Vignettes of your gardening memories

[WSGR]

Ah, great! She did capture the translucency. Amazing. Her painting was so Spanish .. And I can see the passion embedded in her paintings. Thank you for sharing.

[hamparstum]

I guess that you referred to "spanish" because of her colourful painting . Actually that level of colour was already known in medieval Armenia even before Spain was a country...
Arturo

[WSGR]

Yes, the colours are so vibrant, strong and passioned. 

[hamparstum]

Many years ago...just too many, I visited the UK and was able to see paintings by Turner. I was amazed by his skill. Those skies, actually were real. They were everywhere in the UK! quite an unknown experience by a southerner like me! David Austin's roses have that muted subtleties imbedded also. Is it part of the English character? Different people place observation differently, some see passion in colour. I would say Turner's skies are no less passionate, but are placed in form not in colour. There's a strong connection between gardening and the visual arts. However music is no less absent either. My gardens have their beds named after classical music forms: i.e Ballade, Scherzo, Prelude, Rhapsody, Etude...

[WSGR]

I wonder if you could photograph your Rhapsody, Etude and Sherzo .. and I will ask my son to guess. I do know a tiny bit of music. Did theory up to grade 5, but being tone deaf didn't help and could only pass up to grade 3 piano.

I only came to appreciate Turner last year, seeing how he captured the essence of dismal weather. But I prefer your wife's palette to his. Life is too short to be so dismal, depressing...

This is a terrible photo, but this is MY FIRST ASTRANTIA in my garden. How I had attempted to get one! No words can express my joy!





Lagurus Ovatus - in the past years, I always captured it with dew drops or rain .. not so and so it's a bit bland.

I just love this Crinodendron Hookerianum - little lanturns



Whilst watering and sowing and what nots in my lean to, the corner of my eye caught this heavenly colour. Planted it out only to realise that it's very difficult to focus this little gem, with wind, and old age hand shaking and limitation of my little Samsung. Finally, my resolve beat all the obstacles and voila la beauté!

[hamparstum]

Yes, I agree that may seem too short. For gardeners like myself, I have projects that definitely will outlast my present life. Its interesting that you find Turner depressing. I didn't get that impression then. I'll return to a book with paintings and get back to you. I'm very much a warm colourful person, very much the Mediterranean type and enjoy colour immensely. I guess that is why I garden. Blooms, or fall colours (now leaves) really make me happy.Sometimes forms, contrasts, movement...there's so much to see out there. For phots of my beds, I ask for patience. Two of those are just bare now: Scherzo and Rhapsody. I've yet to recreate them. It will be next spring onwards. Possibly only by the end of the year will they have anything worthwhile picturing. Beds need renovation every few years or so andthese two fell into that category. Different circumstances lead to that. My trees grew tall, what was sunny , became shaded and plants grown there no longer flourish. So they need to be replaced with a new cohort. I will do that. For the time being they have no interns and they are covered by fallen leaves.
        Etude became a bed for some of my roses. I collect roses and if possible ( that means given all present restrictions are overcome) I hope to have over 300 cultivars growing here. Etude is a study of a combination of Tea roses (Old garden roses) with a few modern ones and some very large climbers at the back. It also contains a few species roses ( R.chinensis 'Mutabilis') and its yellow form by Peter Beales, Yellow mutabilis,. Everything is now going into dormancy. The bed contains also some daylillies and a few Aubrietas flowing over the edge of the stones of the rised bed. In some ways its my first bed ( etude) that I'm quite pleased with. When in bloom it bursts in colour.
        Astrantias....I wish I learn how to grow them. I tried unsuccessfully with seeds. No one carries them here in the nurseries. From what others say, it's really a steep uphill prospect. Some day. Your last picture is a beauty unknown to me.

[WSGR]

For me, it would be La Boheme!



Gardening with little or no money!

The projects will never be complete, so might as well take some pics to digitally memorise snippets of them.



French Lavender



Digitalis in a hot place - strange! self-seeded!


A big clematis




Welsh Poppy

Cirsium Trevor's Blue Wonder

[WSGR]

I have gone big on salvias; or at least I think I have. Instead of buying beautiful big flowers, I was fooled by photos and the new ones I bought have tiny flowers. Thank heavens that I have these old chums.

Salvia Nachtvlinder


Salvia Ultra Violet?


Love this lantern like fuchsia



Just when I thought I would be photographing a DIFFERENT iris yestrday, one bud fell onto the ground and the rest very buggy!


Do difficult to capture the beauty of this Astrantia - veins and markings and flower form. Really is lovely. After so many years and burning a big hole in my pocket; finally ...

[WSGR]

Have a new chocolaty iris - might be called Quechee! Never remember buying it though



This one looks like a Tulip Festival! What a daff idea to name an iris TULIP Festival! And the critter really loved it. First, one bud is on the floor, then the stem was snapped off. Grrrrrrrrrrrrr!



A vibrant Welsh orange poppy!



Stipa gigantea in full but quiet glory!



Fasciation in full glory in this camellia

[WSGR]

Gee, it must have been freezing up north. Even here, we have plant-toppling winds and a chill to the bones. What crazy weather this is and the worst is that I saw spit and there will be no rain for at least 2 weeks. And I am raining tears!

A new bearded iris. Sadly, I have now a field of one type!



A rather common purple one



Coral Fay peony


Pumila Tickled Peach

[WSGR]

Snowdrop seeds. Ants 0 Me 1! Well, most of the times, Nature 1 Me 0!



White allium



A plant which self-seeded itself in the allotment and I took some seeds last year. This year, it has come up tall and proud with tons of stems and buds! Thank you! Anybody knows the name?

[Maggi Young]

A plant which self-seeded itself in the allotment and I took some seeds last year. This year, it has come up tall and proud with tons of stems and buds! Thank you! Anybody knows the name?

A Tragopogon -  perhaps T. porrifolius

[WSGR]

That does look like it. Thank you. I've got the yellow ones as well! Anybody cooked it before?

[WSGR]

Do you sieve your compost? I did and to my absolute horror 1/4 of the sieveful of compost turned out to be lumps and bumps



No wonder I have had so many casualties and fatalities!

A scented allium Violet Beauty



Snapshot of my patch - Crinodendron Hookerianum, next to Arthur Bell rose on a can, scented bearded irises, Cornus Kousa Rubra and further on cistus.

[WSGR]

Wonder if our omniscient Maggi can help pin down names on my different allium



I really would like to know the names of these two white alliums please!




Do you think these are real seeds please?