Gardens and gardening

I don’t like jasmine either. I might try the winter flowering clematis, and hopefully it will be as easy to grow as the two summer flowering varieties in bloom at the moment in my garden - they pretty much look after themselves.

I've noticed that too, I guess it suits us becuse we can do something meaningful without having to be around loads of people.

I try and leave seed heads and things to give insects somewhere to live and birds seeds to eat. I have some winter flowering plants such as helebore, pansies and some pinks, I try with cyclamen but don't have much success with keeping them. I plant lots of bulbs too. One thing I want to add is a winter flowering clematis, I know lots of people like winter jasmine, but any jasmine gives me a sick headache so I avoid them.

I designed my garden by slightly adapting a design in one of Alan Titchmarsh’s books, and it has worked out splendidly. I haven’t got organisation or art and design skills, but I am good at following instructions if they are precise. I did all the work myself, except for the turf laying, so I am pleasantly surprised at how well it looks now, given my lack of gardening skill and experience. 

I didn’t go with many of Titchmarsh’s suggested plants except the trees - crab apple, rowan, beech and laburnum. The borders are filled with various shrubs, roses, cosmos, poppies, lupins and other plants with names I can’t remember. There is a herb garden and a soft summer fruit area. The only thing is that my garden can look rather dead during the winter, so some day I might sort that out.

I love sitting in the garden at this time of the year and listening to the birds and the bees. The honey bees are really making the most of the lavender at the moment, so I love to sit and watch them, or to recline with my eyes shut and listen to the buzzing. It is so very relaxing. 

yes although this year has been difficult with the lack of rain

12 years ago I got involved in a community garden and then did RHS courses /exams , and after set up as a gardener (which I did for 8 years)

I think there's a lot of ND folk in Horticulture as so many seemed so easy to get on with

Just being outside with nature around you, and the flow of seasons is very calming - with or without gardening

That hedge sounds great. Well done with attracting pollinators.

Regarding Roses, I remember as a child going to visit my grandparents and my Mum had cut some roses from the garden to take to them. My grandfather managed to get a root to grow on one by leaving them in water and the next year he had a little bush in the garden. 

So many plants won't grow here because of strong salty winds, they just shrivel up, but roses, hebe's and lavenders do well here. I can't grow tall plants very well because of the wind, even when staked they blow over, things like hollyhocks and delphiniums, but foxgloves do really well, strange! 

I love the smell of roses, I want more, but they tend to be quite expensive, but then I do tend to buy them from David Austen as they have such a good range and the plants are so healthy.

I've planted for polinators, I have several hover flies patrolling various bushes, I like it when they come and eyeball me, trying to work out who and what I am. We get several types of bee's and wasps, loads of moths and a hedgehog, the wildlife is really responding well to my efforts.

I made a dead hedge too, although it's covered in bind weed at the moment, but I pile all of my woody cuttings, from things like budliea and some hazel branches, along a wall behind a tree, all sorts of things have started living there and more importantly overwintering there.

Yes. When I started here I had all sorts of ideas with beds thick with flowers. Some worked, some spread further than I wanted and some came to nothing.

I have one or two perennials I started from seed during lockdown and I love the idea that I grew them. I also have one or two plants that have appeared that I didn't plant, so seeds must have blown in or been carried by birds. I have grown to like that idea.

l also have an area with a tree that I have wild flowers growing and the grass stays long. I have given up longing for a neat and impressive garden and enjoy what comes. I find being in the garden brings relaxation and it is lovely when a robin or other bird pops in. I remember when we first moved here and I was sweeping the pile of leaves that the robin was the first visitor.

Lavender is a good choice as the perfume is lovely when the wind blows and then gets covered with bees. I love perfumed roses too. 

Some of my more traditional plants were from friends which brings happy memories.