JEARRARD'S HERBAL
1st January 2023
Camellia 'Winters Interlude' .
The year ended in turbulent style. Yesterday it rained and that was all that happened. I looked out of the door for a breath of fresh air and decided that was enough.
2023 has started dry, neither sunny nor cloudy. Nice weather for walking round the garden looking at things.
I tend to walk around in a habitual pattern, but if I'm feeling adventurous I follow the same route in reverse. The last few weeks have seen a slight alteration.
I take a detour along the bottom of the meadow to see Narcissus 'Rijnvelds Early Sensation' and Camellia 'Show Girl', listening for the whispering of spring in the undergrowth.
More specifically, looking to see if the hazel catkins have started to elongate yet. They haven't.
As a result of the detour there is a short section of path that I miss out, and in the process I have missed Camellia 'Winters Interlude'. I had forgotten it was there.
I knew it was somewhere, everything has to be somewhere, but I had forgotten it was there. It is a forgetful corner. It grows next to the shrub that begins with a 'B'.
I can never remember the shrub when I am beside it, only ever from a distance. Sitting at my desk, it is obviously a Blepharocalyx. Up close and it could be anything - as long as it starts with a 'B'.
The temperature has gone up, the camellias are blooming. The garden is moving towards a delightful spring. I don't want this to be winter's interlude.
1st January 2023
Chasmanthe aethiopica .
There isn't much happening in the greenhouse. It is filled with promise but there is very little action. A few sleepy nerines have drooping heads.
N. 'Christmas Dreams' has already nodded off. There is a last flower on Hesperantha coccinea. It looks lost in the slumbering herbaceous mess.
I started tidying it up for the year but got distracted by other things. In an abstract sense, these are quiet days. There is time to get on with
all the jobs I have been putting off. At a more practical level, the days fly by. The sun is rising in the sky and new growth is underway.
Spring isn't immediately apparent, but last week Chasmanthe aethiopica had fans of lush foliage billowing from the pots. This week it is in flower.
It should probably go outside. It wouldn't have appreciated the recent radiation frosts, but I think it would have survived.
The flowers add an unexpected shot of colour, nestling among the jobs to be done. I should tidy the greenhouse while I can, put things away, throw things out. I should finish re-potting the
Sarracenia, start re-potting the Disa. I should prick out the seedlings, mend the roof, weed the Hedychium house. These are precious quiet days when such things are possible.
If I'm quick.
1st January 2023
Galanthus woronowii .
Spring is champing at the bit. The garden is filling with snowdrops. A week ago there was the thrilling prospect of snowdrops. The ground was parting to show the tips of the new spears.
This week there are dangling buds. Under the trees at the top of the garden, Galanthus 'Moccas' had not emerged a week ago. I peered intently at the mossy ground,
checking for any sign of the greyish shoots. There was nothing. By Friday the new shoots had appeared, white buds leading the way upwards.
I thought that I might have flowers today but they are not quite ready. One white bud has nodded, it won't be long.
In the snowdrop bed, my early form of G. woronowii is in flower. For many years it grew closer to the house, under a Rhododendron, but the Rhododendron has grown bigger,
the shade had grown deeper. Last year I moved the snowdrop into the sun again, and it seems to like the change.
I bought it years ago in a garden centre. They were selling pots of G. woronowii as "snowdrops", grown from imported bulbs. This one looked interesting, so I bought it.
I have been delighted ever since. The garden centres don't sell G. woronowii any more, and that's a good thing. The bulbs were collected in the wild and I doubt many of them survived.
I was lucky to get this one when I did.
1st January 2023
Camellia azalea .
That is the nature of gardening. Do things when you can do them, buy things when you can get them.
Camellias are another example. I like the species camellias. Some of them are hardy here, many of them are probably not, but very few of them are easily available.
I have drooled over Camellia azalea for a long time. It carries bright red flowers in the middle of summer when there isn't another Camellia to be seen.
I will admit that by May I can be a little bored with Camellia flowers. They hang on in there long after the garden has moved into summer and left them behind.
I have always thought that a few months break was a good thing before the autumn camellias started. Summer flowering camellias might spoil the rest.
On the other hand, I have been drooling.
I have discovered that I am game if the camellias are.
Where did I get such a wonder? Well, Thompson and Morgan listed it as "1001 Summer Nights Jasmine". Strike while the iron is hot, so I did. The iron was distinctly cooler
by the time it was delivered, but it arrived safely, it arrived in bud. It has progressed to flower.
I have noted that this isn't actually July, but as I understand it the plants were imported from China. Perhaps it is a little jet-lagged. Next year it will be astonishing.
It's a good time for optimism. Start as you mean to go on.