Garden Centre

Thursday, January 17, 2008

Hyacinths

Or, as they are known in our house, hy-whyhaven’tIgotany-cinths.

There are two reasons for the complete dearth of hyacinth around the All Seasons Gardener’s plot:

1 – squirrels – which seem to eat every bulb, just about, that I plant, except nerines, and who make a special case for digging up the hyacinths in September, eating half the bulb, and then scattering the remainder on the path and

2 – small dogs – known as Rebus and Falco, who are agile enough to get onto every windowsill in the house and who knock off any plant pot put there, or eat its contents (Falco turns out to believe scented geraniums are dog breath freshener, they aren’t but he keeps trying) .

And I love hyacinths, so I’m reduced to buying them from the garden centre every year, guarding them on the middle of the dining room table and then planting them out, more in hope than expectation, surrounded by a little grille of wire mesh (the squirrels leave it on the path) and dipped in a pot of turpentine (which is obviously the squirrel equivalent of brown sauce, just adding a little piquancy to the flavour) and watching the squirrels dig them up in the autumn.

Hyacinth by geishaboy500

Labels: hyacinths, indoor flowers, winter colour, winter flowers

The All Seasons Gardener at 11:34 AM

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