JEARRARD'S HERBAL
10th March 2024
Anemone blanda 'Atrocaerulea'
Temperatures fell last weekend and I had a nervous moment thinking that winter might have one last insult for the garden. Temperatures fell and the garden hardly noticed.
The sun climbed high into the sky, the days warmed and spring took hold. I removed the fleece from the greenhouse, uncovered the Clivia and noticed that some of the tree ferns had started to grow.
I have a small group of Anemone blanda growing in a tub. It arrived bearing the name 'Atrocaerulea'. I'm not sure if the name ever meant anything but it is certainly nonsense now.
This is just a blue flowered variant of A. blanda, a species where blue is the default colour.
Notwithstanding, I am pleased to see it. It is not a plant that lurks beneath frost-encrusted ground ready to burst forth (Ta-daa!) at any opportunity. Anemone blanda waits until its tubers have been warmed before
it does anything. It doesn't say that spring is coming, it says that spring has arrived.
Last summer, filled with joy and optimism, I planted another fifty tubers in the new herbaceous border to really start the season with a colourful celebration.
Apparently spring hasn't arrived in the new herbaceous border yet. Nothing.
10th March 2024
Freesia laxa azurea
Despite the blue deficit in the garden I had a surprise in the greenhouse. The blue form of Freesia laxa is in flower, possibly even in its own pot (it does wander around a bit).
The name is rather informal, it may not even be a form of Freesia laxa. It flowers in late winter rather than through the summer and it has smaller flowers than the bright red form.
It is less inclined to be weedy and more prone to winter damage. It is also more welcome. Scarlet flowers in summer have their charm, but the plant spreads seed willy-nilly
among bulbs in pots, and it gets out of hand. Before one of the re-vamps of the Temperate House at Kew, Freesia laxa was doing a good job of smothering everything at ground level.
They removed it. I expect they are still removing it regularly.
It has escaped my greenhouse, a passenger among some Nerine that were planted out. The distinctive leaves are coming up now in a new Nerine bed. It will be allowed
to grow out there and one day I will probably curse my own carelessness and indolence.
The blue form is less invasive. I don't think it would survive outside but it would be welcome.
10th March 2024
Helleborus x hybridus Black
Right at the top of the garden, under the trees, I have some borders for spring bulbs and hellebores. Many years ago I planted some very charming lilac and purple Corydalis solida forms.
In the middle of last week they flowered. I set out to search for them and eventually I saw them. Lilac and purple do not stand out against a woodland floor.
I like to think that I learned an important lesson. The next Corydalis I planted were pink and scarlet.
Even as I planted out the hellebores I knew that the white and pink ones would be most telling. It didn't stop me planting a good number of black ones, they are just so wonderful.
They will add interest and detail to a close inspection of the border, without detracting from the grand effect. Rationalisation is a marvellous thing.
The black flowered forms might as well not be there, they add nothing. Every spring makes that simple observation abundantly clear.
Every year I seem to add more black ones. They add nothing to the display. I have to seek them out as I walk past. I walk past regularly just to do so. They are astonishing.
10th March 2024
Pleione Adams
The greenhouse rattled through most of last week, responding to a stiff breeze from the east. I was reluctant to go down there. The fragility of the greenhouse
is emphasised by the sound. However, the idea that there might be Pleione buds developing drew me out. I had seen my first Pleione blooms of the year
posted online and was feeling impatient for action.
I needn't have worried, there were half a dozen different cultivars in flower. P. Adams was the best of them. It has a bright, compact flower
that looks up. Some of the others early cultivars have droopy flowers that hang over the edge of the pot like seasick cruisers on a choppy swell. They are lovely but
it doesn't feel like a springtime celebration. More bleary-eyed 'don't talk to me'. I left them alone because Adams looked chipper.
In the next few weeks the collection will fill the greenhouse with colour and warm me up for the Disa season, hot weather and drought worries.
Summer has appeared on the horizon.