Friday 11 February 2011

Blooming Friday - Winter (11 FEB 2011)

This week we enjoyed a rare sunny interval in London, so I took the opportunity to compile a photo collection of the blooming plants in my garden.

Before I started gardening, I never opened my back door in winter ....

The huge hellebore leaves, which protected the emerging buds when it was bitterly cold, have been cut away, to allow the flowers to receive applause, their work is done. The snails, grateful for their shelter, didn't eat the hellebores.
 


Multiple flowers on bare, haphazard branches are certainly more striking without foliage to distract the eye.

Winter jasmine and chaemolenes have been blooming faithfully since the autumn leaf shed. I haven't noticed any pollinators around, so I guess they must be feeling somewhat frustrated. Maybe that's why the flowers appear enlarged and even more attractive, in their yearning, as the months go by.



I didn't appreciate the beauty of bushy heather, until I saw close-up the magenta bead-like florets with their black protusions.

Lamium (a weed ?)   rises through the thawing lawn readily adorned with its lilac hooded flowers.


The primula has lost last year's leaves, seamlessly superimposing them with plantlets, giving the impression of immortality. The apparently delicate violet and gold petals have been covered by snow and icy frosts but remain unscathed.


This hyacinth, presented to me by Mr. T, is the first spring bulb to bloom in my garden,  a signal that winter is drawing to a close.
The leaves of my own bulbs are literally inching out of the ground daily.


Snails made sorties to feast on broccoli leaves at night. By day, pigeons ripped off healthy snacks when the soil was too hard to peck for worms. People tell me about their failed attempts with broccoli, as the leaves grow huge without a hint of delivering the goods.
Patience is required -
don't forget that broccoli is also called winter cauliflower.


For more Blooming Friday posts about Winter visit  Roses and Stuff


20 comments:

Anonymous said...

Now that is great color here in gray Niagara Falls.

Unknown said...

Wonderful pictures, more like spring for someone living in Scandinavia:)
Take care,
Charlotta

Esther Montgomery said...

I have my first hellebore plant this year. I've just been reading Frances' post on Hellebores at Faire Garden and she is talking about cutting the leaves there too. Will I have the heart to follow suit?

Esther

p3chandan said...

I see that your garden is slowly blooming again to mark that winter is almost ending. Ive seen the lovely hellebores are making a comeback on almost every garden Ive visited so far. Happy weekend!

Gunilla said...

Fantastic flowers in your garden.
I wish that it was here were I live.

We have still a lot of snow.

Have a nice weekend
Gunilla

Mark and Gaz said...

It's nice to see some colour and greenery in the garden at this time of the year. Some of the Crocus here are starting to bloom, usually they don't come up until March.

There are plenty of nice looking and Lamiums out there, they can be a weed or a wanted plant in the garden :)

b-a-g said...

Hi Everyone - Just to point out - it is grey, rainy and cold in London too ... but the sun came out for a short while on Wednesday afternoon so I took a half-day vacation and escaped into my garden.

Esther - I thought the same way before cutting my hellebore leaves (post in January). No regrets now.

Anonymous said...

Greetings from Southern California :-)

I added myself to follow your blog. You are more than welcome to visit mine and become a follower if you want to.

God Bless You, ~Ron

Fay McKenzie said...

Garden envy - wonderful pictures - too windy up here for all of them - but I live and try!

Makarimi Abdullah said...

Wonderful colors at your back garden.So impressive. So sorry for your cauliflower. Patience is required in gardening.

lifeshighway said...

You have a surprising amount of blooms and color for February. Perhaps our February has been too cold this year, my hyacinth are just peaking green shoots from the soil.

I have to get a few Hellebore, all these post on them, make my skin itch with envy.

Katarina said...

Lovely pictures - spring seems to be on its way!

b-a-g said...

Thanks for all the comments. There will probably be many posts on daffodils and tulips in a couple of weeks. It's interesting to compare how people nurture plants in different ways.

Karin / Southern Meadows said...

Great to see all the color in your garden already! Your hellebore are a bit further along than mine. Spring is not far off!

Alistair said...

Great to see the colour in your garden bag, well, not in your garden bag, you know what I mean. Still a little early for those plants to be showing colour up here in Aberdeen. Remember and split those Primulas in Summer to increase your stock.

b-a-g said...

Karin - I hadn't even heard of hellebores till about a month ago ...

Alistair - Thanks for the tip.

Laura Bloomsbury said...

Hi B-a-g - Chinese Jasmine and Japanese quince are wonderful winter structures. Given that you are gardening from scratch, you're already blessed with some fabulous flowers and here we are still at the raggedy end of winter. Nice shots by the way.

Laura

Wally said...

You have some beautiful plants!

fer said...

So many beautiful blooms! that hyacinth looks amazing

b-a-g said...

Thanks Laura - I'm not really starting from scratch because I inherited plants from the previous owner.

Thanks for visiting Mac & Fer.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...