Spring

(March, April, May)

The first signs of spring are definitely the narcissuses starting to bloom. I love the early flowering 'Tête à tête', their small yellow trumpets brighten up the garden and it looks like the sun is shining, even when it is clouded. Because I do not want to disturb the many plants I have, I usually grow some bulbs in containers. Also, in autumn when you should plant them, it is often hard to visualize where they would look nice in springtime. So when they start to flower, you can either replant them in an empty spot, or just put the pot there. For long time pleasure, you can plant different bulbs on top of each other, like I did with Iris reticulata and Tête à tête.
And soon the blue flowers of Anemona blanda, and the very soft pink from Anemona nemorosa are pushing their heads above the ground. They multiply easily when they like their site and look very pretty.

Another Narcissus I love is 'Thalia' jpeg 16 Kb. It is a white one with a lovely smell, sometimes with 4 or 5 flowers on one stem. This year I counted 70 flowers from 10 bulbs! One year I also had some botanical tulips, called Tulipa kauffmania 'Concerto', an off-white, early flowering small tulip. And when Helleborus Niger jpeg 15 Kb was in full flower too, my garden looked really pretty that spring! jpeg 18 Kb

I also had a Camellia 'Brushfield Yellow' jpeg 15 Kb in a container and for two years it did very well. Lots of beautiful white flowers with a yellow heart, against the dark-green glossy leaves, a real pleasure to look at.
Alas! the next year it lost all its buds, no flowers at all and later it started to drop its leaves and died eventually. What I didn't know was that it cannot stand drought, you have to keep the roots moist all the time, or else... no flowers. The plant looks fine, but the flower buds dry out. Also it needs acid soil, which is why I had it in a container, and very soft water. The cause of death turned out to be a pest (don't know the English name, sorry), that I left unattended. It is easier to grow them in the earth under the right circumstances. Well of course, this applies to almost every plant.

Then there is Fritillaria meleagris jpeg 15 Kb, a bell-shaped flower with very special mauve coloring. They like a rather moist place in light shade and when left alone, multiply easily. Their color combines nicely with the new red brown leaves of Heuchera micrantha 'Palace Purple' jpeg 19 Kb

Years ago I bought a Buddleia davidii for a friend of mine. As it turned out, I did not visit her after all, and planted it in my own garden, thinking it probably would not get enough sun and would grow too big. But it thrived and grew rather tall to reach for the sun. Now after ten years it looks like a tree, because each spring when I prune it, I cut back the lower branches, only leaving the young sprouts at the top. And they grow branches from 2 to 3 m long with lots of flowers. When it is flowering it is covered with butterflies. They did not pick the name 'Butterfly Bush' without reason!
Especially after pruning though, the stem looked rather barren, so I planted a Clematis alpina 'Pamela Jackman' jpeg 12 Kb next to it and let it climb into it jpeg 16 Kb. It flowers in April, does well in shade and has lovely blue bell-like flowers. And after flowering the seed pods form kind of a fluffy ball, very ornamental.

I love Clematis anyway, there are so many varieties, that you can always find one suited for the spot you have in mind. But sometimes you want too much. A few years ago I planted a Clematis montana 'Tetrarose' jpeg 15 Kb and let it grow against the house over the window. It did very well and made branches of more then 10 m. It covered half the balcony from the neighbors at one site jpeg 16 Kb, and started to ruin the gutter of my other neighbor. But so many flowers..., a real feast! I even had a blackbird jpeg 15 Kb nesting, and one day saw the first flying exercises from the young ones, which is rather special for a small city-garden.
It also started to smother my Hydrangea petiolaris jpeg 16 Kb, a climbing hydrangea ideal to cover north-facing walls. It is self-attaching and has beautiful white lacecaps jpeg 14 Kb in May. So because you should keep your neighbors happy if you can, I had to prune the montana back. Not an easy job, when you are scared of heights like me and long ladders are out of the question. But I managed, only it started to grow even faster, so finally I decided it had to go, it was just not the right kind for a small garden like mine.

Early March I cut back the branches of my small 'tree' Salix integra 'Hakuro Nishiki' jpeg 16 Kb. It is a Japanese willow, grafted on a stem. Soon new branches are growing, they have very soft pink, almost white leaves, turning light green when they get older. The effect is of a blossoming crown with a green heart. The branches are dark red, really beautiful.

Sometimes you get a nice surprise. Do you know Allium sphaerocephalum? jpeg 15 Kb They are summer flowering bulbs with small dark red heads, also called 'Drumsticks'. They should come back from one year to another, only they don't in my garden, not enough sun, I suppose. So each October I put in some new bulbs. This year in January I saw a bunch of green leaves, much broader then I was used to. So I wondered what that could be, the man obviously sold me something else. Well, half April they flowered and they turned out to be 'Allium neapolitanum' jpeg 15 Kb, lovely white little stars with a small dark red inner circle. No drumsticks this summer, but these were well worth it!

Because my garden is so small, I always look for plants with as long a flowering period as possible. Also they have to do with very little sun, and with a lot of trial and error, I found quite a lot of nice plants. One of them is 'Tiarella wherryi' jpeg 15 Kb, a groundcover plant with hairy heart-shaped leaves (they stay green in winter) and soft pink spikes of flowers about 20 cm tall, that start in May and go on till autumn. Next to it I grow some 'Claytonia', which is almost like a weed, spreads all over the place, but has nice little pink flowers, also flowering till late summer.

There are more plants, worthwhile mentioning, but I will leave those for an update.
I would like to take you into the summer, hmm... that hot sun burning really feels good, after this cold and wet spring!