Have decided to keep a record of the floral highlights of our garden from month to month as this year progresses. Here are the recollections for February.
Well January may have been very mild, wet and miserable but winter has got it's own back this month! We have had several severe frosts, albeit with subsequent sunny days, but it has been very cold. We even had a sprinkling of snow too. Do you remember mornings when the inside of the window was frosted? Well we had frost on the windows - but only on the outside!
Some of the flowers that were budding/flowering have been halted in their growth.
Nothing, however, seems to stop the snowdrops. What strong little flowers they are to push through the ground and look so beautiful.
The Christmas roses are another value for money plant at this time of year. There are just more and more flower buds appearing. I have tried to support the flowers above the leaves so that we can actually see them! Even after a severe frost when their stems are laying down near the ground they only seem to see the sun come out and then they are upright again!
Primulas continue to look better and better. Did you know the word primula comes from the Latin feminine diminutive of primus, meaning first (prime), applied to flowers that are among the first to open in spring?
The grape hyacinths have blue buds appearing among the green leaves. Love these little flowers, even if we do find them spreading all over the rockery.
Celandines are very green now with just a few yellow buds, but we are still waiting for the first ones to be really open. Have seen some around the area that are in flower but ours are in quite a shaded spot so are not quite there yet!
Our miniature daffodils are another star feature this month. Their bigger cousins are certainly pushing through the ground and some are developing yellow buds but the little ones are looking good.
We have been watching, and listening, to 2 robins in the garden this month. At times one of them has been sitting next to our 2 representations of robins and looking good sitting next to our tank of crocus.
The witch hazel is looking spectacular at the moment too. We have always liked this plant but never had one, so this year we have treated ourselves! Hope is looks as good as this every year!
I know this isn't a traditional garden flower, but I just like the way it is making little cushions on the surface of the brick.
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The garden is certainly waking up, despite the cold this month, and so are we. We look out the window and notice all that needs doing - grass mowing, dead heading and weeding but the garden is still too wet to work on and it has been bitterly cold. It was lovely in the greenhouse the other day when I went in while the sun was shining, but as ours is not heated at all it is still too cold at night to do much in there beyond keep it tidy! We have sorted through our seeds left over from last year and decided what we need to buy this year but gardening in earnest is going to have to wait a little longer.
Plants that have been kept indoors for the winter are coming to life too. Geraniums sitting on the windowsill are sprouting new shoots - and even the occasional flower, and my Scilla violacea is looking very healthy. The flowers are so small it is difficult to appreciate how delicate, but pretty, they are.
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