Spritzhenry's Outbox

Yes - thanks - I agree - I had a message from 'Stonewall' who suggested this, and looked it up in RHS book. It really is lovely, I must track it down! Plantfinder here I come!.

After yesterday's terrible rain, went into the garden in between heavy showers this morning only to find my beautiful tamarix flat! We think that the soil is so waterlogged that it didn't stand a chance against the wind and rain. We have managed to haul it back up and stake it, but fingers crossed as to whether it survives!

Do you belong to the RHS? I joined following my first visit to Wisley in May this year. I reckon the fee is good value, and hope to visit Rosemoor sometime soon. It's our nearest RHS garden. Harlow Carr sounds great. Maybe one day I'll get to see it! Good luck with your seeds.

Hello! could you please enlighten me - did you start your studies with RHS 1? I am seriously considering doing this, and would like to hear from someone who has done it.

Hi Stonewell! I'm glad you found us - isn't it a good site! Will check on your plant identification. Thanks for the message!

That's beautiful, Holly! I have recently planted some viticella clematis, 'Royal Velours', 'Polish Spirit' and 'Mme Julia Correvon'. She has flowered (6 deep red blooms...) but the others haven't as yet. How old is yours and how do you look after it please?

Welcome back! We've actually got a sunny day today - hope you have too...Good luck to your daughter with her problems.

Enjoyed the formal gardens and the wonderful views across Somerset to the hills. What a setting! I found a plant I did not recognise, so I took a photo to see if anyone else knows what it is! Lovely colour combinations in the different areas. I felt like pulling up weeds, however...

What a fantastic colour! I haven't got space for a wisteria, sadly, but love admiring other people's...Good luck with yours, Holly.

How are things now, Holly, especially for your daughter? Did you do her any more tubs or is her plight too serious for that?

I planted two Tropaeolum speciosum plants last week, a la Sissinghurst (Ie next to evergreen shrubs, to grow through them) As I have not had to water the garden lately apart from my tubs, I was horrified on doing my daily walk-about following a very heavy downpour to discover that one of the new plants was sitting in a dry as dust patch, sheltered by its so-called host! So out with the can again, and then I moved the plant further away from the tree with a cane to start it off climbing. (Fingers crossed!) I'll have to mulch that area, won't I! The rest of the garden is still well soaked quite deep down. Compost or grass clippings do you think - remembering that this is a new, as yet small plant?

That's a nice plant, David, is it some kind of Salvia?

Hello Tussie - Thanks for the thought - IF the weather turns dry I may just do that! Can't at the moment, though. I'd quite like the soil to be less muddy!

Interesting. Did yours start off with yellowish leaves? I put a new one in this year, and it has not grown much but has a few flower buds coming. Did you feed yours? - or just talk nicely to it?

That's nice, joey. Did it have a name?

Yes it does, joey, thanks. I'd come to the conclusion that jucundum ones are pink, and I think that's the one I have - so now I need to look at others in the plant finder that have different names! I don't really like the 'Whirlygig' one - personal preference, I suppose.

Thanks also Wyeboy - I have got really confused with the Plantfinder, it doesn't say whether the plants listed are perennials. Do I assume that they all are in there? or are they perennials but not hardy? I can't cope with digging them up and overwintering in the greenhouse. What a confused person I am! I still need recommended named varieties, I think.

Hi Lucy!

Welcome to blogland! How come you have to water things? Not fair - it's been pouring this afternoon! Forecast not hopeful for week either. Glad you are happy with your veggies - as I am with my flowers! Talk soon.

I've been looking though a bulb catalogue which came in my new gardening mag and there are lots of alliums taller than yours, including some new ones. That's the best way of choosing what sort you want. You plant them in the Autumn, and leave them to root and establish, then they come up and get ready to flower in Spring/Summer. You should be able to leave your old ones in the ground - as long as you don't get waterlogged? I had 'Purple Sensation' this year and though the flowere are smallish, they were successful and lasted ages. The seed heads were great, too. They will stay where they are. I paid lots for some big ones (Stipitatum) and they were complete failures. I shall try a different sort for next year. I shall try a bulb expert firm, possibly on the net, or maybe trawl the garden centres to choose good fat bulbs! Maybe somebody with more experience than me will be able to help us both as to whether we should feed them and when? Good luck with yours!

Hello joey. You are right! I couldn't find an entry for Aeonium undulatum in any of my ref books, but today was reading a gardening mag and to my surprise and pleasure, there was a photo of one with its name! Thanks and congratulations on your detective skills!. My friend Lesley will be pleased to know what she has got. Unfortunately, the plant will die back after the flower dies, but she can apparently take off the baby rosettes and pot them up. The plant apparently only rarely flowers, so she's been lucky this year!

Well. today started well, with sunshine, but the clouds soon came up and it has been rain alternating with patches of sun since then. I feel like the woman in the weather house thingybob who pops out to forecast the weather! At least my husband got all the grass cut in the dry! We are only able to compost about a third of each cut as there is so much, so the rest has to be transported to the council tip! I have to try to get back out there again, there is always more to be done, isn't there! The weeds sure do enjoy this weather, they are appearing everywhere in their thousands, so it seems to me, anyway. My least favourite weed is the hoary bittercress - if you miss one, it shoots its seeds in all directions (clever but annoying) and it seems to flower when very tiny, too. Since I dug up all those symphytums, new seedlings have emerged, including to my surprise a tomato! Now where did that come from?