Phew! What a Scorcher!

Well, first thing I weeded the rosebed but as this week has been amazingly hot, this has meant that everything has really got going and the perennials in the herbaceous borders are beginning to fill in the blank spaces ( anything that means less weeding has to be a good thing don't you think?).

The tulips are still going strong and have now been joined by the massed ranks of the oriental poppies and two of the peonies are flowering too.

Other plants starting to flower include the white Geraniums and the Centaurea (aka Knapweed)



Courtesy of our local Gardening Club, a member of which got hold of his neighbours bamboo which had run to seed and then died, as is the way of all bamboos, the garden is now the owner of approx 100 bamboo canes cut to approx 8ft in length, ( the actuial length is the length of my van, from front windscreen to rear doors) with the removed tops, which are about 3ft, being kept too for use as pea sticks and plant / bulb markers. These will be used for beans and sweet peas in the borders this year.

Sally had been to Inverness and returned with another couple of perennials so I planted out 5 x Campanula persicifolia Alba and 2 x Erysimum Bowles Mauve. The ground is unbelievably dry and all the plants received a full watering can to help them settle in. She (Sally that is) then brought down 4 pot grown lavenders and some clumps of Nepeta (I think that it is probably Six Hills Giant) from the house to be planted out alongside the steps down to the greenhouse. The lavenders needed a bit of TLC and the Nepeta just needed a haircut after planting.  I think that the top side of the steps would look quite nice with Alchemilla mollis and some welsh poppies (Meconopsis cambrica) - all yellows - and I can dig these up from my own garden without missing them! Feel free to suggest alternatives though!

In the greenhouse, although the toms hadn't put on as much growth as I had expected, the Petit Posy and Stem Broccoli had not only fully recovered from their mice attack but had grown on so well that they will be ready to plant out next week. The hollyhocks sown last week have germinated already and so have most of the other veg that was sown, with the exception of the crimson flowered broadies and the runner beans. I spent the rest of the afternoon knocking together two raised beds for the greenhouse - one being a deep bed and the other a single height bed. The photo shows just how much ground needs to be brought in just to raise the floor level to the correct height, never mind to fill the two beds!

That it for another week, hope you're enjoying the journey as much as I am.