garden withoutdoors

I can't stop taking pics of my beautiful cats

Socks

Polly Pocket

I know I'm crazy (my gardening neighbour friend thinks so!) but I love thistles and thistle-like plants. This is a milk thistle. I've always thought it odd that slugs love plants like thistles. They adore this and it's only been through a liberal application of slug pellets I have anything left of the two I bought.

a self-seeded thistle in the front garden

another type of thistle that has self-seeded in the front garden - will research more about the types

thistle leaves to compare

There are more flowers every day of the Tasty Pansy. Fabulous.

Zantedeschia (Calla Lily)

loving this hot weather

2 differently leaved hollyhocks

hollyhock leaves to compare - will research types

I don't often order plants as I prefer to grow from seed but when I saw the "tasty" collection (of edible flowers) from a well-known company, I immediately placed an order. This is the Tasty Pansy. I am very impressed with such fast flowers.

Pansy Tea Party

not as vigorous as the Tasty Pansy and I think the slugs got to some

Sadly the Nasturtium Fruit Salad isn't doing very well. They arrived while I was away and didn't get planted straight-away  I hope they revive eventually.

ignore the smooth sow thistle weed to the left!

There are 2 self-seeded hollyhocks right by the front gate.

A few days after the pic below, a couple more are in bloom plus the pink one on the left.

The salmon-pink hollyhocks bloomed yesterday (June 11th)

I finally got around to moving that cerinthe (pictured below a few days ago) that self-seeded so close to the house. It had no room there so the root did a right angle turn away from the wall and has been growing quite happily. Plants are so determined to grow no matter what.

Red-Stemmed Hollyhocks

I never noticed before if some of the hollyhocks had red stems. This one certainly does. There's a ladybug on the leaf.

another white foxglove, to the left a chinese lantern and a poppy (the flower was orange), that holly in the background doesn't have berries - so what's the point of it!

Polly Pocket on the table in the back garden. You can just see a  purple delphinium I just bought, some snapdragons which have self-seeded, the centaurea montanas still in bloom.

Finally I have monkshood in my garden. After failed seeds a number of times, I bought a plant. It was called a "wildflower" so it was less expensive and quite small at first but it looks great now.

These Nasturtiums Fruit Salad appeared to be coming back from a really poor state with the tiniest, tiniest leaves coming out. I was devastated when the slugs ate some of these new tiny leaves therefore a generous use of slug pellets. I must take more photos as I think I'm now down to 1 plant.

I was very impressed with these acanthus in a nearby garden. I can only dream of such acanthus, compared to my one specimen bought last year at Havant Garden Centre.

It's nice being away but also nice to get back to the cats.

The place where I stay on the south coast has a fantastic clump of erigeron.

These pink flowers are in the front garden. I don't know what they are.

I posted a pic of this last year as well. I still don't know what it is.

I don't know what this is either.

Back at home, I picked a sprig of that catnip which she played with and it's on the mat next to her.

20-5-2014

Even if we're on a main road (I'm on 4 London bus routes), we can have beautiful front gardens. The ceanothus is looking great right now. I have 4 and they all bloom at different times. I showed the foxgloves on the right (below), this one is on the left. On the doorstep is a nepeta which I bought as I don't seem to have much luck with seeds and wanted my cats to have access to cat nip if they want. There's another in the back garden.

The best addition to a garden ever: 2 cats.

I just can't get enough of these foxgloves. From what I saw of early Chelsea coverage yesterday, foxgloves feature strongly in the show gardens - a classic beautiful flower! I'm glad they're being appreciated.

I can just see an iris foetidissima next door in the photo above. I have some blooms in my garden.  I never noticed before but this morning (couple days later, 22-5) these are buzzing with bees, as are the foxgloves, aquilegia, comfrey and ceanothus but especially the green alkanet. They seem to love the sun being out.

Some of the buds before they bloomed.

It's interesting to see my garden from next door and the garden from next door. I never remember so many iris foetidissima in bloom since I planted them 2 or 3 years ago (will have to check the date). That ceanothus I think looks better from next door.  Those hollyhocks look ready to burst into bloom soon.

A cerinthe self-seeded right next to the wall, not the best place to grow. I'm going to try to move it.

A foxglove and lupin in the back garden.

The magic time when the iris blooms. They don't last long but while they're in bloom they're beautiful.

Here are the iris in situ surrounded by aquilegia and green alkanet and a stachys on the right.

The thyme is in flower.

The chives are in bloom. I love these flowers.

I love foxgloves. I always have some in the garden, whether planted myself or self-seeded. I was so pleased to see these, in my garden, in the garden next door (planted by myself) and the garden after that from a plant I gave my neighbour there. I love that continuity.

My cat Polly Pocket loves laying in the sun in the front garden.

Centaurea montana which I planted a few years ago. Grateful to see 2 plants have survived. Not sure how many I had originally, sure at least 3. This is one of those plants that I tried from seed a few times but gave in and bought plants in the end.

I'm not sure what happened to this. I thought it was really interesting but when I looked for it this morning it was difficult to find.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/gardening/gardeningadvice/10785393/Germaine-Greer-stop-weeding-and-let-nature-take-over.html

Our weeds are wildflowers. We just need to pick and choose those we like best.  As she says "Yarrow, tansy, ragwort, toadflax, mulleins, mallows, clovers, willow-herbs, dead nettles, comfreys, speedwells – all are wild flowers. "

I certainly love some plants that are considered weeds but I don't think anything is going to induce me to leave the dandelions, herb robert and bluebells in my garden. My garden just isn't big enough to have thugs takeover - and I don't like them! We need to grow what we like, keeping an open mind - and thinking about the bees!

green alkanet - flowers early before other flowers get going and the bees love it

This is one of my versions of the Great Piece of Turf (I have so many - almost any pot or patch of ground). I see Nigella but not sure what else, esp the large one in the middle. Will leave them all until they are recognisable.

I am struggling to get the red poppies to grow yet I have other wild flower poppies self-seeding like mad. (There's one of those pesky bluebells!)

The lily-of-the-valley seem to be a law unto themselves. I tried to plant these within the brick circle around the tree trunk (the inner brick circle with moss) but  these have decided to spread into the path (just to the right of Socks) rather than around the tree. No idea why. And why don't they grow from corms? No idea. I could only get these from the growing plants sold at Christmas, and a generous neighbour who had them growing like weeds.