garden supervisors in profile

joys of spring

Helleborus lividus
Primula Gold Lace
emerging leaves of Erythronium Denis-canis

Betty's garden

I had a lovely lunch today at Betty's house, home made broccoli soup and garlic bread, yum. A good gardening friend, Betty is very knowlegable and good garden 'do-er'; by which I mean if she sees something in her minds eye she goes out and does it, where I would have another cup of tea and look at it in my minds eye some more. . . .
She has this marvellous chinese style house next to her pond. The pond is in the middle of having its sides made level so it wasn't very photogenic today as it had a large aluminium ladder slap-bang over it.
After our lunch it started with hailstones outside, when they landed in the trough I thought it looked as if she had scattered white stones on the soil.

I have been planting tomato and pepper seeds in the house to sit on widowsills, better germinating in the warm, the greenhouse is still a bit chilly at night although it hasn't been below 0C this week. I have early potato 'Red Duke of York' and maincrop 'Record' ready to go into the other plot, I haven't grown either of these veriety's before. The daffodils are starting to come out in the garden, nice bright yellow to look forward to!

primula freedom

I was taking my usual close ups and when I viewed them on the pc I noticed the stamen showing up and magnified it, wow nature!

angels

These angels are in groups of four at the top of amazing picture windows in Dunblane Cathedral. The buildings were made into a cathedral in the 1300's and were built upon from that time with the most recent being 1889.


I liked this carving of a Lion and Lamb, there are whole rows of these carvings depicting various animals.

I was in Dunblane for the Stirling Rock Garden Show, where I took no photographs as it was quite busy and I didn't want to get in peoples way kneeling on the floor! I admired all the exhibits with some jealousy and bought several plants to ooh and ahh over when I returned home. I bought Erythronium Denis-Canis, Crocus Barrs Purple, Sorbus Reducta, Primula Freedom, Primula Allioni, Snakeshead Fritillary -not all for me, some for presents as its Mothers Day tomorrow so Mother is getting Crocus and Fritillary- and Fiona, being an expectant mother asked for a Mother-To-Be-Day present, which she is getting for the cheek of asking!! probably Erythronium for her then. I had parked near the cathedral so went in for a visit, amazing architecture and stained glass windows. I took photographs of the same things on different settings to see how they came out(the computer displays all this information as you view the photo) its good to get to know the camera a bit better.

inverkip walk

Its too cold and windy today to go outside although I may venture out to the garden centre later. These were taken on Monday in the woods behind Inverkip Marina, I think they are mostly beech trees. Some of them are massive old things, a lot with hollow bases and branches. Its a very peaceful place.

robin

there he is, sitting still for once!!

whatever the weather

Dwarf daffodils, a welcome brightness.
Hellebore, being fascinating.

White crocus which were hiding in the cold frame, I have put them on the doorstep now so they can be seen.

This morning in the garden I finished off the 4ftx4ft plot, it is now edged and covered. I planted out a hellebore, cyclamen, snowdrops, ranunculus, foxgloves and a cotoneaster which were all 'lurking' in various pots and buckets waiting for a place to go. There is to be a path to be made of stones around the front(I can see it in my minds eye. . .) it was edged last year in red brick and I have now started at one end with stones and its going to take a lot of stones. I had four bags 'lurking' and they have just done the first corner.

The row of bricks in the middle leading to the tree is the origional line of border, I will take it out when I have enough stones to go all the way round and the tree will be sitting in its circle. I cant find a photograph to explain why its laid out like that, but it looked marvellous in my minds eye at the time. After finishing tidying up to go in for lunch it started to snow which quickly turned into sleet showers, so I retired from gardening for the day.

Primula 'Marie Crousse'

yesterdays photograph

hospital corners

I have dug over the three beds in my garden, covered them and tucked the edges in, there is a lovely photo of this but it will not upload. Two beds still to dig over here and then to check the other plot during the week sometime. It has been a nice weekend, bar the biting breeze, and its been nice to get outside but its definatley not 'sitting in the garden' temperature!

too many seed trays

A photograph of the greenhouse when it was 'new to me', oct '04. It seems to feature a lot in my blog and that is because I think its great!! Also it is easy to lean out of the door and take its picture!

Greenhouse temp at 0C last night, baby onions(they look like blades of grass) are covered at night time and left open during the day. The lid of my small coldframe has broken under the weight of snow, it is plastic, so the two bits are only half covering the remaining plants. The cold frame will need to be emptied and the lid fixed for when stuff needs potted on from the greenhouse. I had a lot of garden pots sheltering in the greenhouse so they are being decanted outside and covered with fleece.

seeds planted this month so far are ;;
Herbs;; Basil, Parsley, Dill, Coriander, Chervil, Cat-nip
Vegetables;; Rocket, Lollo Rosso, Broad Bean, Butternut Squash, Broccolli and Calabrese, Cabage, Cauliflower, Spinach
Flowers;; Erythronium, Dodecatheon, Cerinthe Major and Minor, Viola, Anemone, Dianthus, Scizanthus, Aquilega and loads of Sweet Peas .

Lots of seeds still to plant but I like to plant a lot of stuff straight in. I am re-using plant labels and a lot of last years dates(when I plant something I put the name and date on) are end of April. Also still to get potatoes, they were put into the other garden last April and it is more sheltered than here, I might use it for potatoes again this year but that is not good rotation management!

and it snowed

10 inches of snow fell last night! It is melting round the edges so it may not last long, just after I took the photograph most of it slid of the greenhouse.

cats

I was just looking through photgraphs and this was Tansy the day she arrived from the Cat Protection League, she looks like a wee scared thing. I think you can tell from the second photograph that she has settled in nicely. Then there is Daisy, looking fluffy, and her tortoise-shell sister Lily, who went missing.

seed trays

just as you can never have too many seeds surely you can never have too many seed trays. this leads to the greenhouse never being big enough of course. . .

flowers today

cyclamen coum, one of the darker hellebores with slightly smaller flowers
a dwarf narcissus, amazing how the raindrops are sitting on its edges.

roofing progress

front elevation,
rear elevation, nearly done.

roofing progress

Progress seems very slow but the chimneys have gone and the tiles have started to go on, I went to bed yesterday with two hot-water bottles, an extra quilt and two cats.
The frost on the greenhouse looks a bit like a spiders web, the greenhouse nighttime temperature was -5C, brr. . . chilly. . .
I thought birds would strip the holly of berries but there still seems a lot on this one, I think its Golden King.
I lifted up this flower to take its hidden view, such a shame hellebores always nod their heads. The leaves and flowers of the hellebore are suffering from the frosts, one dark one hasn't flowered and doesn't look like its going to. My fingers look a bit wrinkley under the magnification, this is the camera on 'super macro'.