Six on Saturday – 4/7/2026

That’s another garden open day over. Not many people, but appreciative. I’d expect more tomorrow, being a weekend. It’d be a sad state of affairs if on a day I was charging people entry to the garden I was unable to find six things to feature here though there always seem to be an uncomfortable number of things just missed or things not quite out yet.

You know the drill, post a picture and a bit of info about six things in your garden, put a link to it in my comments below. The participants guide is still in the same place.

One.
The (ex) pond. When visitors come round the side of the house the first feature they come to is what used to be our pond. I filled it in many years back because the frogs filled it with so much spawn it just went stagnant every year and I got sick of cleaning up the mess. I left the liner in, filled it with soil and planted it with Astilbes and other marginals. They are all very happy until the moisture runs out, then they are very unhappy, since their root run is restricted. I don’t know what people are expecting when they come round the corner but it is never this, unless they’ve seen it before they are always surprised. Largely the Tardis effect. (Bigger on the inside, for non Doctor Who folks). The Astilbes are not lasting long in the heat.

Two.
Visitors often then ask which way they should go and I say which ever way you like, it’s not huge, you wont get lost. The path to the right, past the Hakonechloa in a pot, takes you up a few steps where you will find a garish gladiolus in a pot. It may be the same one Tony put in last week, looks very like it. I couldn’t remember the name so was looking through old catalogues and receipts trying to find it, without success. When I looked at the pot it has a label. I was so convinced it didn’t have one I’d not bothered to look there first. I put them in a pot when I first got them, intending to plant them out later. Later is running at around five years and they’re still in the pot. I overwinter them in my tunnel, bring them out to flower, put them back when they’re done. The label says Butterfly Bernadette.

Three.
Every year Sue would succumb to the allure of yellow Antirrhinums on sale in our local supermarket. I never asked how much they cost but I bought a packet of seed for £2.25. Their website says the packet contains approx 4140 seeds, then apologises for that being only an estimate. I wasn’t tempted to count them. I grew some and planted them out and they’re flowering and the ones from Morrisons were a lot better plants I’m sorry to say. However, last years bought plants scattered their seed which germinated, grew up and are flowering without any help from me at all. I have to admit that I passed on the several varieties on Chilterns website costing £3.95 for approximately 32 seeds but it seems that Antirrhinums are largely ignored by slugs, so I may push the boat out next year. I assume the supermarket plants were ‘Canary Bird’, the same variety I bought seed of. The supporting act is Tritelia ‘Corrina’.

Four.
My various lilies are kicking off, indeed the earliest are over. Lilium ‘Red Velvet’ did well last year in a pot plunged into the ground. This year I moved them into a bigger pot and sunk that in a different place, further from the path so less accessible. The good news is that they have not been much troubled by lily beetle; the bad news is that the slugs and snails ate most of the leaves before the lily beetles got a chance to. It’s a fine variety all the same and I resolve to do better next year.

Five.
I just wrote a piece about a hydrangea and have changed my mind to go for this Veronica spicata instead. I doubt this is a named selection, almost certainly an unselected seedling. It was given to me with no name. My only complaint is that it wilts at the first sign of drying out.

Six.
Right at the top end of the garden is a bench. It doesn’t see much use, the cats sit on it more than I do. But when the last of our visitors had gone I poured a beer and took my camera over there. I took one picture stood on the bench, the other sat down. Sat down you feel pleasantly immersed in it all; I should do it more often.

One of our visitors went away with a 1m, 7.5L Podochaenium eminens from my plant sales, she certainly wont have been expecting to find that and I think it’s that sense of exceeding people’s expectations, which admittedly are not high when they head for what seems likely to be a pocket handkerchief garden in the middle of a very ordinary modern housing estate, that makes opening the garden such a pleasure.

I’m putting a picture of Lilium leichtlinii in as the header, it’s only just started to open and if the next couple of weeks are hot will be past its best next time we open in a fortnight. It’ll get a proper slot next week.