JEARRARD'S HERBAL
29th September 2024
Dahlia (australis x tenuicaulis)
The skies have darkened, leaves have fallen and I have spent the week in a chair looking out at it. Autumn sunshine can be bright and glittering but it doesn't take much
grey weather for the shine to rub off. This morning the weather arrived, wet and windy. I expect that it is shredding my bananas just when they had reached their magnificent best.
They are there all year but there are really only a few short months at the end of summer when they are magnificent. Once the leaves start to shred, they seem to darken in colour
and become ridiculous and sombre like a gangling funeral director who has taken to theatrical prancing. They produce fresh leaves in the spring, but it takes a while to build up a decent head.
Until then they look strangely unbalanced. Tomorrow I will see if this years display has been brought to an end.
In front of the house I grow a few Dahlia species. After a slow start to rival the bananas they are beginning to make a display.
Dahlia (australis x tenuicaulis) fascinated me because it is a hybrid between a tree species and an herbaceous Dahlia. It approximates to shrubby growth
but manages to flower in the warmth of autumn. The true tree Dahlia put off flowering until they can see the frost advancing towards them on the grass
(if the deign to flower at all). This one is striking in the dark light, buzzing disconsolately with cold bees and drooping down a low wall.
29th September 2024
Camellia brevistyla
The sense of gloom in the garden is deceiving. Powerful forces are at work reshaping the garden as it sleeps. For the sake of argument, let's call it the spirit of spring.
Last week I looked carefully at the forms of Camellia sasanqua in the garden to see if they were budding up. I didn't find anything and resolved to enjoy
the final rush of warmth rippling along the borders. Pish tosh! I was looking in the wrong place. Down by the side if the greenhouse, C. brevistyla is in flower.
I raised these from seed many years ago and I have given a number away, but there are still six of them planted around the garden. They are interestingly diverse
and although I planted them as a clump initially, I had to dig them up and spread them out this year. One is quite fastigiate, with small flowers. Beside it I have one that is more rounded
and shiny. Down near the bananas I have one that flowers for a very long season and then there are two small ones that haven't flowered yet. One of them has very broad, olive green leaves
and I am hoping that it is a hybrid.
Finally there is this one, the best of them all in flower. Inevitably it is also the one that is least convenient. I plonked it down in a pot outside the greenhouse meaning to move it.
It has now rooted down between the paving slabs and looks set to make my life difficult. However, it will be cherished carefully. It is undoubtedly the best of them.
29th September 2024
Galanthus reginae-olgae 'Blanc de Chine'
While I am still adapting to the idea that autumn has oozed into the garden, I am forced to face the prospect of spring. Down in the Nerine house, the first of the autumn snowdrops is in flower.
I saw some pictures yesterday from Loughborough Alpine Garden Society show and in the background was a magnificent pot of G. reginae-olgae. Last week I saw that the flower stem was staring to emerge on this plant,
so the flower shouldn't come as a surprise. Additionally, this is an autumn snowdrop not one of those spring ones.
Notwithstanding, the appearance of a cool white flower while the Nerine house is still warm made me stop and consider things carefully. Snowdrops, snowdrops all the way. They may sputter a bit during November
as the true autumn snowdrops give way to the very early spring snowdrops (G. elwesii in its many guises) but snowdrops will grace the scene now until there are azaleas to show and the thuggish bluebells start to muscle in.
'Blanc de Chine' has been consistently the first to flower in autumn with its pure white flower (no green mark). 'Pink Panther' may well be next and the annual discussion about whether it is pink or not will be renewed.
29th September 2024
Nerine (North Pole x Queen Mary)
The Nerine house is simmering. It hasn't come to a boil yet but I don't think it will be long before is is washed in a reckless tide of clashing colour.
I have been raising seedlings for many years with the idea that I will sort them all out one day, keep the good ones and plant the rest in the garden.
I started three years ago with the N. bowdenii seedlings. I kept about a dozen, gave a hundred away and planted the last hundred around the garden. They are very pretty.
Of the dozen I kept, I'm not sure that any of them will make the grade in the long term but they will get a few years more on trial to prove their worth.
Two years ago I started on the N. sarniensis seedlings. I have been fixated on the purple colours for several years so the seedlings were easy to sort. There are a great many in the same colour range
so the good ones are great and the less good are planted in the garden.
After my "purple" period I got interested in other colours. Scarlet was last years fascination and only time will tell if I have made any worthwhile progress there. Before that
I was looking at the large orange flowers with a broad white stripe. Is it genetically inherited or just chance? I had three or four cultivars that showed the pattern
and this seedling, from a cross between 'North Pole' and 'Queen Mary' suggests that it is. This is the most exciting seedling to flower this year.
Now the question is, does the pattern only appear in orange and white, or could I breed it in pink, or purple?
Interesting times.