...and what a bizarre year its been!
We're just a couple of day's away from the New Year and the weather continues to throw up anomalies. We had some of the warmest temperatures in November,
accompanied by incessant rain. It left the garden saturated, not in the way same way as when it floods though. As devastating as the flooding is, it usually drains quickly leaving the garden relatively unscathed, but this year, the non-stop rain has just left the garden like a bog. The wildlife pond has overflowed its liner causing a sodden mess and recently when I went to plant tulip bulbs near the pond, I was shocked to find the planting hole filling up with water. In the six years I've been here that's never happened.
The year didn't get off to the best start. Heavy frosts including a minus 11 lingered well into April in sharp contrast to 2020 when we sat basking in glorious sunshine. For the first time this year I had sweet peas rot before even germinating. I lost two big buddleias leaving a large gap in the hedge border and even the big, ancient Ceonothus, my beautiful tsunami of blue in springtime was clinging on to life, I seriously thought I'd lost it but luckily with some judicious pruning by my mum and myself and some new growth did eventually appear although there was no flowering. The 'Beast from the East' was most devastating to the woody shrubs. In addition to the buddleia, I lost a Skimmia and the Euonymus while a couple of Hebes, the Fuchsia, Phygelius and Penstemon all took a battering too.
May did start to make up for the freezing April and the cold actually benefited the tulips, they put on a fine display that lasted for ages. As the weather finally warmed up it revealed large gaps in the border with many plant casualties and I made the decision to cancel the first Scotland's Garden Scheme open day scheduled for June. There was plenty of lush growth but not much colour at all.
Things did start to catch up a bit as the year progressed....except my beautiful collection of Dahlias that grace the exotic garden, Noordwijks Glorie delivered not one single flower, Mystic Enchantment rotted away in the pot and my favourite Impression Festivo, only put up a very week stem with a few leaves...all very disappointing. The Himalayan blue poppies that came to nothing in 2020 however, well they put on an amazing and lengthy display adding a welcome splash of iridescence to the courtyard. They are now out of their container and in the ground in the woodland garden where a wee bit of change has happened this year. My throne has been moved to the front garden and the stones all lifted to create a new planting space.
Strong winds in the summer wreaked havoc as usual with any un-staked plant succumbing to the gales. It really is a good reminder to stake plants early, before they have reached their lofty heights. Its one of those jobs I always plan to do but never get around to until its too late!
I'm beginning to have a love-hate relationship with cosmos. The perennial chocolate cosmos didn't give me a single flower until mid December, only to succumb a week later in the first frosts of the winter, alongside the Ricinus which looked great until
then too. In fact, despite the dahlia disaster, the exotic garden made great strides this year and although I lost the growing tip on the Tetrapanax, the 13 pups I got from the parent plant have made up for the lack of big showy leaves this year. The Persicaria Red Dragon proved extremely easy to propagate rooting very quickly in water and on a walk near my house I happened upon a variety of buddleia that I hadn't seen before (now identified as Buddleja × weyeriana 'Moonlight') that has given me two cuttings that have rooted well. It will be a while until these cuttings are anywhere near the size of the mother plant which is like a small tree, but having seen it absolutely smothered in butterflies and bees, its an exciting prospect for the garden, as well as a simply beautiful form of Buddleia.
But back to the cosmos. This has to be the most frustrating plant ever! The gorgeous little yellow variety 'Lemonade' was a wee trooper. A small bushy plant it flowered early and it flowered for ages as did the variety 'Apricot Lemonade' which germinated within three days. The much anticipated display from Velouette fell flat. Only one seed germinated and keeled over. What a let down. The mixed variety pack off seeds gave mostly the large dark purple variety, but, just the same as last year, it put on massive amounts of foliage and didn't flower until October, by which time some of the plants were six foot tall!
With the warmth continuing well into autumn I sowed a number of varieties early as usual to get a head start and small plants before winter and had pretty much zero germination with those that would normally have raced away. Some of the other varieties do need a cold spell to break dormancy but I am hoping the haven't been
warm for too long and rotted off already.
After Spring's tulip success I decided to increase the amount of bulbs in the borders and especially the dark (almost black) variety Queen of Night and the equally as rich Ronaldo as well as a red, orange and yellow selections that I had intended to put into
the exotic garden for some early spring colour. In the end I only managed to get some of the bulbs in the ground with the sodden borders and ended up having to put most of them in pots. When it was dry enough to plant Queen of Night and Ronaldo, I was greeted with an empty bag containing just a few bits of bulb and a lot of mouse poop! Little bugger had scoffed the lot!
The wet ground and the addition of a greyhound to the home has had a devastating effect on the grass paths which are now mud paths. As an experiment, I covered the side garden path with woodchip. Its still squelchy though and I'not 100% convinced....it may yet get scrapped off into the borders and the paths reseeded in the spring...watch this space.
All in all its been a frustrating year. The one open day that did go ahead was a success and it was lovely to talk plants with people all day. The feedback from visitors was wonderfully positive and although the garden is not opening in 2022, I am expecting to pick a couple of dates for 2023.
Right now I am hankering for the lighter nights and more importantly warmer days
but I know we have the real winter weather of January and February to come. I do hope winter doesn't overstay its welcome this time and is well on its way out in March. I have a plethora of seeds to sow, some favourites and some new varieties. The banana plants and colocasia are staying warm in the house and I'm resisting the urge to fire up the propagator too early.....will I be able to hold off... I'm not making any promises! I'm tempted to get the seed tins out and start going through them after my shopping spree last year, including a few exotics, but I just know I'll want to get some sown and will waste precious seed.
So I wonder what 2022 will hold in store for us gardeners. The climatic changes we are experiencing could be both negative and beneficial for the garden. Late winters are devastating for wildlife, and at the same time we may see more species migrate further north as the temps rise. For the last few years we've had a few days over 30 degrees C....practically unheard of up here. More garden programmes are becoming conscious of the gardener's role in biodiversity and the need to de-couple from the use of Peat. Both 2020 and 2021 saw a huge rise in the number of people taking up gardening due to the pandemic and that can only be a good thing!
See you next year...