No January Blues this year
Thursday, January 31, 2019
My News headline at the start of 2018, although not original,
was possibly one of the best I have come up with, as it typified
what many of us feel at this time of year:- "Bloody January Again!"
from a 1960's song by Flanders and Swan. It also reflected how we
felt in 2018 with torrential rain for much of the month, me
having started a course of chemotherapy and Moira in increasing
pain from her left knee. We now both feel better than we did this
time last year with Moira at last walking without sticks for the
first time since her operation in September.
Fortunately this month the weather has been generally kind,
permitting plenty of gardening work, one of the earliest starts we
have had in the garden which already looks very tidy, with just 2
of the largest borders left to cut back in the Paddock Garden, with
help from our friends at Farmyard Nurseries to clear away all the
haulms.
The Beech hedge walk is always a good place to be at
this time of year and is very well advanced with hellebores,
snowdrops, cyclamen coum, sarcococca and other treasures just
starting
Just in front of the Beech hedge walk is the red border,
waiting to be cut back
2 days later all the spent haulms have been cut
back.
Just a reminder of what it looked like last
summer!
I liked that pic. so much I indulged myself with
another! Hope you like it too.
All good reasons for us to feel upbeat and looking forward to
another gardening year at Cilgwyn Lodge, our 43rd here!
It also helps the feel good factor that so many plants are
already in bloom and on milder days there is perfume from a range
of winter flowering shrubs. And daylight hours are getting longer
which always makes me feel better, being light enough to work
outdoors until 5.30 pm, without artificial lights
on brighter days. I did read somwhere that between the
shortest day on 22nd December and the last day of January it
is 1 hour lighter
Sarcococca is a superb all year round shrub for
more shady and slightly moist areas. It comes into it's own in
winter with masses of tiny but highly scented flowers. We have 12
plants in the garden of various forms. I was surprised to read in
The RHS Plant Finder that there are 47 species and cultivars
currently available. They are members of the buxaceae, the box
family, hence the common name of winter box.
I no longer have the name of this one which is long
established here.
This smaller form is sarcococca confusa which like many
in the genus has berries, black in this case.(Ruscifolia is a good form to look out for
because it has red berries in winter)
Weather
Although there have been some frosts, they have not so far been
too severe. Rainfall levels have been far less than usual in
January and were way below what we experienced in the last 3 months
of 2018. A surprise day of snow on the 22nd with a couple of inches
cover, was a precursor to what was to come later in the month, with
some long range forecasts suggesting that parts of the UK may be in
for more colder temperatures and snow but mostly in the north
and east. But the last couple of days were snowy with wintry
showers
Cloudy days = 13, sun = 6 days, Rain = 6 days, Snow and hail =
6. Total precipitation = 3.75 inches.
Max temperature = 10.5C on Ist of the month, 7 other days over
10C. Min= -7C on the last day of the month 11
frosts in all. Very little wind
One of the benefits of leaving seedheads intact is
those wonderful patterns that are formed when snow falls on
them. This is Hydrangea aspera subsp. sargentiana, which I
showcased on Gardeners World last summer when it was at its peak of
perfection.
We enjoyed some beautiful sunsets and sunrises but unfortunately
the recent blood moon was not visible here. It always seems to
happen when we get an event like this which was said by experts to
be exceptional. Some of the pictures from across Europe on TV news
bulletins were quite astonishing. To try and see it for real, I
took the trouble to get up at 4.00 5,00 and 600 am. to
photograph it but to no avail. There was thick mist and cloud cover
and was it cold!!
This was very clever picture that linked a series
illustrating the phases that the eclipse went through.
Back down to earth! A sunset picture
at Cilgwyn embelished by vapour trails
And sunrise in Buckingham where we stayed for a
couple of days
Artistic rainbow imitating the shape of the
surrounding hills. The grass is so green you wouldn't think it was
January
Garden update
After several previous months of DIY work, there were still some
repairs and renovations to be done in the garden to paths, sheds
and hedges, but most of all to fences, gates and the river bank,
all of which were damaged by the fateful storm Callum in October.
Some of this is heavy duty or specialist work which we needed help
with. It is good to be able to open gates again and to feel that
river bank is now secure from future floods - we hope!
Growth in the garden is already quite forward, the grass is long
and amazingly green for the time of year, and it is the same in all
the surrounding fields. The sheep are going to enjoy it once they
are turned out from the lambing barns.
This snowdrop is we think an elwesii cross that no-one
has yet been able to identify. Julian a galanthofile friend of ours
has given it the unofficial name of "Keith's Korker" To find out
more please visit the January 2018 Web News item
Hellebores in the woodland garden before and
after frost showing how quickly they recover
The bank at the rear of the conservatory with a pleasing
combination of winter flowering plants. The centrepiece is a
lime green hellebore which may be an ericsmithii crosss but label
is missing.
Even more attractive after snow
The only vegetables we now have in the garden are a few nice
savoy cabbages, several tatty sprouts and the ever reliable
parsnips which have performed well, are of a good manageable size
and very clean with little rust or canker. The variety is "White
Gem" one I haven't previosly grown. It is readily available from a
range of seed suppliers.
What's looking good?
Not a great deal of choice, what you would expect and mostly
plants that I seem to feature in January News items every year, but
any colour is welcome. and there are encouraging signs of more
still to come; even nicer too when embellished with snow.
Frosted cyclamen coum
Hellebores are doing superbly in spite of, (or because
of perhaps) the summer drought,
The bud stage on an unusual form raised a good fews
years ago by our friend Richard Bramley. He christened it a
fritillary form.
Breeders are always looking for something
different; this hellore reflects what many of them are looking to
achieve, upward facing flowers and good colour on the outside of
the sepals.
More hellebores in different areas of the gardens,
groing in 6 various borders. I counted 30 in flower on Christmas
Day, and last week nearly 300
This is probably one of the most unusual colours
and patterns we have here. It stands out and really shines out at
you
Although I cannot be sure where many of our
hellebores came from, most of the collection came from some of the
great names of hellebore breeding, including Ashwoods, Farmyard
Nurseries, Robin White formerly of Blackthorne Nurseries, Credale
Nursery, Will Mclewin, and of course Garden Centres and
nurseries.
But the most prized few we have go back to Helen
Ballard's time when from about 1988 - 1993 we used to visit her
garden and nursery Old Country near Colwall in Worcestershire.
Unlike modern times the plants she sold were bare root divisions of
mature plants and nearly all of them were named. Widely admired and
known as the Hellebore Queen, her stock plants formed the basis of
many of the plants subsequently developed by modern day
breeders.
This is a Ballard form called "Greencups" her style
evident form the beautifully round buttercup shape and clarity of
colour
This an un named Ballard seedling in a lovely pure
white that may have been a fore runner of "Ushba" which we used to
have but have lost, one of the purest whites you could
imagine.
Moving indoors and away from hellebores, into the
tunnels there is always something of interest such as Zantedeschia
"Glencoe" a very tall form just as happy outdoors to flower late
spring and summer
From S, Africa is Velthemia bracteata grown by me
from seed 5 years ago and flowering well every year from large
bulbs
The large tunnel a warm refuge for us and
plants
Wildlife and countryside
With lambing about to start the fields around us are relatively
quiet, just some sheep that are due to lamb later. There is still
some good grass for them following the milder weather in the last
couple of months.
The first lambs turned out into our neighbouring fields
were these Dorset breed on a cold day in the last week of the
month.
2 newborn lambs in our farmer friends brand new
barn
It is a bit like a 5 star sheep hotel where they
can lamb in the dry
Not much going on with wildlife front either, although we
did have the menacing sight of a cormorant flying over the paddock
pond but fortunately it didn't land. We had a couple many years ago
which got into the pond and took a lot of fish.
No problems in the Koi pond where the fish are looking
good and fairly active whilst the water remains
warmish
The last of that massive crop of cooking apples we had
in the autumn are coming to an end and the blackbirds are
beneficiaries when we put the faded apples on the hedge opposite -
an unconventional but effective bird table.
To find more bird activity we paid a visit to the recently
opened Bird of Prey Centre at the National Botanic Garden for
Wales, just 18 miles away from us. Those of you that regularly read
our News items may remember that I raved about this in July last
year. It is still as impressive and well worth a visit, being of
interest to all age groups.
Eagle owl
And here is a real thing a golden
eagle
It is a massive bird in flight especially when it flies
low over the upturned heads of the enraptured (Think about that
word in the context of these birds!) visitors. Here he is having a
well earned rest with its keeper
Shortly afterwards they were sharing a
joke!!
Just before Christmas on a very mild evening when driving home
after dark, there was an amazing collection of night flying moths
easily picked out in the car's headlights. I had hoped to take
pictures of them but found if difficult to get the light levels
right in the challenging conditions of the car lights.
The sheer beauty of all manner of trees never ceases to
delight me at all times of the year. Even bereft of leaves
there is still much to admire with their unique shapes and forms
and the fan tracery of the branches in all weather conditions.
Reflecting upon this in the recent spell of mists and snow I
recalled the title of a poem called" Trees" , which starts with the
words " I think that I shall never see a poem lovely as a tree". As
I like both trees and poetry I find this a difficult proposition to
reconcile although as a countryman and a plant lover I would have
to side with trees!!
At the National Botanic Garden for Wales there is
a display of huge tree stumps of tropical hardwood trees which have
a unique alluring quality all of their own
I did some on line research on this poem which I had only
previously heard of thanks to Spike Milligan many years ago who
himself was quite a capable poet as well as a zany but much loved
comedian and one of the stars of "The Goon Show" (which goes to
show how old I am!) He didn't write the poem in question but I have
discovered that it was written some time in the mid/late 1800's by
Alfred Joyce Kilmer an American writer and poet. The poem starts
with that great line but the rest of it has very heavy religous
overtones about who made trees which as an evolutionist does
not sit comfortably with me.
Visits
It was good this month to have started garden visiting again and
to meeting up with kindred spirit gardening friends on a visit to
The National Botanic Garden for Wales. Open for all but 2
days of the year there is always something of interest to see and
The Great Glashouse which features plants from Mediterranean
climates across the globe starts to look it's best from now
onwards, and to complement this there are large plantings of
snowdrops to admire in the more naturalised parts of the garden.
There is also the Bird of Prey Centre which I have already written
about.
We have several of these visits to different venues during the
course of the year and always end the days with a meal in a nice
restaurant and good conversation. For more info about the Botanic
Garden go to www.botanicgarden.wales and
find the link to Bird of Prey Centre
A delayed post Christmas vist to friends in
Buckingham was very enjoyable. it is a lovely drive from Cilgwyn
taking in the Oxfordshire and Glocestershire Cotwolds, and is one
we have made on numerous occasions at different times of the
year.
The roadside trees are adorned with the faded seedheads
of Old mans beard, the only native British clematis, C.
vitalba
Coming home between Chipping Norton and Stow on the Wold, 2
delightful Cotwold towns, I spotted a signpost to Adlestrop which
suddenly brought to mind the name of a poem of the same name, that
has been one of my favourites for many years, and the chance to
visit the village was one not to be missed. It was written by a
lesser known poet called Edward Thomas who was travelling by train
from London to Ledbury, Herefordshire when it stopped briefly
at the station in Adlestrop a small Cotswold village. The poem
reflects his keen observations in the few minutes when the train
was in the staion. It is a wonderful evocation of time and place in
June 1914 just a few weeks before the start of the !st World War.
It is poignant in so many ways especially the tranquility and
simplicity of the age it conveyed before the horrors of that war.
Sadly there is a poignant Post Script in that the poet who was aged
37 with a wife and children, had volunteered to fight in the
war, and was killed in 1917, a fate that befell many of our
fine poets.
The main line still runs through the village but the
station was closed in 1966 and all the mid Victorian buildings
there were burnt down, Fortunately the villagers saved the platform
sign and one of the benches. It is now a unique and historic bus
stop
This steel plaque is fitted to the seat in memory
of that station and the poet that captured it in time.
Briefly in a very long news item ( amazing for January!)
I just remembered one final event for your new diary or
calendar. The annual Winter Gardening Weekend in Llandysul,
Carmarthenshire which takes place on 15,16 and 17 February. 10-5-00
pm each day.Talks, Refreshments Gifts and plants for sale and a
stage set by RHS Gold Medal winners Farmyard Nurseries. Go to
www.farmyardnurseries.co.uk/winter-gardening-weekend-2019
One of the many quality hellebores bred by Farmyard
Nurseries that you are likely to find for sale at the
event.
We hope your start to 2019 has been a good one
All good wishes and happy gardening
Keith and Moira.