Here is another selection of our favourite things in the garden this month.
1 Hamamelis or Witch Hazel. A lovely small tree that flowers profusely at this time of year, it has a lovely spicy fragrance and delicate, frilly, yellow flowers that look like tiny party popper streamers!
2 Sarcococca or Christmas Box. Lovely glossy, low, evergreen bush that has delicate, not very obvious white flowers. It's the honey sweet fragrance that is most noticeable, so it's perfect to plant next to a path or back door, and is happy in most situations even dry semi shade!
3 Euphorbia. A huge range of plants in different foliage colours and sizes, that show well from now until this time next year! We have lots of different types in our gardens but make sure that you buy the most suitable one for your planting position, some of them get pretty big and can spread (not invasively, but they can reach out quite a way) Lovely pale green flowers are showing on the larger species at the moment, a great burst of fresh colour much needed at this time of year.
I'm a great fan of the Euphorbia - I even forgive them for having the Poinsettia (Euphorbia Pulcherrima) as one of their number!
4 Camellias. Again a huge range of colours, flower shapes and sizes that flower from now until mid spring. The early species, like Camelia Anticipation, are flowering already and giving beautiful bursts of colour.
5 Lonicera Fragrantissima or Winter Honeysuckle. The white/palest yellow flowers appear on arching bare stems that have a lovely coppery/reddish tinge. The tufts of flowers are also sweetly scented.
A lovely start to the year. Now to plan what needs to be added for next year, and any gaps that could be filled! Any suggestions of things to add?
In the cold weather it's time to look after our feathered friends. This is when we can encourage birds to visit our gardens so when the slugs and snails and other pests are wreaking their havoc later in the year, the birds will come back and help us out!
Remember to put food out, seed mixes, peanuts, fat balls are all good, either in feeders or on the ground (put food on the ground sparingly, if it lies about too long you might get the wrong sort of wildlife!).
Don't forget water - birds need to drink too!
Now is also the time to check your bird boxes and clear out any old nesting materials, or put new ones up in time for the nesting season.
This weekend is the RSPB's Big Garden Birdwatch, so if you have an hour to gaze at your garden and count birds (and possibly drink tea and eat cake) you can tell everyone you're conducting scientific research - Hurrah!
Use this link to get your counting sheet (to help you identify what you see) and information on how to upload your results - happy birding!
http://www.rspb.org.uk/birdwatch/
Hellebores are looking lovely in our gardens this month. Regular readers may remember a previous post extolling the virtues of the Christmas Rose, Helleborus Niger, and we're still very keen.
They are a lovely and hardy plant with a huge range of flower colours and foliage variations. They grow well in any soil that isn't completely waterlogged or bone dry, they thrive in shade, and most importantly they flower from Christmas until mid spring - depending on the variety - a time when the garden is just getting started. Last year we saw some Hellebores still flowering in June, that may have been because the spring was so cold but the Hellebore is a great value plant none the less. They are also perfect for planting on raised areas or on banks so that you can look up into the pendulous flowers, and get the full effect of any frilly petals, speckling or colour.
At this time of year it is worth removing any old and damaged leaves, so you can see the flowers well. New leaves will appearing soon too, so enjoy the flowers now.
Here at Daisy! we have a plan! We want to bring you our star plants for each month this year. These can be anything that features in our gardens and offers interest and excitement in that particular month. Over the months we hope to build up a great list of plants that grow well and show well in our experience. Hopefully we can make sure our gardens never have bleak and dull periods, times when looking out of the window just fills us with dread because all we can see is a load of clearing, pruning and digging that needs doing. The work won't change, but it'll be much more fun if there are lovely things to look at.
Now, we need your help. We can tell you what is doing well in our gardens, but we also want to know what looks good in yours. It could be flowers, foliage, bark colour, even dead seed heads, anything that adds to your garden. If we share ideas we can spread gorgeous gardens!
Time to get started...
It's that time of year again, time to make lists of things that didn't happen last year and should have, and things that did happen last year and shouldn't. This is where we are supposed to learn from experience and improve things in the future, so here goes with the Daisy! New Years Resolutions!
1. Composte the Poinsettias! (see post 18 December)
2. Plant the spring bulbs that are still sitting on the shelf trying desperately to shoot (the above Tete a Tete daffodils were a ready planted Christmas gift obviously!). This leads on to the previously mentioned wider resolution to plant the seeds/plants/bulbs that we buy promptly, before they have died/ rotted/dried out!
3. Avoid impulse buying of plants/bulbs/seeds. However beautiful or interesting it is, if it isn't suited to your garden or you don't have a space for it, it will just sit in the pot until it loses the will to live (see resolution 2), and that is just depressing.
4. When planting seeds, be they flower or vegetable, do it properly! Don't hurl seeds into old compost in a rush between the PTA meeting and swimming lessons, leave them on a draughty window sill and ignore them, and then wonder why they didn't show! Planting from seed is a great way to grow cheap and healthy plants but you need to put some time and effort into it, and it takes a bit of practice so do persevere.
5. Plan out the vegetable planting so that you have a succession of things to pick. Don't concentrate on summer harvesting things if you are going away on holiday and will miss the main crop. And only plant things that will get eaten! It took me 2 years to clear the freezer of the last harvest of broad beans, because I'm the only one who eats them!
6. Tidy the shed, sterilise pots and prepare seed compost. This leads on from 4 and appears on the list every year. Absolutely no chance of it happening this year either!
Now is that everything... any suggestions?
A very Happy New Year to all our lovely readers and followers, and what a beautiful day it's been to start 2013. If this weather carries on it will be a pleasure to get back out in the garden, and we might finally manage to plant the last of our spring bulbs!
Talking of which that really aught to be one of our New Years Resolutions - plant the things that we buy promptly. Now what else should we include? Hmmmm...
