. Otherwise it is easy to please. My plant seems to be increasing slowly in semi-shade. Growing orchids from seed is for the lucky or the expert, as many require beneficial fungi in the soil to be able to germinate. Some terrestrial orchids, such as D. fuchsii, create siblings that can be lifted and divided. The little forked roots, united by a small growing node, can easily be teased apart from each other. I try to re-plant as small ‘family’ groups, otherwise they might get lonely! There are some fabulous orchids out there. A particular favourite is the huge lizard orchid, Himantoglossum hircinum. Residents of southern France’s Garrigue scrublands, from where it hails, call it ‘orchis bouc’ or goat orchid. Apparently it smells like one. But in my opinion, the weirdest is the violet birdsnest orchid, Limodorum abortivum. Thick-budded dark purple flower stems containing no chlorophyll push through boar-ploughed rich forest earth, looking very gothic.
Bountiful peonies
If only I had a bigger garden I could grow more peonies. Herbaceous peonies, like iris and old
“O, the month of May, the merry month of May, So frolic, so gay, and so green, so green, so green! O, and then did I unto my true love say, Sweet Peg, thou shalt be my Summer’s Queen.” Thomas Dekker, ‘The Merry Month of May’
roses, encapsulate early summer, with their blowsy, scented voluptuousness. There are approximately 10 different herbaceous and tree peonies distributed around the garden at the moment. Many of our most familiar peonies were bred in the 19th and early 20th centuries. ‘Festiva Maxima’, dating to 1851, is a herbaceous peony. The scented double-white flowers have occasional red flecks on some petals. To complement mine I’ve recently planted a rather weedy (at the moment) specimen of the earlier-flowering scented single, ‘Krinkled White’ from 1928. In the rose bed there’s ‘Buckeye Belle’, a mere 60 years old! I fell for its satin singlish crimson blooms at Bob Brown’s Evesham nursery. Also at
the nursery, the deep purple-black emerging foliage of ‘Madame Gaudichau’ in one of the show beds stopped me in my tracks. I had to wait a year to get my hands on this Edwardian cultivar as it had already sold out. The double flowers are an empurpled crimson, while the foliage loses its early drama, becoming dark green later in the season. Peonies can be long-lived. My mother grows one originally from my great grandma’s garden. This is probably the well-known and reliable ‘Sarah Bernhardt’, from 1906. The ample pink scented blooms evoke the opulence of the Edwardian period. It’s still one of the best for cutting and arranging. Tree peonies are a favourite too. The two easiest to grow are the yellow-flowered P. lutea var. ludlowii from Tibet and deep red P. lutea var. delavayi from China. The names reflect their collectors, Frank Ludlow (1885-1972) and missionary Père Jean-Marie Delavay (1834-1895). Neither has flamboyant flowers but the finely cut foliage provides an elegant soft backdrop for other plants. Both can be propagated from seed and by division. Once I had the right conditions for a beautiful unnamed single white tree peony bought in a shop years ago. I took it with me from the Bath garden but sadly it’s declining here in Wiltshire year on year. Another unnamed orange peony bought in a sale, probably ‘Souvenir de Maxime Cornu’, aka Kinkaku, produces one huge, scented ruffled bloom a year. The flower is so heavy it weighs the stem down. Unfortunately this plant doesn’t put on much, if any, extra annual growth. I once tried keeping the sumptuous silvery-pink ‘Duchess of Marlborough’ in a pot. After a couple of years it said, “No more!” and gracefully expired.
“Feelings of beauty diffused, to entwine My spirit with June’s own aura.” Ann McGough, ‘Summons’
Pergola woes
Two years ago we built a pergola, which when first erected looked rather monumental and stark. We left the wood to weather naturally rather than painting it. Today I can report that it has settled in, hunkered down, is more relaxed in its space. The intention was that in May the pergola would be wreathed in wisteria blossom. I planted three W. sinensis, Chinese wisteria – the pale lilac ‘Prolific’ and ‘Amethyst’, and a white, all for scent. A Japanese wisteria, W. floribunda, ‘Lavender Lace’ was added for its longer-flowering panicles, as they are not so scented. Being wisteria I expected them all to romp away – sadly not. Three of the four wisteria start putting out long, questing new shoots and then they die back a bit. They’re inching forward rather than leaping along. Only the stubby-bloomed ‘Prolific’ has flowered so far. ‘Amethyst’ has hardly grown at all. Gloriously deep red rose ‘Guinée’ is happy but
a mistake, this climbing rose looking gawky and out of place on the pergola. A Solanum laxum ‘Album’ planted for later summer interest died. The opulent tunnel of blossom I envisaged has yet to come to fruition. More patience or a re-think is required. I haven’t completely cracked the planting along the pergola path either. However, some self-seeded Helleborus foetidus that looked sullen there have been moved to the copse at the end of the garden. The dark, almost metallic foliage fits in better there.
Summer pots
This year’s patio pots will be planted up mainly with pelargoniums. For the south-facing back garden I’m trying trailing ivy-leaved ‘Surcouf’ and ‘April Hamilton’. ‘Mrs Pollock’, a tri-coloured leaf zonal cultivar will be joining them to give, I hope, a long-lasting vivid summer display. A more subtle combination will comprise white-flowered ivy-leaved ‘L’élégante’ paired with scented leaf ‘Grey Lady Plymouth’. Pots of scented leaf ‘Prince of Orange’ and ‘Islington Peppermint’ will be put where they can be brushed past to release their scent. Overwintered cuttings of scented summer favourites, heliotrope ‘White Lady’ and lilac-flowered ‘Lord Roberts’, will also be potted up as the weather warms.