Garden Centre

Thursday, May 3, 2012

12 months, one garden, one allium

If anybody was wondering how bad the weather was, overall, in April, here’s the answer. This picture was taken a year ago tomorrow – it shows one of the alliums in my garden that were being constantly suppressed by the presence of Falco.

Falco was a cairn terrier who used to see things in the garden that nobody else could see, then run as fast as his short fat legs would carry him to the bottom of the garden, where the fence would stop his progress, usually with a thud, as his nose connected with it. In eight years, nothing every stopped him seeing and chasing things in the garden, apart from the fence. Borders certainly didn’t stop him. He ploughed through or over them all the time, causing more tender plants to die and others to be smashed, trampled and otherwise damaged before they could flower. We loved him dearly but it was a real surprise to see how many plants appeared, and flowered, when he was no longer with us.

This is the same allium 364 days later. It’s clearly at least a week, or maybe two, behind where it was last year. Alliums do love sun, but even more than that, they like an open and well-drained site. If they get too congested they cease to flower and if they are waterlogged they just tend to rot away. This bulb is definitely suffering from cold, damp conditions and the flowers just don’t want to leave the shelter of their protective coating and expose themselves to the chilly elements!

Labels: alliums, bulbs

The All Seasons Gardener at 5:25 AM

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