A Cold Week

Six on Saturday is a weekly garden blog hosted by The Propagator & contributed to by gardeners all over the world.  Links to SoS posts can be found in Mr Prop's comment section & by following the Twitter hashtag, #SixOnSaturday.

Frosted creeping thyme.

We had our first hard frost this week, forming ice on the Doodle Pool.

I learned that 8C in the sun is brisk gardening weather while an overcast 7C is the 9th circle of Hell.

Nevertheless, we persisted.







1.  Final tulip bulbs.

Last week, I promised myself to rid the planters of those still-blooming begonias, come guilt or high water.  The frost damage made it so much simpler to cast them aside - the last 45 tulips got themselves planted.

So many SoSers featured their cyclamen last Saturday, I've left space in the planters for cyclamen plants that hopefully are winging their way to my door even as we speak.


2.  Black Swan, white outline.

The frost outlined all the leaves on my weeping Black Swan.

This tree was a present from so many years back, I don't remember for what.  I thought it was a hazel, but when I Google 'weeping Black Swan', (its name, which I do remember), it comes up as a beech.

To me, the leaves look more hazel than beech, but I'm happy to be corrected.


3.  Tithonia optimism.

There are always some plants that magically escape the frost, but the supple tithonia buds surprised me.  Not only are they in the middle of the lawn, away from shelter, but the rest of the plant looks dead.

Maybe the petals are just preserved by the cold.  Or maybe since they're planted with the castors, the tall guys gave them a bit of protection.


4.  Castor seeds.

As to the castors themselves, I wasn't sure how easily they could kill me, so dead headed them earlier in the summer.  The briefest of research soon proved it wasn't easy at all, but the damage had been done - only a handful of seed pods were produced.

I also learned (via direct experience, rather than research) that a small amount of pressure in the middle of the 3 connected pods causes a seed explosion!  For those with delicate fingertips, the spiky bits break off with a gentle side pressure.


5.  Indoor endeavours.

In early summer, one of our neighbours left some small jade plants at the end of her walk with a note asking folk to take them home.  My son adopted one for his office.  I'd never grown jade before, but the internet told me they didn't need much soil, so I put it into an old bonsai pot.

It's got tons of new growth since then, but recently it's been not quite its usual crisp self.  I moved it to a warmer room which seemed to help, but it still didn't look great.  I decided to re-pot it . . .

. . . in this hand thrown pot where my son's magpie is buried.  The pot's previous tenant, a viola, had a really bad summer living in it.  After several fruitless remedies & various comments from other SoSers, I decided the viola had outgrown the pot. 

So now both the viola & the jade have new homes, plus this lovely pot is on display inside the house, & the late great magpie takes his eternal rest in my son's office.

The same morning of the re-potting, I found an auricula that some crittur'd uprooted, so it got put into the bonsai pot with hopes it'll recover.


6.  They're up!

Some things haven't minded the recent cold.

I don't remember what these are, though I think they might be shade tolerant allium.  We shall see in due time.

Frosted castor.

Temps are supposed to go up this weekend & into next week, so I hope to get things ready for a new pear tree that's coming to live with us.

It's also the US Thanksgiving.  You can bet these resident aliens'll be cooking & eating & eating some more.

As ever, thanks so much for stopping by.  See you next time.