Backwards and forwards

Home-made Christmas wreath hanging on the gate

Nearly the end of 2024. 

Looking back, it’s been a soggy old year, with a lot of wet, much wind and only a few, all-too-brief, warm spells.  There have been successes in the garden, such as the new flower bed by the patio (although some editing is needed there), and some good crops in the veg plot (including eating apples, the store of which is only now running out); but some less successful things too, such as the salad and bean crops succumbing to slug damage (and autumn plantings succumbing to the mice), and the failure of seed-collecting because of the wet. 

Time now to look forward.  There’s the old herb bed, nearly all cleared and offering opportunities for more planting. The tulip bulbs are mostly planted to provide colour next spring – and, for the record (since I usually forget): the biggest patio pot contains ‘Prinses Irene’, ‘Doll’s Minuet’ and ‘Havran’, while the slightly smaller one has ‘Lady van Eyck’, ‘Mystic van Eyck’ and ‘Paul Scherer’.  Both have several forget-me-not plants, moved from the veg plot edges, bedded in on top, both as complementary planting and to discourage the squirrel from digging up the bulbs.  Other tulip bulbs (‘World Friendship’ and ‘Pieter de Leur’) are still to be planted, while I decide whether to put them in more pots or in the ground.  All I need to allow me to get on with things is some better weather; December has been mild, apart from a couple of light grass frosts overnight, but damp, and nearly all the past week has been foggy as well.  The forecast is for a very wet and windy New Year, followed by colder days and frosty nights. 

And two promising signs for 2025: Lefty, our elderly lame woodpigeon, who has been coming daily for his breakfast on the patio, has been tolerating the company of another pigeon; we assume it’s a female and that he’s contemplating mating next year.  And the first snowdrops (Galanthus elwesii) are already out.  Happy New Year! 

December snowdrops (Galanthus elwesii)

Midwinter flowers

There isn’t much colour in the garden in mid-winter, but it’s not a completely flower-free zone.  The mild (mostly wet and windy) weather has helped, of course, and having a few winter stalwarts in the planting also ensures some blooms. 

Mahonia 'Winter Sun'

Of the winter shrubs, the most floriferous is the Mahonia ‘Winter Sun’.  It’s much better than the later-flowering Mahonia aquifolium, which I inherited (from the previous owners) in the rubble-filled area round the gas tank.  I’d love to dig that out, but it’s impossible to get a spade or fork in there.  I’m thinking of letting it flower in the spring, and then cutting it down as far as possible.  But that’s another story.  ‘Winter Sun’ does what it says on the tin, and it’s an excellent garden plant for this time of year.  The winter jasmine and both the Viburnum tinus are also in flower, and the winter honeysuckle (Lonicera purpusii) is starting to put out little blooms, though there is a pair of male bullfinches that love to peck at it.

Self-sown primula flowering in December

There are fewer perennials in flower, but a couple of primulas in the little patch of border outside the front wall are doing quite well, and there are plenty of berries on the Iris foetidissima plants that appear around the place.  I took the leaves off the hellebores back in November, as they were suffering from hellebore leaf spot and didn’t look good; the new flowers are already in bud underneath, promising some colour in early spring.

Replanted window-box

Another job already done is to replant the window-box for winter.  Back in late spring I heaved out the whole contents – two rosemarys, a little gold-leaved euonymus plant, some crocus and ‘Tete-a-tete’ daffodil bulbs – compost and all, and left them over summer in a similar-sized plastic trough in a corner.  Now it was time to heave them back again, and top-dress with some fresh compost.  We’ll see if it works!  The rosemarys are a bit leggy, but already in bud so I don’t want to cut them back.  The plants that were in there for the summer were either expendable annuals, now composted, or potted up and put in the greenhouse to overwinter (a fuchsia and a couple of osteospermums).  A variegated ivy that spent the summer in the windowbox has been put back in place for winter.  For now, everything seems happy enough!

Out front

The front garden doesn’t get as much attention from me as it ought.  It’s a bit ‘out of sight and out of  mind’; in daylight hours we tend to spend our time in the back of the house, enjoying the view down the main part of the garden, only migrating to the front rooms after dark, when there isn’t much to see.

Vinca major

But today I ventured out to make some inroads into the Vinca major in the front garden wall.  This is one of the very few plants surviving from before we moved here, thirty-odd years ago.  It wasn’t the greatest planting idea on the part of our predecessors; while Vinca minor is a pretty little plant, its big brother Vinca major is a well-known thug.  The evergreen leaves are handsome and the purplish-blue flowers attractive, but its tendency to send out long arching stems that root at the tip make it a less than desirable garden plant.  Its ability to flower off and on pretty much all year is welcome, especially in December, but overall it’s not a plant to covet.  And in honesty, I haven’t been good at keeping it in check.  It originated in the front border, but has made its way through and under the dry-stone wall out into the grass verge in front of the house, where of course I can’t normally see it.

The last few days have been very windy and rather wet – Storm Darragh.  Not good gardening weather.  We pay the council for a green waste bin, but it has sat empty these past ten days, and I’m minded to fill it as much as possible before its next collection-day, on Friday.  In such circumstances I tend to cast around the garden for high-volume, easy-to-gather material that allows me to fill the bin quickly, and pulling up vinca stems fits the bill nicely.  I’m not sure that it will make a noticeable difference to the front verge – there’s a lot of the stuff – but it’s a start. 

While checking over the front garden (a biggish branch of the holly tree was brought down by the storm – no damage done, fortunately), I noticed that Camellia ‘Donation’ has a good number of fat flower buds on it, just waiting for spring.  Both it and the other camellia (less floriferous-looking) seem to have enjoyed the new compost added to their pots, as their leaves look healthy and glossy, though the effect is spoiled by the grass and other weeds on the compost surface; I washed the top-dressing gravel and put it back, but clearly some weed seeds had survived.  More weeding needed.

Camellia 'Donation' - in bud

Despite the wet and the wind, the temperatures this month have been above zero, sometimes considerably so, which probably explains the camellia buds (the wet summer would also have helped); nearby, Fuchsia ‘Hawkshead’ is rather optimistically producing new flower buds, and the lawn is growing green and shaggy.  The two tubs of miniature daffodils, which were top-dressed with compost from a failed sowing of lobelia and where the lobelia subsequently germinated and flowered very well, still has a good layer of lobelia with some flowers.  Not for much longer, I suspect, although the forecast isn’t showing much change in the weather.

Lobelia - still flowering in December

The hazel catkins put on a fine display on a sunny day!