I was asked a question the other day about Camellia ‘Satan’s Robe’. The flowers had white stamens instead of the yellow ones they should have had. On closer inspection it turned out that the anthers had not developed and each stamen ended in a small white club. Looking at photographs I have taken of the…
Allotment update.
Another year, another back ache. But I'm warming to the no-dig theme and apart from endless shredding and humping compost about, not digging is easier. Before the winter last year I had covered most of my plot with vegetable matter of some description. I am very pleased to say that most of it has rotted away…
End of month view, February 2016
It's not fair to expect much to change in February and while I haven't compared the pictures, I imagine they look much the same. Things are changing though. A few dry days have allowed me to catch up on tidying up. The grass in the foreground, Hakonechloa macra 'Mediovariegata', has been chopped right down, a…
End of month view, January 2016
I missed last month and am late this because I've been on holiday in Australia. The main impression on arriving home is that it looks pretty much the same as it did when I left. The Hakonechloas are deader and brighter, that's the orangey blobs; there's an Azalea flowering. I've just been out clearing up…
End of month view, November 2015
The wind is howling, the clouds racing across the sky. Every now and then the wind comes loaded with rain. There's a trellis panel down and for now it's going to stay down. My end of month view is the view from indoors. Earlier this year I paved the various gravel paths we had in the…
Autumn flowering Camellias
I paid a visit yesterday to the Camellia National Collection at Mount Edgcumbe in the hope that their autumn flowering camellias would be putting on a show. I was not disappointed. The autumn flowering camellias are often referred to as "the sasanquas" though some are forms of the species C. hiemalis, others hybrids. Many originate from…
Camellia update
I've had blooms on a number of camellias over the past couple of weeks, mostly on small, under cover, pot grown plants. First out was Camellia sasanqua 'Gay Sue'. This New Zealand raised variety is described in the Camellia Register as having 12 petals and cream anthers. All the blooms I have seen here are anemone…
To dig or not to dig.
This year was my third season on my allotment, time that has passed with unseemly haste. I inherited a plot that had been pasture and had been badly ploughed before the first tenant took it on. A year later, when I started, they had done almost nothing and the grass and weeds had grown back…
