A sunny week and hot work especially in the veg garden, even at 8am the sun felt hot and the glare made it difficult to see the flowers. We worked on the Sweet peas this week. They have reached the top of their support canes and so to prolong flowering we take each plant off it's cane and lie it down along the ground until it reaches its full extent and tie it to another cane. The process goes on until all the plants are along the ground and attached to a cane further along. The plant then gets trained up the cane again, side shoots removed, tendrils snipped. The plant must wonder what on earth is going on - I am now going sideways but supposed to flower straight. Huh?
A great process to learn and watch, I do wonder how long these wonderful traditions will go on in the future. Will Gardeners still want the faff just for a Sweet pea for a day? I hope so, the flowers are gorgeous.
We also weeded around the Zinnia and Cosmos flowers, planted Sage and watered all of the pots and there are lots of pots! The weather has been scorching these last few days. Fantastic blue skies and wisps of cloud. It is so quiet at 8am that we heard a tiny bird (Mistle Thrush?) whacking a poor snail on a stone. Amazing what nature does.
We spent time weeding the Lavandula borders along the croquet lawn, a quiet and steady job, ticking along until it is done and we started to try and tackle the borders in the veg garden along the wall.
A Fig needed a trim and it looks very neat now and lots of Aster had grown into the Irises, so we cut back and dead headed and cleared. A big job, daunting to start with but again, slowly does it. Astrantia needed a chop, Solomon's Seal and the soft furry flowers of the Stachys byzantina. I do love these leaves, so different to the rest, furry and a silver greyish colour, they are very tactile.
Plant of the week? This stunning Rose pruned to the balustrade near the river, just perfect, will have to wait and ask Michael Maltby, HG, for its name!
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