JEARRARD'S HERBAL
Thats enough introduction - on with the plants!
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... out in the garden.
27th April 2025
Acer pseudoplatanus 'Brilliantissimum' .
I have been away for a couple of days, here and there (Rhododendron show, Orchid show). The garden was grey and wet when I left and bright with sunshine when I got back.
In the interval the colour had changed and spring had lost its innocence. There must be a time in a child's life when they go from wearing the clothes put out for them to
choosing the clothes they want to wear. I can't remember much about it myself except for a thick bottle green sweater that I was unreasonably fond of, sporting it through winter and summer
without exception. It started to unravel at the sleeves but I persisted with it. Enough is enough I suppose. One day it simply vanished. I expect you left it when you were playing with Stuart, dear?
Yes, and the dog really has gone to live on a farm.
Spring goes through the same trauma, from the pastel innocence of March to the calculated style of April.
Acer pseudoplatanus 'Brilliantissimum' has unfurled a shoal of shrimps into the border. The poor plant has suffered. I allowed a shoot from the rootstock to grow for too long
and when it had to be removed, felled had become a better adjective. The remaining shoot grew out of the shock and then a pesky squirrel ring barked it.
The first two feet of stem are still without bark, but astonishingly it has still shrimped-up.
27th April 2025
Hydrangea macrophylla 'Pink Sensation' .
There are more bus stops on the moon than mop-head hydrangeas in the spring, or so I thought. Then I met 'Pink Sensation' and demonstrated, at least to my own satisfaction,
that it would be better not to think.
Pink mop-head hydrangeas are a common and generally rather repulsive phenomenon that has the common decency to confine itself to late summer when the garden is too tired to fight them off.
Recent breeding is working to rehabilitate a tired gardening cliché. Diversity has been added to the flowering season and the pink has been detoxified. 'Pink Sensation'
has grown some coral for the shrimps to shoal around. It produces a delicate head or two as soon as growth starts in the spring.
Not that pink hydrangeas are toxic in my garden. The soil here turns them blue, sometimes delightfully, sometimes ... well, it's still blue anyway.
'Pink Sensation' has another transformational trick up its sleeve. It doesn't transform. It's the only hydrangea I have seen that stays pink. It's a wonderful thing, I expect it was bred
for the pixies of Cornwall to bathe in tender dew on its rosy florets.
No. It was bred by Niels Arts in Aalsmeer for the patent royalties. Its real name is 'Agrihydravijf'. Romance is dead, I guess that is the real loss of innocence.
27th April 2025
Malus x floribunda .
Not to worry, there is a corner or two in the garden filled with the promises of old. I have planted many apples in the garden with half an eye on their delightful flowers
but the other half fixed on their delightful fruits. They are all gone now, planted in prime places to get the best crop and then swept away when I wanted the space
for something more special. Apples always taste slightly wistful to me. This is what you could have had if you weren't so pushy.
Fortunately Malus x floribunda has never fruited here. It's a crab apple, it wouldn't have mattered anyway. It was planted as a seedling at the foot of a
Leyland Cypress and although it has been dwarfed over time, I have a feeling that it might outlive the conifer. Then it will be released into the sunshine
to flower abundantly. Until then, this is the charm of April without any wistful aftertaste.
27th April 2025
Camellia 'Alba Plena'.
Cornwall can be thought of as the land of perpetual spring. The fresh shimmer of flowers will continue until the first autumn snowdrops appear.
It is possible that the latest flowering camellias will still be banging out tired old blooms as the first autumn camellias start.
On the one hand, it can be seen as a year of freshness. On the other hand, there always seems to be camellia flowers dying on the shrubs somewhere.
With a lot of camellias in the garden, I have started to pay close attention to those that die well.
Camellia 'Elsie Jury' is making a fine spectacle. She is late into flower but has now got into her full stride and when she tires of the
magnificent pink mop-heads she throws them to the ground with the haughty bravado of a flamenco dancer. It is a joy to watch, they land with an emphatic thud.
Camellia 'Alba Plena' has a different style. The perfect and precise white flowers shatter like a fine glass breaking and shower the ground with shards.
They lose their gloss, turn brown and sink into the earth. It is very satisfying. No pom-pom tantrum just a slow cherry-blossom oblivion.
It's a week for shouting hurrah for 'Alba Plena', and even for 'Agrihydravijf'.
To find particular groups of plants I grow, click on the genus name in the table above. Click on the "Index" box at the top of the page for the full list.
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