  |
| Everything looking a little sad and bare in April 2009, just the
daffodils trying the cheer things up a bit. You'll note the erysimum
(Bowl's Mauve) in flower - as I write (in November), they're still
flowering. |
 |
| A lovely little rose I've planted this year, called Hot Chocolate. Not much
for scent, but beautiful flower shape. |
 |
| This is what happens when you don't keep control of aquilegias self-seeding. |
 |
| An oldy but goody, the hybrid tea rose Alec's Red. Very variable flower
shape, prone to stem sag due to large blooms (and bloom rot if it's wet), but
the powerful scent makes up for all that. The colour here isn't quite right,
Nikon digicams tend to over-emphasise red tones in any picture and make
everything reddish look a little "flourescent". |
 |
| Rosa Gertrude Jekyll. I'm not overly fond of pink, but the combination of scent,
disease-resistance, flower shape and sheer flower volume is hard to say no to. I have
six of these beauties. The downside is that they're expensive to buy, and fussy about
pruning. The key is to prune them to several vertical lengths, to prevent the plant only
flowering at the top. |
 |
| This Acer (palmatum dissectum 'Garnet') does a half-decent job of hiding
my bins. |
 |
| Agapanthus flower head |
 |
| The Agapanthus is in a medium-sized pot (will need potting up next year).
13 flowering heads this year. The flower stems follow the light like crazy so
I have the pot on a stand I can rotate easily. |
 |
| I had the builders leave some open ends on the screen-block wall so
I could make my own planters to cheer up the wall. One afternoon to make
new planters every 6 or 7 years, and I can plant bizzy lizzies (new guinea)
in summer and pansies in winter. |
 |
| A repeat-flowering fragrant old rose from David Austin, William Shakespeare.
Nice "quartered" flowers, but has a very loose habit and badly needs support.
Best avoided. |