A walk around my garden this week in sunshine! Yay! It’s been a weird week. Being told to #StayAtHome makes me feel a bit jittery, even though that is my norm so much so that some people could call me a recluse. But it is a different kettle of fish choosing to stay at home and being enforced to. But as one of those people in the age group who may not get a ventilator if required then I am more than happy to keep away from people at this time. I am happy pottering in the garden and listening to the birdsong and I am lucky in that I can walk locally without needing to use my car – though I do need to drive to a supermarket as I cannot get online deliveries. Worse than that is I cannot get my usual WINE deliveries! Fortunately a local wine merchant is still happy to do deliveries and in fact really welcomes the business! If his wines are good I may become a regular!
Plenty happening now, but I’ll start with one more of the rockery daffodils which didn’t feature last week. Still one other variety to come, but so far only buds, no flowers so that will wait until another week.
(1) Narcissus ‘Canaliculatus’ is a tazetta daffodil (15cm) with clusters of three to five beautiful white flowers with a small golden-yellow cup. Highly scented and easy to naturalise, mine are in a small pot, but I will look for a space to plant them after they finish flowering. Not all of the 25 bulbs are flowering so I hope they will next year as they are very pretty with slightly reflexing petals.
(2) When the garden was enveloped in fog the other day I took the camera out looking for nice raindrop photos, from which my tulip post was created, and saw these lovely lupin leaves with their diamond necklaces.
(3) More Muscari – I showed blue ones a couple of weeks ago, but since then the white ones have begun to grow and some pretty Muscari latifolium, each blue-black spike is topped by a tuft of striking bright blue flowers giving it a two-tone effect. I love these and I am happy that they have appeared.
(4) In the autumn I planted 25 Fritillaria meleagris (common names include snake’s head fritillary, snake’s head, chess flower, frog-cup, guinea-hen flower) in a tiny patch of lawn which I will leave wild. I also planted Camassias there and leaves have appeared. Only one fritillary is fully open with its pretty nutant head, but others are on their way.
(5) The Chaffinch is a small passerine bird in the finch family. I get a lot of these lovely little birds into my garden. The males are particularly handsome with a blue-grey cap, pink cheeks and breast and a reddish-brown mantle. The females and juvenilles are much duller, but all have distinctive wing bars. This one was happily singing to me from the top of the contorted hazel tree whilst I was working in the garden.
(6) Polyanthus – this was a pot topper back in 2016 and after the bulbs were removed in summer 2017 I planted them along my woodland border. I’m not hugely keen on the gaudiness of these flowers and they do get horribly nibbled by S&S and every year I think I will dig them out and compost them, but so far they have had a stay of execution. For some reason I love this one. So far this spring it has not been badly eaten. I am sure that won’t last though yesterday I did water in my first packet of slug nematodes. I should get another one in 6 weeks time and I hope they will make a difference. I used one pack last year and the slugs around were much smaller. Of course it does not work on snails and I also have plenty of them too!
While we are having to stay at home and practice social distancing in these distressing times those of us with gardens are so much more lucky that those without. Sharing them through the Prop’s meme will allow everyone to enjoy the spring flowers and help to keep stress at bay.
As always, if you want a peek over other people’s garden walls then please pop over to our host, the lovely Jon, AKA ‘The Propagator’ where you find links to many more wonderful garden enthusiasts from all over the world.
Take care out there!
See here for the participant’s guide.
Cornwall in Colours 
I love the colours in your primrose – gorgeous! It is a very different prospect being told to stay in rather than choosing to – just gotta do it! On a positive note, we’ll all be on the other (safe) side before we know it – time never stands still…
Well I hope so! Safe that is 🙂
Frittilaria are so gorgeous.
They are rather. I have about 6 flowering now! Not quite the same as a wild flower meadow 😊
I do love looking at your roundups of what is in your garden – there is always so much of interest. I love fritillaries and I now have one in my garden – I got it on one of my last outings before we were all told to stay at home.
I’m late in getting here. How can someone who is retired and also in lockdown be quite so busy when I now have so much extra time? The photographs of the lupin leaves with their necklaces are superb – it’s exciting when you spot something like that then hold your breath hoping that the light doesn’t change or the droplets don’t start to fall off. You’ve captured the shot beautifully.
Thanks Catherine. Sometimes things just work!
The Narcissus is beautiful, I’ve not tried that one. We don’t get Chaffinches in our garden, such a shame
Lovely photos of your garden and I love the photos of the chaffinch. Am glad you’ve found a wine merchant who can deliver! We’ve been getting in some supplies too!! All helps 🙂 🙂
What lovely little Daffodil and photos are stunning, may I ask which camera you use.
I have a link to my camera equipment on my other blog: https://traveltalk.me.uk/my-camera-equipment/