A couple of weeks ago, Jim called me into the garden to look at a large moth.  Here it is:

It was particularly impressive; dusky grey, with black markings …

… and a flush of pink beneath the wings.  And it was really big – with a wingspan of about three feet (I’m kidding), with a wingspan of 70-80mm.  But it was only when the moth opened its wings, that I was able to identify it (later, using my Boy’s Big Bumper Book of Moths) as …

… an Eyed Hawk-moth (Smerinthus ocellata) – so-called for the vivid blue ‘eyes’ that it flashes at predators in the hope that they’ll be scared away.

I was surprised that this stunner hadn’t taken fright at my intruding lens and flown off.  But pleased too – I could continue snapping away.

The adult moths don’t eat at all (poor things – imagine) but the larvae feed on tree leaves, including willow and apple.  We’ve planted three apples in our garden orchard (do five trees constitute an orchard?  Actually, six trees – if you include the olive tree.  Do six trees constitute an orchard?) and perhaps it had been laying eggs on our apple trees.  I don’t mind; I was very taken with the S. ocellata – almost mammalian, I think, rather than insect-y.

It was only when I belly-crawled to the moth’s other side however, that I realised why it hadn’t flown away.

A spider had dug its Shelob-fangs deep into the moth’s thorax.

Rather like the fox taking the duckling, I couldn’t really blame the spider; besides I’m a big spider fan (how can you have read ‘Charlotte’s Web’ and not be?).  I was just saddened that the only Eyed Hawk-moth I have seen was in its death throes.

Yeah, I was just saddened.

oooOOOooo

Hmm, that’s a bit of a bum note to end a post on, isn’t it?  The death of a another lovely creature.   I should lighten the mood a little.  I need a random photo of something.  Something nice, pretty and calming, yes – that’s the ticket.  Like a, oh I don’t know – a horse, maybe.  Yes, a pretty horse on a hill – oh, oh … no wait, better still, a pretty horse grazing amongst some pretty buttercups.  That would work.  Hang on!  What’s this?  Good lord, what a coincidence.  I’ve just found a …

… a pretty photo of a pretty horse grazing on pretty buttercups.  What are the chances?  (No more death for a while – probably).

I couldn’t see anything untoward at first, but then I caught a glimpse of burnt orange amongst the meadow-grass; a fox with something in its jaws (click on photos to enlarge – if you like).

Only then did I notice the female mandarin duck and …

… realised that it was her making all that noise.  The fox (holding on to its mandarin duckling) …

… started to make off, pausing only to throw a glance in my direction.

But, suddenly, the duck was back …

… flapping over the fox’s head to land nearby hoping, I think, to divert the fox’s attention away from its prize.

Thwarted in her attempt, she tried again, swooping low and …

… again landing nearby.

But, her efforts were in vain; the fox unconcerned by her feints and squawks …

… carried his/her booty away.  Leaving behind …

… a bereft (and very beautiful) mother.

I didn’t even know that the mandarins had raised a brood this year (they didn’t use the owl nest-box like last year).  I certainly hadn’t seen any ducklings – except for today, in the mouth of a fox.  Though I often find clumps of feathers and the remains of birds and rabbits about the Priory, I do forget that it is a place of death – as well as of life and beauty.

Not much is flowering at the Priory therefore though there is plenty of new, green growth.  Here in the rock border, ferns (which survived the-years-of-neglect and being strimmed!) are stretching up and out among a drift of the forget-me-nots I introduced a couple of years ago.

The bank of rhododendrons behind the kidney beds (also still just foliage) are starting to flower – so a that’s a jab in the arm.  And, for the first time in weeks, I’m on top of the mowing.  Who knew that a sentence like that could give me so much pleasure?

But the long borders are still a damp squib; the allium leaves have rotted away like the tulips.  And all that cold weather has burnt the emerging persicaria in the foreground.

The Acer palmatum dissectum in the kitchen bed looks fine though and once again I’ve planted the bed up with Lobelia ‘Crystal Palace.’  Bedding plants?  I know, I know – but I’m a bit of a convert to lobelia.  I like lobelia – there I’ve said it.  Anyway, I’ve also added a few shuttlecock ferns (Matteuccia struthiopteris) – though I wonder whether they won’t dwarf the tree and box.  Probably.  If so, I’ll move them; but for the moment I like the little lime-green fountains.

Birds are pressing on with birdy business despite the wet, cold pseudo-spring.  Most of the nest boxes are in use …

… and the moorhens bring their young to feed on the scraps beneath the bird feeders.

The chicks may look ungainly but, being very shy, they don’t half leg it when they catch a glimpse of me – those huge feet disappear in a blurred whirl as they scoot off to the ponds.

Inconveniently, a blackbird has made a nest in the woodstore by the house.  I crept in and, using my most powerful lens, took a couple of snaps.  I’ll leave her be now, put up a sign to warn others and delay topping up the wood-pile.

On my drive to the Old Forge last week, May was more in evidence …

… with the lanes lined with cow parsley and …

… a great slab of rapeseed as a backdrop to the garden, while …

… a neighbouring paddock had a rather nice buttercup field-of-the-cloth-of-gold going on.

The grass in Margaret’s fields has grown long too.  But all the rain has forced her to defer the Great Stampede as it is known (but only by me).  I didn’t realise, until I met Margaret, that cows (at least in this part of the world) spend about six months of the year indoors.  She normally lets them out in early May but the ground has been too wet and the cows’ hooves would churn up all that lush pasture all too quickly.

Last week it was finally dry enough; watch out – here they come!  You can imagine how very excited they get at the prospect of fresh grass after months of silage.  Galloping …

… towards and past an anxious photographer (quaking on a wooden stile) and …

… careering out into the field above the Priory greenhouse.

For a couple of weeks a bull will keep the cows and calves company.   He probably thinks his luck is in – but unbeknownst to him, all the cows are already in calf.  Poor lad; disappointment looms.

Still, the cows are happy and so am I.  With the cows out in the fields at long last, it feels like May has finally arrived.

Albeit, almost in June.

R. ‘Pinky’

They flower for weeks and weeks, even months on end, and they are pretty easy to look after.  Keep on deadheading (the spent flowers come away easily) and water regularly throughout spring and summer.  Planted in well draining beds or in terracotta pots they make a great, long-lasting show, quickly increase in number and seem to pique people’s interest.  Surprisingly (at least in my experience) they are not widely known.

In autumn, I put all my pots under the greenhouse staging and stop watering completely.  After a few weeks the dried, dead growth pulls away freely and they can then be left undisturbed until  March, when I start watering again – but not too much and infrequently.  By early April new leaves begin to emerge:

Now is the time to increase your stock.  Propagation by division is easy; just knock out each plant and divide it into two or three; the corm-like tubers separate easily …

… and re-pot using ericaceous compost – if you use it.  I don’t and they seem to thrive in anything other than alkaline soil.

Top dress with gravel, put them outside, protect against mice – or, like me, don’t protect against mice …

… throw a tantrum, pop a patience pill and wait for them to flower.  It won’t be long.

I put these in the cold frame just to keep the rodents off ; they haven’t all started flowering yet but many are under way.

I have about ten varieties; this is ‘Tetra Red,’

here is ‘Candy Stripe,’

and my favourite, ‘Hebron Farm Red Eye’ (Pedant’s Corner: strictly speaking this is a x Rhodoxis) a slightly pink-tinged white with a golden centre.

‘Picta’ is a another white …

… which looks lovely en masse, with its pink blush.  Can you tell it’s still raining in Sussex?

R. ‘Fred Broome’ may fade a little if left all day in full sun …

… and this is one of my newer acquisitions – ‘Pintado.’  Similar but a little shorter than ‘Candy Stripe.’

So, yes, like I said, I am pretty smitten by this beautiful little plant, originally from the Drakensburg mountains in South Africa.  And why do I have so many?  Because I keep on propagating them!  I give them away as gifts – which are always well received – and I used to sell them on a little stall outside my house, alongside other choice little alpines.  But now I plan to plant them out into a raised, sharply draining bed at the Priory – and make up some more pots.  And if the pesky, pernicious, pilfering, pestiferous podents rodents don’t get them, they should look mighty fine.

So, rhodohypoxis.  Have I convinced you?  Are you smitten too?

In a rare sunny moment, I took a photo or two but not many; after all there were bound to be more …

Apeldoorn

… balmy, sunny days on which to capture them on chip.

Queen of Night

I looked forward to the show of Apeldoorn and Queen of Night that we enjoyed last year:

Perfectly in harmony with the cherry blossom and with nicely mown lawns, these photos were taken on 18th April 2011.

But 2012 wasn’t to be so kind.

Frost, wind and steady, seemingly ceaseless rain …

… took their toll …

… and now most of what is left is simply mush with little chance of storing strength for 2013.

The happiest, healthiest tulip is one of just two that were in the gardens in July 2008.  Strimmed to the brink by the previous grass-cutting crew, it startled me when it suddenly flowered in 2010.  I wonder whether there were originally dozens of them planted in amongst the daffodils but that the majority weren’t as tenacious as this fellow.  It hadn’t occurred to me to plant tulips into turf but I may just try it.

Conditions have been difficult this year, so very difficult.  I know I’ve wittered on and on about the amount of rain we’ve had (sorry) but I’ve never known the Priory to be so tediously WET in spring.  Wet, wet, wet.  All my plans, all general maintenance – heck, even general gardening have ground to a halt.

The new borders alongside the path are still empty.  I plan to have a temporary planting of Nepeta ‘Six Hills Giant’ here – though at the moment papyrus or mangrove might be better suited.

I did begin planting up the new tropical border; though that seems a cruel, daft name for a collection of tender plants moping and shivering and sulking in cold, wet clay.  Tropical, schmopical.

Viburnum roseum sits in the paddy field that is the west lawn – mowing is obviously out of the question and has been for several weeks.

Puddle planting; Rosa rugosa, soon to be smothered by uncut grass.

Good thing I put in raised vegetable beds, eh?

And I do worry about my young beech-hedging plants.  Beech shouldn’t be paddling in water; it should be stately and majestic high on the South Down, the roots airy and dry on chalk.  By rights it shouldn’t grow in heavy sodden clay at all, but stubbornly, with clenched beech-teeth, it clings on with admirable determination.

Here, where the overflow from the ponds runs out to the river, the beech is often submerged for days on end.  And it might just get worse.

The river is worryingly high …

… and if it continues to rise, the bridge will perform its secondary (unwanted) dam function.

Two  or three feet higher (which the bridge-dam would easily provide) and, as you can see, the banks will be breached and the meadow and gardens will flood.  In May.  Quite ridiculous, positively alarming, absolutely annoying and categorically inconvenient.  I really, really, really, really, really, really want it to stop raining now.

You might not know it by its Latin name (I didn’t prior to this post) but if you call it anything it is probably Lords and Ladies.  Or Cuckoo flower (though confusingly Cardamine pratensis shares this common name), as its flowering is said to coincide with the spring arrival of cuckoos in the UK.  This seems true enough – I heard my first cuckoo on 14th April and saw one two weeks later.

Perhaps you use neither of those names and call it Jack in the Pulpit or, if you prefer, Parson in the Pulpit.  Maybe Wake Robin, Babe-in-the-Cradle, Robin and Joan, Greasy Dragon or Silly Lovers.  No?

Many of the names are baffling but not Friar’s Cowl

How about Friar’s Cowl or Bobbins?  Or Adam and Eve, Lily Grass, Knights and Ladies?  Or Calves Foot, Devils and Angels, Red-hot-poker, Snake’s Meat, Frog’s Meat, Lady’s Smock, Lamb’s Lakens  or Cows and Bulls?  Have you decided yet,  Sweethearts?  (that’s another name.  I wasn’t being over-familiar).  Parson and Clerk, Adder’s Tongue, Ramp and Kings and Queens are perfectly acceptable and if you’re from Somerset you might know it as Sucky Calves.  I also found Kitty-come-down-the-lane-jump-up-and-kiss-me – though I find it hard to imagine anyone using that many syllables to describe what’s under the privet.  Hobble-gobbles, Moll of the woods, Jack in the box and Jack in the green; English passionflower, Lady’s keys, Long purples, Nightingale, Soldiers and sailors and Flycatcher – the list goes on.

The brown spadix and hooded spathe

The shape of the green hood gives us Tender Ear, Narrow Ear and Goat’s Ear.  And that of the spadix: Bloody Man’s Finger,  Dead Man’s Fingers and Cobbler’s Thumb.

Some names such as Starchwort and Starch-root refer to the historic use of its cooked and ground tubers as starch for laundry and even food (but please don’t try this at home unless you know exactly what you are doing; A. maculatum is toxic).  They can also be used as a thickening agent hence the name Arrowroot  – though this is not the familiar, readily available ‘arrowroot’ which is usually derived from Maranta arundinacea.

You might have guessed that many of the names are ribald and even lewd, as the shape of the flower is suggestive of male and female genitalia.  I’ve always known it as  Cuckoo-pint – though I have been mispronouncing it; pint rhymes with ‘mint.’   Pint is derived from pintle an Old English word for penis.  And cuccopintle means cuckoo penis which the plant is said to resemble.  (I wasn’t able to verify this from my sighting of a cuckoo in flight)!  Willy Lily,  Priest’s Pilly (Westmorland), Parson’s Billycock and Naked Boys are hardly euphemistic but if you really wish to cut to the chase, move to Wiltshire where it is known simply as Dog’s cock.  No  beating about the bush in Wiltshire.

The most common name, Lords and Ladies might be Victorian; used to gloss over some of the more er, colourful rustic epithets.  Though it has been suggested* that with a little apostrophe-use, it is just as vulgar as some of these other names, viz Lord’s and Lady’s – bringing us right back to the earthy vernacular.

So pick a name.  You might just plump for Wild Arum though that now seems a little tame. And me?  I think I’ll ditch Cuckoo-pint in favour of the perfectly marvellous Sucky Calves.

(There may be as many as a hundred common names for A. manulatum.  I found many more that I haven’t listed, mostly because they are variations on some of the above eg Dog’s bobbin, Man in the pulpit, Soldiers, Pokers, Naked ladies etc.  And I figured fifty-five – now sixty – was more than enough).

* Richard Mabey’s quite brilliant ‘Flora Britannica’ (which was invaluable in writing this post) – if you don’t already own a copy rush out and buy one.  Right this minute.

The nine automatic wall and roof vents cool it a little but it still gets terrifically hot in there.  Of course, as soon as I finished stapling the netting into place, the sun slid behind …

… dark cloud, temperatures dived and we had weeks of rain.  And rain.  And then … some rain.

But if the sun does ever peek out again, I shall be prepared.  It had grown too stifling in the greenhouse for me to sit and drink tea.  And that will never do.

In previous years, I have lost plants to late frosts (to which the Priory is prone) and so I am probably overly cautious in moving tender stuff outside.  The greenhouse is heated by a fan heater (the size of a small jet engine)  and the cosseted plants within are blissfully unaware of the wet, cold horror outside.

.

The auriculas have been blooming since March; as has …

… the lovely scented Pelargonium ‘Royal Oak.’

Last year I potted up a Pachyphytum oviferum leaf.  It doesn’t look much does it?  But it has doubled in size (and not just shrivelled up and died which some do) and it will eventually grow into …

… the weirdly beautiful, powder (or bloom) coated sugar-almond plant … or moonstones … or, as Jim calls it, the hemorrhoid plant.  How uncouth.

The lithops are stirring and beginning to gape as …

… new ‘leaves’ begin to emerge from between last year’s …

… though this one’s new growth is itself splitting, to reveal yet another new set of leaves.  Curious.

An interloper has found a home in one of the pots of sarracenia but I haven’t the heart to remove it; I love ferns.

Other sarracenias are flowering …

… but unlike the nondescript green flowers of last year, these …

… are a deep claret.  I have no idea why.

Most of the dahlias I potted recently are poking forth.  I find starting them off in pots gives them an advantage over the slugs – for when they are eventually planted outside.

After a recent visit to Architectural Plants (on yet another rainy day), there are new tenants in the greenhouse.  For the tropical border, I’ve bought a plant I’ve long hankered after – Tetrapanax papyrifer ‘Rex.’  This architectural, hardy exotic should reach 3-4 metres in height with leaves a metre across.  Goodness.

I also bought Arundo donax or Spanish reed – another 3 – 4 metre hardy big boy and …

… this not-at-all-hardy canna lily, Canna coccinea; relatively petite at about one and a half metres tall (though I’ve heard that it might struggle to get that high).

Now I need it to stop raining and for it to warm up outside.  I’ve got loads to do; the grass is still growing but the ground is too sodden to mow; I’ve got planting to do but the soil is gloop; I’ve got plants to harden off but the wind would rip them to tatters.  There has been so much rain that …

… water from the surrounding fields is still pouring into the grounds, filling …

The east pond. Normally the alders stand well clear of the water.

… the ponds to full capacity.  Thankfully, the emergency channel we dug three years ago  …

The flood waters haven't washed out as much duckweed as I would have liked.

… is carrying excess water out to the river – and away from the front door of the house.  Phew.  Thank goodness the South of England is officially in a state of drought.  Otherwise who knows how wet it might be.

I recently put in three Cornus controversa ‘Variegata’ which, as they can grow eight metres high, let’s call ‘trees’ shall we?

Digging into rain-sodden, heavy clay was a joyless, back-breaking task but one I was determined not to give up on.

Ten minutes later I gave up.

But, after a mug of Earl Grey, I came back and finished the job.  The Priory owner suggested planting them closely together and I think he’s right – they should look fine as a mature grouping.

In early 2009, I planted three Eucalyptus gunnii in the small copse up on the drive.  One, sadly, has died but the other two have romped away.  Indeed they have romped away too quickly.

Last winter, weighed down by snow or battered by strong winds, they would often kiss the ground and the root balls rock alarmingly.  They seemed to grow quicker than either their stems or their anchoring root system could cope with – so I decided to pollard them.  I do this to a gunnii in the gardens – to encourage the glaucous, round juvenile leaves.  But here I just wanted mighty, towering eucalypts with a far, high canopy – a goal that will now be delayed.

It’s not an elegant look, but they should soon re-spurt – and the roots and trunk will have time to grow sufficiently strong to support all that top weight.

Three or four years ago I stuck a neighbour’s pruned willow twigs into a pot and, even though they had been lying about for several days, they quickly rooted.  The willow was a corkscrew (Salix matsudana ‘Tortuosa’) and last year I planted it out on the east lawn.

It is growing nicely; the lawn here is often soggy.

In my first year, I planted an olive tree on a lawn just outside the gardens.  This was before I had fully realised just what a sharp frost pocket the gardens sit in.  The olive struggled valiantly for a couple of years and then, with a shiver, a sigh and a wistful longing for the warm shores of the Med, it died.  I replaced it (on what I still call the olive lawn), with a …

…  columnar Beech (Fagus sylvatica ‘Dawyck Gold’) – eventual height 15 – 20 metres! It seems much happier than the poor olive ever was.

These two flowering cherries ‘Kanzan’ are growing well too.

April 2011

The flowers are a little too pink and a little too fluffy for my taste.  But what could I do?   They were in a plant sale and incredibly cheap.  And the red leaves are undeniably handsome.

Recently, we had some uninvited guests (see … ‘Do Not Tempt Fate’) and actually, they behaved appallingly – killing two apple trees in the meadow; now replaced with ‘Katy’ and ‘Cox’s Orange Pippin’.

To keep out the deer, we did consider fencing the garden with six-foot high wire but, as the owner remarked, it would have given the gardens a POW-camp air – not a look we particularly wanted.   Option two was to individually protect the young trees on the meadow and I asked Rob the Brickie (not his real name) to build some wooden barriers.

I was worried that they would look too big and boxy, so Rob and I decided on ‘vase’ shapes to lessen their impact.  Over the course of several days, Rob made twelve of these.  Great to have him on board at times like this.

I’m very pleased with them; I didn’t want big wooden structures in the meadow but given that I had to, I am very pleased with them.  In time the timber will silver and become lichen encrusted and they’ll be rather stately, I think.

I should hate for all these fruit varieties to become anonymous; I wanted to label them for the future – for when me and my Blue Notebook have long gone.   So I had these brass plaques made and for consistency even the easily recognisable Gingko has a plaque.

The trees need to grow of course; up and above the timber cages.  But at least they now have a chance to do just that without the unwanted (and uninvited) attentions of fallow deer.

Each year, I arrange for any sickly, dangerous or unwanted trees to be felled and for dead, rotten and restricted  branches to be removed.

If  a smallish tree needs felling or a low branch removing, I’ll do the job myself; anything larger and I need to get in help.  This year, there were no trees to chop down (a good thing) but I still had tree-work that was either too high for me to reach (I have no head for heights) or beyond my skill level (hard to believe I know, but true).

On the drive, just before it turns and enters the gardens, is a large candelabra-shaped ash tree.  After a mighty storm in early February, a big, rotten section of one of its many stems, crashed to the ground below.  Peering up at this elephant-skinned giant, I could see that there was still a big length of trunk and two or three dead branches that needed to be removed.  (At this point, the drive is a public right of way and so the tree needed to be made safe).

The rotten trunk is to the right of the tree surgeon

So, at the end of March, I hired a local company (who I’ve used these past two or three years) to tackle this and two other jobs.  Jack (the tree surgeon) gradually reduced the rotten bole …

Another chunk of rotten tree-trunk falls to earth

… and removed the dead branches.

I also asked for advice on two of the big oaks on the east lawn.  We had spoken about them last year and I wanted him to cast a professional eye over them.

Here they are on the right.  They have sparse top growth, crumbling bark and plenty of dead branches.  Last year he told me that they were dying from the top down and probably won’t survive many more years.  He suggested that they may have been struck by lightning.

Unlike ash, oak is as hard as iron (-ish) and far less likely to shed branches; unless they are rotten.  After a quick inspection, he saw no need to carry out any remedial work.  These two oaks should be fine (and safe) until another check is carried out next year.

Reassured, we then moved on to job number two.  This was a quickie; just a simple lifting of the tree-crown (by the removal of two or three lower branches) from the tulip tree next to the house.

Before

We wanted to increase space and light for the amelanchier on the left and for the yew hedging beneath.

After

You can hardly see the difference which is how tree maintenance should be, I suppose.  Nothing too drastic.

But the final job was to be more drastic.

On the west lawn by the pond are six weeping willows and I had been asked by the Priory owner to have the crown of the largest reduced by about 25%.  I  was worried that such a big crown reduction, at this time of year, would look ugly, perhaps harm the tree and (despite being willow) that it wouldn’t re-sprout.

“Such a big crown reduction, at this time of year, won’t look too ugly, won’t harm the tree and (being willow) it will soon re-sprout,”  said Jack.  Huh?!?  I hate that mind-reading thing he does.

Once more aloft, Jack starts work while his assistant waits below.

And when they had finished?  Noticeable certainly – but more light for the house and for a pair of adjacent birches.

A good morning’s work then.  Three jobs done, loads more firewood for me to chop next winter, plenty of waste for a big bonfire (always a joy) and a metre high mound of wood chippings.  And the trees on the estate made safe for another year – fingers crossed.

But realising that they won’t take a blind bit of notice, I continue to edge and dig, mow and plant; all the while taking time to enjoy the spectacle.  Even plants that I wouldn’t have planted myself, such as …

Forsythia in bloom. A neighbour's cottage at The Old Forge.

… forsythia, are looking mighty fine in this, their lime-light moment.

There is a forsythia up against the house and under a window at the Priory.  Seems an odd place to plant one as, once the main event is over,  it is a dull shrub.  But, with an underplanting of forget-me-nots, I have no plans to remove it.  Yet.

Something I would have planted (had there not already been one) is Magnolia stellata.  Such perfection is rare on this particular little tree but the absence of late, hard frosts this year has left the delicate blooms unblemished.

Tulipa bakeri 'Lilac Wonder'

I must stress that, actually, I have planted some stuff myself (this is important; it’s my job).  Here Tulipa bakeri ‘Lilac Wonder’ flowers against a backdrop of fresh crocosmia leaves.

Primula denticulata with the first Peacock butterfly of the year - 28 March.

And beneath a young fig tree, a clutch of primulas attract an early visitor; always gratifying that I have helped to attract wildlife.

But as much as I would like to claim credit for all the beauty in the gardens, sadly, I can’t.  One of my favourite areas of the Priory is a bank, running down from the greenhouse to a drainage ditch.

I strim it once or twice a year but certainly not in Spring when, after the crocuses are over,  it is speckled with primroses, the odd daffodil, wood anemones and cuckoo flowers.

Primroses (Primula vulgaris) grow throughout the estate.

Here forming a carpet (or at least a rug) in the wild-flower meadow,

here popping up in the lawn and …

… here self-seeding themselves into places they really shouldn’t.  But, bad as such behaviour is, I can’t always bring myself to root them out.

Usually I’m unimpressed with pink but, while I still prefer the common yellow primrose, I do rather like some of the variations; such as this one.

Viola odorata

Even more widespread than the primulas are wild violets (Viola odorata).  A visitor to the gardens was really quite excited when she noticed the white form …

White Viola odorata

… as she thought them quite rare (though a quick internet search seems to dispute this).  The white violas don’t mix with their common-or-garden cousins; remaining haughtily separate and aloof.  We have several patches of them along the drive and by the river-bank.

Cardamine pratensis

The Cuckoo Flower or Lady’s Smock (Cardamine pratensis) is common in these ‘ere parts, lining hedgerows and field margins, and is now spreading into the meadow; which pleased me no end.

Under three large oak trees, on the east lawn, is another area of grass which I leave uncut until the autumn.  Chiefly because later in the summer it is home to a small colony of …

Dachtylorhiza fuchsii. June 2011

… Common Spotted Orchids (Dachtylorhiza fuchsii) which I wish to encourage (obviously) but also…

… because of a growing spread of bluebells and …

Erthronium pagoda

… a little something extra that I have added:  Dog’s Tooth Violets (so-called because of the shape of their bulbs).  I have planted three different varieties but only this one, Erythronium pagoda, has deigned to flower.  The un-mown grass is also home to a steadily increasing number of wood anemones (Anemone nemorosa).

I’d like to say that their gentle, perfect spacing is down to me.   But that would be a lie.  I know how tricky naturalised planting is to achieve and it doesn’t come any better than this; careful where you tread.

I first noticed wood anemones as a twenty-one year old visiting Rievaulx Abbey in Yorkshire.  Coming from the city, I had no idea what it was but, thinking it gorgeous, plucked one to press within my angsty journal – for later identification.  Now almost thirty years later, the pressed flower is still in my angsty journal and, remarkably, perfectly preserved.

Up on the drive, where it passes through Margaret’s wood, anemones grow much more abundantly.  They have erupted in number since the  trees were thinned a couple of years ago and sunlight now washes the woodland floor.

Caltha palutris

In the water margins of the gardens, I have added Kingcup (or Water Marigolds if you prefer; either way: Caltha palutris) and, unsurprisingly in this perfect habitat,  it is thriving.

Another Marsden introduction (and mentioned in a recent post) are Fritillaria meleagris.  I boasted then that there were hundreds of this handsome charmer dancing across the meadow … but only posted photos of single flowers.  So were proof needed …

Ranunculus ficaria

Lesser Celandine (Ranunculus ficaria) is endemic at the Priory and (very annoyingly) infests some of the formal borders.  But here in the meadow, it may do as it likes – and does.

Nearby is a swathe of wild flowers that, were they not already well established, I certainly would have planted.  Along the river bank, on either side of the post and rail, is a heady, salami-scented expanse of Ramsons or Wild garlic (Allium ursinum).

Allium ursinum

So far only one or two have flowered but …

… when they all do, it is quite a sight.  And smell.  The sight I’ll share, in due course. The smell?  Er, garlicky.  Go sniff a salami; you’ll get the idea.

Prunus spinosa not yet in full spate.

And providing the shade that Ramsons love?  A large bank of Blackthorn (Prunus spinosa).  I certainly didn’t plant this but I did save it from being felled.  The chap who put in the post and rail fencing wanted to clear it (would’ve made his job much easier).  But I fought its corner and the thicket was reprieved.   I’ve been delaying publishing this post for a few days now, as I wanted to show you the Blackthorn at full throttle; unfortunately though, that is still a few days off and (as a good friend has just pointed out) it has been a while since I last posted.  So …

Looking over Apeldoorn tulips to the Blackthorn. April 2011.

… we must make do with this photo from last year.   It is a magnificent, completely over the top, distracting performance – which I love and never tire of.  I’m so glad it wasn’t chain-sawed.  Aren’t you?