Six on Saturday – January Colour

by | Jan 19, 2019 | Lifestyle

First of All a Happy New Year to you all. I took quite a break there and my blog is going to look a little different to all of you as I slow down and pull back but the one thing I’m continuing is sharing the cottage garden.

I keep a log of how the garden is doing so I can adjust and make changes so having this blog is incredibly helpful in planning the coming year’s borders and crop rotations. We can all agree that the weather this January isn’t typical and if anything my bulbs and plants are confused. It is already having an effect on the type of harvest that we will have but for the start of this post let me share the colour in our cottage garden:

Cyclamen

Back in October, I was preparing for Spring and in this post I said that I was testing out cyclamen. They have lasted incredibly well so I will be investing in corns so that they can naturalise in this spot. My dear readers, you were right in the comments, testing the area and living with it through the winter season I can now visualise what I would like this area to be so thank you!

Daffodills

Remember how I said my garden is confused? Well, these are my daffodils that I planted. We shouldn’t be seeing these for another few weeks but here they are. I checked older plantings around the cottage borders and they are also at similar stages meaning that these blooms will be here from the end of January through to February. While the snowdrops and crocus here are still sleeping. It’s a conundrum which will see me buying a few more bulbs to continue the colour. Yes I am the mad person who was out planting 300 tulips this week and they don’t go as far as you might think.

Primrose

Ah, the primrose, the alarm clocks of my garden. I have quite a few primroses that I have dotted around the garden and they are in full bloom right now. Again a little earlier than last year but it is nice to see their happy strong colours around the garden. I don’t lift mine, I just plant them and leave them and I get 2 to 3 blooms from them in a year. They usually signify that my garden is waking up.

Winter Heather

Living by the sea I would never be without heather in my garden. It adds shape structure and colour but more importantly it’s in bloom while much of the garden is asleep. This means you can usually find some bees that are also a bit confused hanging around here. I like having washes of this heather edging borders or mixed in with later blooming shrubs.

Viburnum?

I *think* and maybe you can help me here that this is a viburnum. It is a magnificent addition to the garden but I inherited it so I’m guessing at best as I have never had one in any of my gardens growing up or rented accommodation before. I love it’s blooms and it gives 2 flushes in the year with delicate pink tinged flowers that open and have a slight fragrance.

Peach Tree

Remember when I said that my garden was confused and it would have an effect on the harvest? Well enter case number 1 (I’ll continue this next week) but this tree should not be awake for another few weeks. I left her outdoors and now need to bring her into the greenhouse. Yes I forgot and I’m lucky that she is sheltered but the damp weather is goign to cause me a few issues with peach leaf curl.

The problem with her going into bloom so early is pollination and heat. While I can hand pollinate her the problem lies in the fruit setting but also protection in the coming weeks if the weather gets truly bad. Luckily I can move her to the greenhouse or inside to the conservatory but to some of the other fruit trees I have that isn’t an option. They are all breaking bud at the moment, everything here is which leads me to wonder about pruning. I would normally leave this until February but I’m unsure this year. What are your thoughts?

That’s it from the cottage garden this week. Do make sure that you pop over to The Propagator ‘s page to check out more wonderful gardening posts and why not search the #sixonsaturday tag on twitter too to fill your feed with beautiful blooms. There is also a participant guide here if you would like to join in too. Looking forward to catching up with all of your garden posts this week too!

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