Weeding the Web

Hillier bigger than ever at RHS Chelsea 2018

One of the most fascinating things about Chelsea is the preparation that goes before. And if you feel that, then you're not alone. "We get the highest number of hits on social media when we show the preparations for Chelsea," explained Sarah Mills, Commercial Head of Wholesale at Hillier, the family-run nursery near Romsey.  

Stihl Inspiration, Sarah Eberle's design for the Hillier stand in the Grand Pavilion at RHS Chelsea 2018

 With Chelsea firmly on the horizon, the mounting pressure is clear. Director of Retail and Wholesale Chris Francis, ultimately responsible for the success of the Hillier stand, said that these days his first emotion on receiving a gold is relief. With Hillier's uninterrupted, and unbeaten, run of 72 golds since 1945, you can see his point.

For Hillier, Chelsea is inextricably entwined with their brand, adding history and credibility with each year. Both the show and Hillier have come a long way since you pitched up with a van, unloaded your pots, put a rope round them, and waited for orders. And in the last five years, it's changed again for Hillier. Recently moved to a central spot in the Grand Pavilion, the stand's  design is no longer solely focused on what they've grown. "Now we're very much able to produce something that will inspire people to create their own green living spaces," said Chris. 

Designer Sarah Eberle and Hillier's Head Grower Jo Fell examine plants at the Hillier nursery.

Sarah Eberle, the most decorated designer in Chelsea history, is the stand designer for the third year running. She's won gold in more categories than any other designer, and last year became the first to achieve three years in a row of two gold medals; she's taken the innovative step of allowing visitors onto the stand this year. "We've opened up the garden to allow people to interact with it and take inspiration for every aspect so they can get up close to the planting." From the walkway you'll be able to see various parts themed around work (including a potting shed), rest (a relaxed garden room) and and play (a firepit). "Each exhibit will have special element for people to take home," she said. Sponsored by Stihl, the garden will have made liberal use of their equipment in its creation,and include a broader range of what's on offer in Hillier Garden Centres, including pots, tools and accessories.

It's a huge space to fill, up from last year's 12 x 22 metres to 15 x 24 metres. "It's a challenge with growing the number of plants," said Sarah. "We've had snow, rain, twenty-eight degrees heat - designers are stressed! My pillow of comfort is that everyone is in the same boat," she added. 

Charles Carr, Head of Wholesale, and Robert HIllier in discussion. Photo: Helen Gazeley

The Chelsea run-up begins pretty much with the previous year's show. "My greatest source of inspiration is the show itself." So keep your eyes open for Sarah zipping around with sketchpad and notes. On the stand, expect to see earthy, organic colours in the hard landscaping of polished concrete and corten steel provide a backdrop to rich oranges and blues. 

Pampered plants. "From winter blankets on frosty days, to cold storage on warmer days - whatever they want they get," says Charles Carr, Head of Wholesale Nurseries. What makes Hillier such a specialist is the technological advancements and systems we have in place. For example, we use computer-controlled environments to compensate for the weatehr so that we can make sure everything is ready for Chelsea at exactly the right time. And just to be safe, we have batches of the same plant kept in different growing environments purely because of the weather - our attempt to outsmart the unpredictable British climate." Photo: Helen Gazeley

With all that space, the show is the chance to show more and more of the plants that Hillier grows. Three new plants will be in the display. Eryngium 'Blue Waves', an upright plant with large flowerheads surrounded by smaller ones, which along with bracts and stems turn a vivid blue as they mature...

 

Eryngium 'Blue Waves' from Hillier will be on sale at its garden centres

 Hydrangea aspera 'Gold Rush', which starts with gold and flame orange foliage and matures to a golden yellow before turning green...

Hydrangea aspera 'Gold Rush' has velvety textured foliage with lavender blue flowers surrounded by white florets.

 

...and Salvia 'Rhythm and Blues' with stiff, long, black-tipped flower stems contrasting with strong blue flowers...

Salvia 'Rhythm and Blues' liberally repeat-flowers throughout the season, with vivid blue flowers contrasting with black-tipped flower stems.

For George Hillier, fifth generation of the family, the new plants are always a highlight. "We love unveiling our plants at Chelsea and watching people come to find them in the garden. There is almost as much anticipation each year for the announcement of these as there is about the garden design. 

George Hillier, Head of Property, and the fifth generation brought up in the family business.

What visitors to the Hillier stand in previous years will know is that the display will show none of the sweat that will have gone into it - the twenty lorries filled with 8000 plants setting off from the nursery, the 112 bags of cement, the twenty-four pallets of bark, the 150 people involved in the build and all the tea drunk.

If you're not able to make it to Chelsea this year, then pop along to one of the twelve Hillier garden centres around the country. Along with "Chelsea Trolleys" showing a selection of the plants used on the stand, you'll get a small flavour of the show.  "We send pictures to the garden centres," said Chris, "and ask them to produce a version at the entrance." 

No, it won't be quite the same, but nor will it have required 60 tons of hardcore to reproduce!

 

 

 

 

Is there a better early scented shrub than winter honeysuckle?

With barely anything blooming in the garden yet (apart from bulbs) I think I can say that we've already had one of the best performers of the year. For at least a month, the winter honeysuckle has been glorious.

My first brimstone butterfly of the year, drawn in by the winter honeysuckle.

I last wrote about it, Lonicera fragrantissima, in 2014, when it had been in three years and, it seems, I was keeping it smallish and still having to bend down to smell the flowers. I bemoaned the fact that the scent didn't waft far from the bush.

Winter honeysuckle flowers remind me of witch hazel, the way they populate the branches.

Well, three years on, and six years since I worried that the honeysuckle was a mistake, what a change. I've walked down the garden every day to be engulfed in the delicious sweetness of its scent. It still grows like Topsy, now pretty much six feet high, with greater aspirations that I will have to discourage. And it's been smothered in flowers which have drawn in my first butterfly of the year - a brimstone - in warm sun, and countless bees even on dull days. Their buzzing has been a reminder of summer to come.

Lonicera fragrantissima in full bloom

It turns out to be good in the house too, filling the sitting-room with scent on days when the sun has come through, though obviously flower arrangement-wise it's a bit minimalist and the blossom drops all over the place.

So, I have to admit to a great satisfaction. Six years on, with doubts along the way, it now does exactly what I hoped it would, even drawing the eye down the garden to the cloud of white blossom. I'd like to say I always knew it would work, but you only have to look back at previous posts to see how untrue that would be.

But it's been well worth the wait, and if you want an early flowering shrub, heavily scented, that doesn't have to star at any other time of year, I'd certainly put Winter Honeysuckle into the hat. Is there another shrub you think should join it?

 

Plant Review: Honey Boat Squash

If you've ever fancied growing a giant pumpkin, Thompson and Morgan not only provide seed taken from last year's record-breaking winner of the Great Pumpkin Commonwealth's annual event, but this year have set the date to sow for you: 12th April.

Paul Hansord, T&M’s Commercial Director, who likes growing pumpkins himself apparently, revealed:  

We get so many enquiries at the giant pumpkin weigh-in and around Halloween, when people are seeing pumpkins in the shops, asking how to grow them at home, we’ve decided to set April 12^th as National Pumpkin Sowing Day 2017.

If people can buy their seeds and get ready to sow them on this date, we’ll support them with growing tips and hope that someone out there might grow a pumpkin to rival last year’s winner.

Honey Boat Squash from Dobies, part of the Rob Smith Heritage Collection. One quirk is that the stripes disappear as the stored squash ages, so you always know which to eat first.

Personally, I've never felt the urge to grow ultra big (or even big, come to that). Too much feeding, watering, nipping off flowers. So I was more than happy to receive some plug plants of Honey Boat, one of Rob Smith's Heritage Collection from Dobies, last year - part of a surprise package from them.

Honey Boat promises a size just right for two - with super sweet, with firm, deep orange flesh - and productivity better than a butternut. There was only one problem - pumpkins and squashes don't like me. With the ardour of a teenager who can't read the rebuff from that good-looking boy down the road, I keep trying, but almost without fail I get a plethora of male flowers, followed by a few sulky females which show promise and then drop off, only for the plant to realise - rather too late to grow anything larger than a grapefruit - that perhaps it ought to answer Nature's call to reproduce.

My Honey Boat squash actually came up with loads of female flowers, but nearly all of them dropped off. When I gave a rundown of my experience with the Red and Yellow Currant Tomato plants from Dobies, I was despairing of seeing any squash at all. But - hurrah! - this was too pessimistic. Full harvest from one plant (the other never came to much - my fault, as previously reported)  = two delightful little squash.

Please note that 'little'. The description that comes with Honey Boat is that each squash will feed two. Mine each offered something rather skimpy for one. However, they did taste lovely. They had sweet, dense flesh - just what you hope for. They have large seed cavities, which mean they'd be good stuffers, but I just cut them in half and roasted them with olive oil and garlic. Very popular at the Sunday lunch table, they were, even if there wasn't a huge amount to go round.

Honey Boat Squash, ready to roast

I grew the squash in a large planter, up a fence-wire support. This means you can see what's going on more easily, dead leaves are easier to pick off, and slugs and snails are less of a threat. Possibly it results in a smaller harvest but, given my track record, this for me is pretty much as good as it gets, so I'd say not.  Feeding-wise, I'd added Thompson and Morgan's Incredicrop granules. Dobies' website recommends a mostly manure-filled hole around two feet square and 18-24 inches deep, so I really should think of extra feeding next time.

Despite last year's harvest, I liked the result so much that I've saved the seeds. You see, as far as squashes go, they just can't give me the brush-off.  If you've got any tips on getting squash off to an eager start, do share them below!

Plant review: Cosmos 'Xanthos - the first compact yellow, early-blooming variety

One of the members' trials for Which? Gardening this year involves yellow cosmos. Later in the year they'll be reporting on participants' experiences with the variety 'Lemonade', but yellow cosmos has already caused a stir, with the promotion of Cosmos 'Xanthos' last year.

Short and compact, its main "ooh" factor was that it comes into flower early, offering blooms potentially from May to October, making it the first yellow-flowering cosmos that suited UK weather. Previous varieties just got going about the time of the first frosts.

It was a Fleuroselect's Gold Medal winner for 2016 on the grounds that it was uniform, well branched and very suitable as a pot plant, and added a new colour to the dwarf Cosmos range. For the horticultural market, it is ideal for transport (being compact), has a short production time which makes it an early-season attraction in the garden centre. They described it as "Xanthos, a revolution for the compact Cosmos market".

At a height and spread of 60 x 40 cms (24 x 16 ins), they're a good choice for underplanting. I tried them out in the front garden. Plenty of other people pounced on them too. In the UNHCR Border Control Garden at Hampton Court Flower Show, they were part of an airy, semi-wild planting by Tom Massey and John Ward which helped win them Best Conceptual Garden.

Planting, including Cosmos Xanthos, in the UNHCR Border Control Garden, RHS Hampton Court 2016.

A month later I spotted them in the beds of the Victoria Embankment Gardens, London.

Planting in the Victoria Embankment Gardens, Westminster, August 2016

They tick several boxes:

• Soft, pretty yellow
• Compact
• Short
• Bushing out into space-filling sturdy plants
• Good in mixed planting
• A long flowering period

Graham Rice, in his article on the RHS website, says:

This is the first Cosmos bipinnatus type with yellow flowers that is actually worth growing.

However, a number of bloggers tried them last year and there's something of a consensus. The Chatty Gardener said:

If there was a problem with them, it’s deadheading, as the flowers are packed onto the stems, making it difficult to snip off spent blooms without accidentally removing flower buds.

Michelle Chapman at Vegplotting said:

I've found this variety disappointing to look after as the flowers go over very quickly. Sadly many of the spent flowers are not separate enough from the buds, so I end up removing both when I dead head the display.

Michelle also comments on fading colour, though this may be due to their hot south-facing position.

And what did I think? Well, pretty much the same. Mine arrived as plug plants from Thompson and Morgan at the beginning of April. They grew well. When they bloomed, the soft yellow did fade with age, but I didn't mind that so much.  What I didn't like were the brown dead blooms. The first flush was lovely but, once the flowers began to die off, the plants began to look messy. You either have to put up with the brown or pick it off.

I should have called this blog "The Lazy Gardener" because -  you know? - I can't be bothered. Especially when it means being bent double over short plants. When I tried, I found that I was indeed pulling off buds along with the spent blooms, and I wasn't about to snip them off individually.

To give Xanthos its due, this didn't stop it in its tracks. I got flowers coming through right up to late summer, just not, I suspect, nearly as many as I would have done, had I assiduously done the deadheading.

Cosmos Xanthos growing in the south-facing front garden. Both here and in the picture at the top you can see how much brown you end up with.

Would I grow them again? Well, I won't be rushing to get more, but they definitely have a place. If you want to grow them - and there's no denying that they are a very pretty colour and bush out beautifully to fill up space - I'd suggest raising them up and putting them somewhere you pass regularly so you can deadhead little and often on the way to somewhere else.

Meanwhile, Thompson and Morgan describe 'Lemonade' as an improvement on 'Xanthos'. It's a multi-flowering subtle yellow cosmos with a central white eye, bred by T&M from a very bright yellow, late-flowering Japanese cosmos and an earlier-flowering shorter variety. The result is - again - a "major breakthrough in cosmos breeding" and, they say, blooms prolifically throughout the summer on short to medium-high, branching plants, making it perfect for patio pots, as a floriferous border filler, and a cut flower.

I wonder what the readers of Which? Gardening will make of it?

Autumn planting combination: lace-cap hydrangea and cyclamen hederifolium

Does your heart sink when you realise that it's pretty much dark by 8pm? Mine does. This year has been particularly good at the extreme ends of the day and I'm missing the extra light. I've woken to bright sunshine at 5.30, and even got up then to sit in the garden! Now it's definitely still dark at 5 am, and dusk is settling early. Still, this time of year can provide some of the loveliest planting combinations, so here's one that cheered me up when I found it last year.

Shade is often a problem, but this combination of cyclamen hederifolium and hydrangea was thriving in quite heavy shade, where the sunshine penetrated mostly in the later afternoon and, even then, was dappled.

The small bracts of the lace-caps added a sort of splash effect in the shade, and really brightened it up. But what lace-cap is it?  I'd guess maybe White Wave, though this had a spread of at least a couple of metres.  Lanark White possibly? But I didn't see any blue (or pink) colouring in the centres. Do comment below, if you have any ideas.

For more #autumnplanting combinations, see Fuchsia and Dahlia and Sedum and Dahlia.

 

Licking the Lily Beetle Larvae

Actually, I can't think of anything much more revolting than the literal interpretation of the title of this post. Having spent half an hour de-beetling my lilies, I can safely say it is one of the more repulsive gardening activities. 

The reason, just in case you haven't had the pleasure, is that these grubs cling to the underside (and sometimes the top) of lily leaves, covering themselves in their own excrement and (not so) slowly devouring your plants. They've positively gorged themselves on mine this year, which drove me to take a wooden spatula and scrape them into a yoghurt pot.

As you can see, rather too many of them. All the progeny of the only two adults I captured?

The orange sausage thing is, I think, eggs laid by the lily beetle (lilioceris lilii). So insouciant were they that these were clearly visible on top of a leaf, rather than on the underside. If you think they're something else, then do tell me.

I used to think the beetle's red colouring was rather fetching. Not any more. I'm just pleased they show up so well in readiness for their nemesis.

And my reward? The leaves may look ragged, but the flowers are perfect.

However, no time to sit back and admire. I'm keeping an eagle eye on the lilies. The beetle's lifecycle means that a new generation of adults is likely to appear any time now and I'd like to decimate their numbers before they go into hibernation and reappear around March next year, looking for new juicy leaves, not only of lilies but fritillaries.

If you also suffer with this pest, the RHS would like you to fill in a short lily beetle questionnaire. It's a pest that was pretty much confined to Surrey until, in the mid-80s, it decided to take a hike and spread as far as Scotland and Northern Ireland.

The information received by gardeners eager to share their woe has been collated into an animated map of its reported spread since 1939 - and it's quite a restful 2 mins, if you need a break.

The lily beetle isn't the only pest being monitored. If you suffer rosemary beetle, box tree moth, berberis sawfly or hemerocallis gall midge, you'll find links to questionnaires via the link above.

In the meantime, how are your lilies doing?

 

Azalea 'Willy' resplendent in pink

Right now our pink azalea has us spellbound with its mass of blossom. It's absolutely smothered, and was last year too. Previous years - OK, but not so much. And I put the change down to sequestered iron. This is the second year I've watered in sequestered iron in early March, and at this rate I'll make sure it gets it next March too.

If you're a bit hazy on what it does, sequestered iron is added to boost acid-loving plants like azaleas and rhododendrons which are susceptible to iron deficiency and which find it difficult to access in soil that isn't acid enough for them. Deficiency can manifest itself in yellow leaves, and poor growth and flowering. To be honest, I hadn't noticed either of the first two, but I now realise just how many flowers it can produce and I think I'd recommend it to anyone who wonders if their azalea could do better. I use Murphy's Sequestrene and water it in, but you can also get granules to sprinkle over the soil.

 

Needless to say, the azalea's name has been lost, if indeed we ever had it. It arrived years ago, a gift of a friend of my mother's who had come to stay. Having done some research, however, and remembering the sense of humour of said woman, I'm pretty confident that it's Azalea 'Willy'. Evergreen, 50-75 cms (around 20-30 ins) after 10 years (this must be at least two decades old, if it's a day), freckles sprinkled in the throat of the blooms and light autumn tints to the leaves. Almost certainly Willy. This being in a refined garden (hah!) I shall, in future, address it as William.

What is particularly satisfying, though, is that I now have a range of smaller Williams. When the TLC began last year, I scraped out the soil from the top of the pot to replace it with new compost, and found that several of the low-lying branches had, where they'd become partially buried (no doing of mine, I'm afraid), put out roots.

 

Gardeners' gold - free plants! I ended up with five. One died over winter, one has stubbornly sat there with a measly four leaves, only recently showing signs of growth after I threatened it with the bin. Three others are doing splendidly, including one that has already left home to adorn my father-in-law's garden.

You really can't get much more satisfying than that, can you?

And do let me know if you think it's not a Willy after all.

 

 

For Your Eyes Only - Rosa Persica grows on me

Why would you give space to a plant that you dislike? Which is what I did last year when Thompson and Morgan sent me Rose of the Year, For Your Eyes Only.

For Your Eyes Only, Rose of the Year 2015, bred by Chris Warner

Well, there’s a clue there—one of the reasons was that it was free. It also filled a space. The third was that, given its accolade, I thought I really ought to be more open-minded and give it a go. I did, for a moment, offer it to Husband for his father’s garden, but he didn’t want it either.

It’s certainly a rose that elicits strong feeling. “Frankly dreadful” was the uncompromising opinion of one rose-seller I spoke to. I’m not sure if it was the colour he objected to but, visiting The Master’s House* recently in the Temple Inns of Court, I spotted it in the borders. “It’s a bit more salmon-coloured than I expected,” said head gardener Bob McMeekin. “I’m not sure it’ll stay.”

Well, I can tell you now, it’s staying in mine.

Thirty-two years in the breeding

For Your Eyes Only has quite a history. Plant breeding is a waiting game, but it’s a patient man who takes 32 years to reach a goal.

For Your Eyes Only, in abundance, at RHS Hampton Court 2014

The original Rosa Persica was discovered in Iran and for many years botanists queried whether it even was a rose. The answer turned out to be yes, only one that had adapted to growing in the desert. From the mid-70s Harkness Roses were offering Persica hybrids and for interesting detail on the story up to this point, see Breeding with Hulthemia Persica (Rosa Persica) by Jack Harkness**.  It was then they offered plant material to breeders around the world to try to further the research more quickly.

The potential colour markings were what excited breeders, and Chris Warner went on crusade. “The holy grail,” he told me at Hampton Court Flower Show in 2014, when the award was announced, “is a bright red blotch. Out of 1000 seedlings you might get two or three with a blotch.”

Chris gives the impression of a man with equanimity. It’s just as well as one can only guess at the long run of frustration, raised hopes and disappointments. Through the years, he bred hybrids that proved unhealthy, that didn’t produce good offspring. One proved promising. The only (and major) problem was that its blotch was the same colour as the flower. That was bred with others. And finally, thirty-two years after he started, he had a rose that, as he described with some pride, requires only 60% sun, mixes with all other plants, is insect friendly, disease resistant, and repeat flowering.

Phil Harkness presenting Chris Warner with the Rose of the Year crystal vase at Hampton Court Flower Show 2014.

For Your Eyes Only - my garden test

I planted it in spring 2015. It flowered a little last summer. This year it’s got going. And you know what? This year I’ve changed my mind.

Plenty of buds coming.

OK, close up, it’s not yet my favourite—I personally don’t think the flowers will ever be described as elegant—but the bush is a lovely shape, being compact and something of a dome; it’s a neat plant that’s just the right size for the front to middle of a border, its leaves are glossy, it looks healthy, the flowers have a gentle scent (though it’s hard to get down to them on the bush to find that out) and it is flowering its little heart out.

Even its colour is growing on me, though, because it’s so changeable – there is a salmon tinge, especially in aging flowers, but the buds begins as a clearer pink. Not only does the colour change with the opening of the flowers, but they seem to take on different pinks depending on the light. The buds themselves very prettily unfurl, in a sort of spiral, and there’s been a good mix of buds and flowers in all stages on the bush at all times.

The half-open buds are its most photogenic moment, by my reckoning.

This is definitely a big plus. It should repeat flower all summer and it’s making a valuable addition to the border.

All in all, I’m glad I persevered with it (and glad that Chris Warner persevered too) and wouldn’t be at all surprised if it becomes quite a pet over the years.

*The Master’s House garden will be open as part of the The Open Garden Squares Weekend, 18-19^th June.

** The article is worth looking at for Jack Harkness's observations on the clues the Rosa Persica gave as to how it gets fertilised.

Plant of the Month round-up May 2016

A return to POTM Round-up this month for the Hardy Plant Society, who recommend Primula sieboldii 'Winter Dreams'.

My ideas of primulas tend to start and stop with primroses, although they've been rather grudgingly joined by more garishly coloured primulas, which arrived as gifts and have been planted out in my "spring" section. I've grown used to red appearing in the area, but am still not entirely comfortable with it. 

Not the Hardy Plant Society selection, but the red primulas which have insinuated themselves into my Spring Corner.

The Hardy Plant Society's Primula sieboldii, especially with the version with "snowflake" flowers, looks very tempting. Incidentally, did you know the HPS offer free advice? The email address is on their website.

A totally new arrival to the Plant of the Month Round-up is St Andrews Botanic Gardens, with Pandorea pandorana, which I could happily grow in the conservatory I haven't got, merely because it's common called the Wonga Vine. Presumably, it makes a great companion to the Money Tree. The Wonga Vine is a woody climber that's useful as a houseplant because of its long flowering season.

Incidentally, St Andrews University are hoping their website will make the gardens better known (must admit, I'd never heard of them) and, if they happen to read this, I'd suggest the website pages contain better links back to the home page. If you're heading that way this summer, though, it would be worth checking out their programme of outdoor (in Scotland?!!?) concerts and film screenings. I rather covet their study day in September on built additions to the garden.

The Flower Council of Holland are pushing Woodland Sage (Salvia nemorosa)this month. Good for pollinators, with purple plumes, if you cut it back immediately after flowering, there's a good chance you'll get a second flush.

Woodland Sage grows well in pots too.

A newly discovered source of Plant of the Month is Plant Advice who offer a monthly podcast with gardening tips and advice. Started in 2005 by George Munford, a horticulturalist, and Richard Farrar, an electronics engineer and featuring Sue Mack, it's gentle fare, with a good amount of info about the plants featured. This month's is a shrub rose, Rosa Xanthina 'Canary Bird'. It can be used as a hedge or trained, has an AGM, is very hardy, grows up to 2.5m, with a 3m spread, and is one of the earliest roses to flower in the year with single yellow flowers that, in the photo on the website, remind me more of Potentilla. Deadhead for a second flush in late summer.

I can't really do POTM without mentioning the RHS gardens. Harlow Carr recommends Pulsatilla vulgaris, the Pasque Flower, with purple flowers and interesting seedheads. At the other end of the country, Rosemoor suggests Cytisus, or Broom. We had a large bush for ages and, to be honest, I got fed up with it as it wasn't hugely interesting and I wasn't enamoured of the pea-like yellow blooms. However, Rosemoor are featuring Cytisus x boskoopii 'Hollandia' with cream and dark pink flowers and it's always good to find something that will tolerate a difficult position with poor, dry soil. Planting companions are also suggested.

Wisley features Magnolia 'Daybreak'. It's the stellata magnolias that usually make me covetous, rather than those with large tulip blooms like this one, but this one has remained shrubby and small over 15 years and is highly fragrant, so it's worth thinking about for a smaller space. They suggest growing it with camassias, but regular readers will know what I think of them after my experience last year.

Hyde Hall is concentrating on Allium Christophii this month, which ties in nicely with the salvia above, as Salvia nemorosa 'Lubecca' is a suggested planting companion.

My absolute favourite this month, though, has to be Woodgate Nursery, near Aylsham, who have this month elected, as their Plant of the Month for May 2016...Horse Chestnut. (I'm sorry I missed their offering of Ground Elder last month, as that would have had more gasp factor). Never mind pushing the surplus, each POTM is a personal commentary on a plant that means something to owner Peter Purdy. This month he fears the impact of disease in chestnuts. If ever I'm passing, I'd like to drop by because I like the approach.

Woodgate Nursery have a free garden show on 18-19th June, which includes show gardens. That sounds like a jolly jaunt.

 

Plant of the month round-up April 2016

As I plunge once more into a round-up of Plant of the Month, there's a somewhat shrubby feel this time round. Rhododendrons feature well, and Rhododendron arboreum "Blood Red" is chosen by Gary Long, Head Gardener at Trewithen, Cornwall, who says of their specimen, "You will stopped in your tracks at her beauty."

No, not a rhodo, but what did this plant do that it had to be locked up? (See below.)

Birmingham Botanical Gardens have also chosen a rhodo - early-flowering Rhododendron calophytum - which opens into trusses of soft-pink bells with a maroon throat. Sounds lovely, but with leaves that grow up to a foot long and a size reaching 10 x 6 metres, this is definitely one for someone else's garden. Altogether more manageable was RHS Rosemoor's choice for last month of Rhododendron praecox, but this month they've gone for Dog's Tooth Violet, Erythronium 'Pagoda', which I'm really tempted by. A clump-forming perennial and described as "outstanding", it's a beautiful spring-appropriate yellow. I'm just a tad put off by the threat of its thug-like spread if it finds itself a comfortable position.

Rosemoor is out on a limb, as far as RHS gardens are concerned. RHS Wisley returns to shrubs with Ceonothus x veitchianus. Hyde Hall has plumped for Amelanchier laevis 'Snowflakes', good for all-year interest, but starting now with a snowstorm of white flowers contrasting with young, coppery foliage. They suggest growing a clematis through it to add blooms later in the year.

Moving north, Harlow Carr sings the praises of compact shrub, Prunus incisa 'Kojo-no-Mai', the Fuji Cherry. Again, this has all-round interest, even in winter when its zig-zag limbs add architecture to the garden. (Incidentally, Kew's Plant of the Month April tours concentrate on Prunus too.)

Acer palmatum 'Bloodgood' has dark leaves that brighten in autumn. ©The Farplants Group

Keeping oriental is the Horticulture Trade Association's Plant of the Moment for April, the Japanese Acer. I have to admit a certain ennui with these, as they're ubiquitous, and unless they're blazing with colour I find them dull. However, I admit that plants are generally all over everywhere when they're useful and attractive, so here are the recommendations: Acer palmatum 'Bloodgood', 'Osakazuki' and 'Sango-kaku', along with Acer shirasawanum 'Aureum', which are some of the most widely available AGM varieties. 

Acer shirasawanum 'Aureum'. ©Adam Pasco Media

Maintaining the Japanese theme, but somewhat more unusual, is Stachyurus praecox, chosen for April by the Friends of the Botanical Gardens, Sheffield (FOBS). Its flowers were described by E A Bowles as "pretty hanging tails like threaded cowslips, and...charming."

Enough of shrubs! For something completely different, eFIG's Houseplant of the Month is Peperomia which, if I had one, would surely be assigned ID as the Peperoni Plant. It's got a lot of variation - red, silver or yellow leaves, some are variegated, some pointed, others small and bushy. What I love about the blurb on the eFIG site (they're the trade association for the Interior Landscaping Industry) is that it says the layered, dense structure of Peperomia absorbs sound so creates peace and quiet in the home. OK, but you'd surely need a small forest to do that.

 

A wide variety of foliage from Peperomia. Picture: Flower Council of Holland

And finally, that caged plant at the top - what did it do? It's Plant of the Month from the Flower Council of Holland - Million Bells (Calibrachoa, aka mini petunias). It starts flowering this month and should continue into October, with the advantage over petunias of being "self-cleaning" (it deadheads itself, essentially). And the crime committed? Well, in my opinion, it's putting a pretty plant inside a brightly coloured cage.

If you're wondering why, then look away. Is your abiding impression of the plant or the cage?

See what I mean?