July was for us a total contrast in weather as Ireland was a wash out with rain for the entire month whereas Croatia was a furnace with an average of 38 deg. searing heat on a daily basis … however gardening work has to go on whatever the weather ! Gardening by it’s very nature and purpose is interventional and artificial as we are shaping nature to what we perceive is beautiful and practical . In Old Spa Road we took a naturally wet land , a bog really or what local people referred to as “ the swamp ” and repurposed it as an informal garden . We drained […]
My Gardening Month June 2023 … Head Butting the Blarney Stone !
Gardening in June is a favourite time for me with long light filled evenings leading up to the longest day of the year on the 21st and it seems a crime to be indoors before 9 pm ! We spent a few weeks in Croatia adjusting again to Mediterranean gardening but learning from past experience to not over water the rosemary and lavender but before we left I tackled what has been a problem now for a few years at the garden at Old Spa Road, a wooden decking patio in the Lower Field which we built out over the stream in 2006 and which was actually the first project […]
My Gardening Month May 2023 … Chelsea Rewilding and the usual BS !
May is my favourite month in the garden , everything is fresh , green , the growth is spectacular, the hedges are full of whitethorn in full bloom and the whole summer is ahead ! The Euphorbia wulfeni along with hostas are the stars of the May Garden and as striking architectural plants are hard to beat in UK and Irish gardens as our damp changeable climate suits them . Unlike hostas that are plagued by snails the euphorbia has no pets or animals that eat it probably because if you cut or bite a euphorbia it exudes an acid that stings … the gardener that breeds a hosta that […]
My Gardening Month April 2023 … It’s all Greek to me !
It’s Hosta month this April at Clonmel Garden Centre as they have their largest collection of hostas ever in stock , all the old reliables , June, Gold Standard , Big Daddy and all presented in great condition with small leaf growth and nothing forced under glass as can often be the case in April with hostas . If we didn’t have deer coming into the garden I would have a huge collection of hostas , my favourite plant but unfortunately we have a lot of deer who over the years visiting the garden have developed a sweet tooth for hostas . I try and find nooks and crannies that […]
My Gardening Month March 2023 … An unplanned dip in the pond in March !
I love March as we are definitely heading towards late Spring and early Summer , the clocks have gone forward and there is an extra hour in the evenings while everything is on the move in the garden and it is the last chance to get any bare rooted trees into the ground . Snails also love March as this is the month hostas start to peep above the ground and of course hostas are like caviar to snails and they are already lining up with their knives and forks ready to tuck in to those luscious early shoots … allow this to happen and you will end up with […]
My Gardening Month February 2023 … Brigid is Ireland’s pre Christian Goddess !
Here in Ireland and the UK we regard February 1st as the first official day of Spring and I brought that thinking with me when I started to work in the Balkans which amused my local colleagues in Macedonia and Bosnia no end as generally there would still be two feet of snow outside the office window especially in Sarajevo where the snow and ice could continue until at least the middle of March . The 1st of February in Ireland was and is marked as Saint Brigid’s Day , a shadowy figure in Ireland’s early Christian history that in my schoolboy days nothing much was known about but back […]
My Gardening Month January 2023 …The start of a new Gardening Year
I am often asked at Gardening Q &A’s do you give your honest opinion when asked about a garden … and my answer is I do , sometimes brutally and often I give my opinion even when I haven’t been asked ! Of course if you think the person is a beginner or somehow unsure about their gardening skills or wouldn’t be able to take criticism on board then I certainly would not be directly honest but I always try to be constructive . I have one gardening friend who always offers her view on a visit to our garden here and I value that opinion as it has a […]
My Garden Month December 2022 … Seeing in 2023 , Happy New Year , Sretna Nova Godina !
December has been a brutal month on the garden with frost and freezing temperatures down to minus 5 deg each day for three weeks , going down the garden was not pleasant seeing the plants frozen solid . But plants know how to respond , not the tender ones as they just die , but the perennial plants droop their leaves and play dead but when the weather changes it is amazing to see how they bounce back and I was particularly impressed with the bergenia and the euphorbia . Euphorbia wulfeni is my favourite perennial which is a plant but one that looks like a small shrub , they […]
My Gardening Month November 2022 … Good Morning Vietnam !
To start on a pessimistic note , death and decay everywhere in the November garden as plants die back or are cut down by the frost but it is the natural cycle of things in nature but it does leave gaps in the borders and a lot of cutting back to take the untidy look away and certainly every garden needs a rest… and good news the new season’s growth is only two months away ! Gunnera would be my favourite architectural plant and it makes a huge statement in the garden but it needs space and water and when I say water I mean that it needs water close […]
My Gardening Month October 2022 … More like coffee beans than olives !
Gardeners seldom have patience in growing plants and we all want instant growth or at least I do and it is a great feeling when the garden gets established , the borders have thickened out and you can add things and not be hovering around waiting for them to grow …such is now the case at Old Spa Road and I am getting to that same stage with the new garden in Croatia after six years where in the top terrace gravel garden where the plants have at last adapted to survive the baking hot summers and I now have plants peeping out from under plants in no particular order […]