A Sense of Place

Usually by this time of year, my witch-hazel ( Hamamelis x intermedia 'Jelena') has been in bloom for weeks. As early as January, given a warm day, it will burst into bloom and close up again when the weather turns chilly again.  This year, the brutally cold Winter has held it in check, and even now in the first week of March it still sits waiting for a moment of warm air and sunshine.  Today I decided to treat myself to a little preview and cut a few branches and brought them into the kitchen, where they opened up in the course of an hour.

It has been a long, frigid winter and many plants have perished in the greenhouse on the coldest nights. However I was thrilled to see that almost all my clematis cuttings and seedlings have survived, despite being left on one of the coldest areas of the greenhouse. Among these are several cuttings I made last year of a plant that I grew from seed that was collected from Clematis 'Helsinborg'.  When it finally flowered it turned out to be coloured a very lovely clear blue, quite unlike its parent which is described as having slightly twisted tepals and, together with its steminoides, coloured a deep purple or mauve. C. 'Helsingborg is a cross of C. ochotensis and C. alpina and it looks was if "my favourite blue" has inherited its form from its alpina parent. Blue tepals with white staminoides are also common in C. alpina. Clematis cutttings and seedlings. Including my favourite blue. My favourite blue. Clematis 'Helsingborg' one of the pare...

It's St. David's Day and Wales will be celebrating the saint's day of its patron saint. The floral emblem of Wales is actually the leek (Allium pornum), but the daffodil is more often used as a more attractive substitute. On this day, people in Wales will be wearing one of these on their lapels with great pride. This gives a sense of the scale of Narcissus asturiensis. The delicate little N. asturiensis is actually from Spain, and blooms in my greenhouse around this time of year