A very overdue update on the 2025 garden

Sunday 22nd June – 12 – 6pm – Garden open for the National Gardens Scheme

I am afraid that we have been so focused on getting the Growing Garden next door into shape for the garden opening that my garden has had to take a back seat – if not in care then at least in reportage. So, to do a little catching up.

The mimosa excelled itself back in March – glorious yellow mini fluff balls to greet the spring – and the rain….  Although over the last few months of virtual drought we have been very glad of that rain. The combination of that really soaked ground and my thick layer of bark on the herbaceous border has meant that the plants do not really seem to have got thirsty at all.

In April I persuaded the lovely Sue Cane who helped me lay the stepping stone path last year to abandon the delights of Exmouth and come and help me sort out the scrubby area round the old compost bin.

No grass had grown here for years, the compost bin was filthy and overflowing and it was a general mess. So we emptied all the compost into the raised planters next door, moved the bin back again the wall and hosed it down, laid down some of the remaining paving stones and then finally seeded it with the amazing Tuff grass seeds. We frustrated the pigeons who would have munched the lot in 24 hours with lots of green builders’ netting, and now 6 weeks later, it looks as though it has been there for years.

Round the front of the house last year’s planting has come into its own: the heucheras, choisia and pittisporum all seeming very happy and gradually growing up to conceal the dreaded wheelie bins. The only odd man out is the paprika coloured geums which took a great dislike to something and all but withered away (I think I might have saved one of them); in the herbaceous border they are huge and bursting with health.

Meanwhile on the other side of the path the erigeron, companula, yellow cordalis and salvia hotlips all appear to be loving the builders’ rubble they are growing in.

The erigeron is of course also doing its best to take over the dry bank outside my study although I am delighted that the lovely dark red dianthus and the snow in summer are putting up a good fight. The ajuga however, having flowered prettily in April, seems not to have liked the lack of rain since and the thyme is struggling.

The wild strawberries under the holly tree however, have just loved the wet followed by all that sun. I have never had such a crop of fruit and it looks as though it could go on for months.

The fuschia patch has been a bit mixed. One of the new ones is grossly ridiculous and its brother from last year is not doing badly for a second year. Another new one has now finished its first flowering and is taking a breather and the third, as last year has produced vast quantities of leaf and as yet no sign of flower. We live in hopes…

The ferns around the pond are huge – to be split next year I think…

…and earlier in the year I uneartherd an old coal scuttle that we used to use in my mother’s patio and installed it by the pond filled with those sunnny yellow non stop begonias and my favourite dark blue lobelia.

The big herbaceous border meanwhile is coming along nicely and the roses are fantastic. Just hoping they are going to last until our opening next Sunday!

Heuchera, alchimella mollis, and geranium Rozannes now all in full flow; some new penstemon are just getting established while the lavatera and macleaya are about to burst into flower. And, at last, the variegated miscanthus Cosmopolitan which has caused me so much trouble (two have died and a third is in the ‘recovery ward’ next door in the Growing Garden) and which is designed to contrast dramatically with the bronze continus, is finally getting going.

The only thing which really seems to have suffered from the two months of no rain (apart from the silver birch next door whose leaves have already turned yellow and are falling) is the grass. Last year it grew deep and thick and luscious so I went for the ‘no mow’ look with narrow paths mown through the meadow. However, this year the lack of rain meant that it did nothing –  indeed it looked more like a disused football field than a luscious meadow! Finally some rain did come and, on the advice of my son, I cut back a lot more than I had originaly intended. So now Tawny Pipit and my new fig tree have a nice oasis of gently waving delicate grasses to gambol in – and garden visitors will have more space to sit.

If you would like to see for yourself, come and visit us next Sunday.

Tea and home made cakes from 12 – 6pm – plus music!  A guitarist, a saxophone quartet and a jazz cellist!  Entry £5 to include a cup of tea, children free. Book here or pay on the door.