Hobbies and Crafts

Horrid weather Ann. I don't do so much gardening these days as OH has rather taken over and I let him get on with it, particularly as we don't always see eye to eye about the type of plants we want or where they should be positioned. I do still look after most of the pots. We currently have hellebores, winter aconite and snowdrops in bloom. We bought a small pack of snowdrop bulbs and a little pot of plants in the green at Anglesey Abbey about 2 years ago and they have definitely spread since we planted them. No daffodils actually open yet but I don't think it will be long before the February Gold open up. They are in a bed in the garden and make quite a display. I have 3 later varieties in pots.

Had a look and among the hardy geraniums I found two clumps of snowdrops, that is one more clump than last year.

What horrible dismal weather we are having. Not exactly encouraging any gardening is it. I bet most gardeners are turning to seed and bulb/plant catalogues to remind them of what is to come.
I do have daffodils, Hellebores, crocus and primroses out in my garden. I am sure there should be some snowdrops out there somehwere so maybe I had better go and search for them. :-)

We don’t have either in our garden so I can’t really comment on that Ann but I have noticed our early daffs, which should bloom in the next couple of weeks, aren’t very tall although they have got flower buds showing.

Has anyone noticed that the crocus and snowdrop flowers are a lot smaller this year? Or 1s it just in this area? I am assuming it could be down to the very hard -5/7 frosts that we had.

Hope a hard frost doesn’t kill the buds Gwyn

A neighbour's magnolia tree has lots of new leaf buds showing.
Spring is on it's way!

Such a beautiful sight when it blooms and the flowers show up against a bright blue sky.

I must take a walk locally and see if any narcissus are out yet.
They were this time last year........

That's interesting.... I was trying to delete something on my post and it wouldn't delete so I was going to rewrite it when I saw it had posted itself! I definitely did not press submit, even by accident. I was going to change the bit about the choisya as I remembered mentioning it a couple of weeks ago. I think the blossom was just opening then, now there is more and it's fully open.

I only had a few French marigolds in a trough this year but they didn't do very well so I pulled them up earlier than usual. Everything does seem out of gear this year. I am still dead heading scabious and argyranthemum and they are still throwing blooms but I am sure the frosts will kill them soon. I noticed today that one of our choisya plants has quite a lot of blossom opening on it. It often has a second, smaller, blooming in the autumn but not usually as late as this. I wonder what will be early or late in the spring?

We have two foxgloves in flower and the fuschias are still looking good. A Mahonia is flowering as are some wallflowers!

French marigolds are doing well then they will be caught by the first hard frost I dxpect

Our nasturtiums are very out of sincerity this year :-D :-D Instead of trailing off down the garden for yards, this year they are forming hummocks of leaves with the flowers hiding underneath. I should think they are in hiding - they are vey late!
French marigolds still a blaze of colour.

Yes I wrote sinc Vera. Lol I had not seen that yes stupid auto correct on IPad

I love your autocorrect Ann (if that’s what it was) Seasons all out of sincerity is so expressive though I suspect you wrote out of sinc or sync. :-)

The seasons are all out of sincerity. Fuchsias are still flowering in the garden , hardy varieties. One is better than it has ever been.

No sign of anything coming through here in pots or in beds :-( However the Choisya's just coming into bloom again and so is one of the Viburnums and the Argyranthemums are still blooming away. I deadheaded them again yesterday but a couple of heavy frosts will probably finish them off. The ones in the garden, and a couple I had in pots, were cuttings from the plants I had in the previous year and have done really well, so I took another half dozen cuttings this year and they have all rooted. I've just got to keep them alive through the winter.

When daughter checked the pots today, she noticed some bulbs i planted in October, think they were lilies and others have already started growing! My roses also have new rosebuds on them, is this normal for November?

Even the purple lobelia is still in flower although maybe dying off now.

Florence in the hebrides

Yes Vera, it does seem early.
I just checked back on this thread and I see that I saw yellow blooms in that garden on 1st December last year.
The cluster continued to have more new flowers for many months too.

Those bulbs are showing through really early Gwyn. At this rate they'll be in bloom for Christmas. There's no sign of anything coming through around here yet.

Bulbs starting to shoot in the pots that daughter planted outside last year.

Today I was really surprised to see some narcissus leaves already about 4 or 5 inches

tall in a local garden. They are always early to flower in that spot, so it seems they will

be early this year too.