Verdant and lush

Two weeks. Just two weeks and there has been an explosion of growth.  I do so love coming back home after time away.

The car was laden with all sorts of last minute plants and mulch and I was laden with foreboding about the state of my potting shed plants.

And my relief at finding everything mostly alive but a bit thirsty was heartfelt.  No sign of Artur in his box, just a spider which has chosen to spin its web down a rafter.

I am so pleased to see most of the plants happy.  My camera didn’t have any battery power so I couldn’t take action shots as I stepped in the door.

But a little later I was able to wander around the garden in a daze of happiness.

So many plants are in flower.  The aquilegias are out in the shade garden (way too tall for their surroundings, but what can one do? A chelsea chop? I don’t think so.

And the mystery bulbs I have growing everywhere in the terrace bank and the barn garden turn out to be alliums. Of the purple sensation variety I think.  They are fat and happy and just emerging from their stalks.

And they are balancing nicely with the first lavenders to flower; the stoechas.

I rarely manage to keep alliums going for longer than one season in this garden. It’s odd as the tulips and narcissus seem to thrive.

Actually the bulkier alliums – christophii perhaps- which I have in the east garden in a very parched area seem to come back.  So perhaps it’s not just the dry which is at fault.  Creatures perhaps?

Moles have certainly been busy. So much for my perfectly mulched gravel paths up to the potting shed.  I’ll have to scoop up the soil and plonk it back under the mulch and then stamp down the hills.

And the irises are almost out.  I’m always gobsmacked by the height these flower stalks reach each spring.  The courtyard ones are half out: I ought to wait to photograph them when all the iris flowers are out. And when the courtyard gravel is weeded.  But I’m impatient. So here it is.

And my irises which grow out of the vertical wall of the potager are doing their annual gravity defying act.  I wish I could move them  – but I’d have to donate a few fingernails trying to dig them out.  So they stay where they are and cheer up a rather quiet part of the garden.  I could use them for cutting; but might leave them be for the early June pictures.

But with lush you also get the most amazing growth of the grass.

I had to laugh at the lavender bank in front of the house. Taken from the side, you cannot even see the plants for the grass.  I won’t dare call it weed.  Just lush green growth that needs to be tamed.

I went to pick up my strimmer, but the machine isn’t ready.  Irksome. But I’ll pick it up on Thursday when I go up for the market.  Actually the forecast is not promising for a long day of mowing and strimming.  I love rain, but would dearly love to tame some of the jungle.

Somewhere in here are steps.  It’s all knee high grass and beyond.

The good news is that I have growth in the potager.  My favourite flowers are up – crimson flowered broad beans.  So that’s reassuring.

And there are plenty more to come.  I have over sown the beans I suspect – there are even more in root trainers in the potting shed which are up and bursting out of their pots. 

If it is wet, I’ll spend my time in the rain planting out and getting these small plants into the plot.

With the sun almost setting I decided to do a quick potting on session.  I left lots of seedlings in trays and they need to move up a level.

So the dill, euphorbia oblongata, lettuce and a few tomatoes have found new homes.

I can’t stand the special water retention floragard mix I’ve been forced to use. It takes almost an hour to bulk out and the compst is dry as dust to start.  But luckily I do have some sacks of compost in the car which I can use.

Luckily there is no more seed sowing to do. (Apart from some parsnips I have to resow. Third time lucky.)

And on that note, I’m heading to bed.  A huge few days ahead of me to get through before I can feel I have tamed the garden.