Whats Looking Good December 2024

That is brilliant @On the Levels. Do you grow yours against a wall? That is how mine is growing. Agree, beautiful flowers both in bud and when opened. It is often buzzing with bees. Also. various birds love the fluffy plant material for their nests. I will have to speak to it about flowering for longer!

 

My lonicera is also in full flower and wafting a delicious scent as I go past. It is planted next to a gate across steps which lead down into my garden. I love it. Insignificant flowers but Wow, the scent packs a punch on grey days. I love it. I have planted one in each garden I have had.
The flowers on the awful gaudy azalea are just fully open, it has really sickly pink edged white flowers but is forgiven, for the splash of colour it makes during boring winter weather.

 

@ClematisDbee we planted ours alongside a huge bamboo pole. This did rot away 2 years ago so a new arch was made using old wood. The clematis though is reluctant to use the frame and just clambers over other plants.

 

Some faded stems of grasses and perennials in the garden today.

 

Plectranthus mona lavender.

 

Camellia sasanqua "Rosea"

Impatiens tinctoria Still going although flattened by Storm Bert

Salvia guaranitica "Black and Blue"

 

Good that you took pictures from the grasses before the storm hit, @Plantminded

My mother had sent me an Amaryllis bulb from Berlin by post. She loves Amaryllis and so I take care of it to make her happy
I discovered yesterday that it starts to flower and it's red, I told her over the phone.

 

Disclaimer: These pictures all taken before Storm Darragh - I haven't checked what's survived yet!

My young Mahonia has just a single spray of flowers at the top and they are feeding the wasps.


The ancient Bergenia is flowering. This plant was here when I moved in over 30 years ago, and survived at least a decade buried under brambles.


Still some fuchsias flowering


Echinacea hasn't given up yet:



Polyanthus

 

Yes, I'm having a rethink about tall grasses @simone_in_wiltshire. They may be drought tolerant but if this year's rain and winds are to continue, I want to avoid scenes like this .

 

That’s the issue in my garden with permanent wind @Plantminded.
I was wondering what all the gardeners did with their drought tolerant garden after the drought 2022, and so many who changed the planting, and they had the following winter and summer the wettest weather.

 

Your garden plants remind me of an ancient magical kingdom, @Escarpment. Beautiful. Do you have a sheltered microclimate? (I realise this was before the storm). I hope these plants survived.

 

That is a shame, @Plantminded. Was that ornamental grass winding down for winter? I suppose without this wind, it would have continued giving interest until the new spring growth? I do sympathise.

 

Thanks @ClematisDbee - the close-ups do tend to flatter it! It's a very unusual garden. My house is built on the side of a steep hill, and the back garden which is north-facing has two level-ish sections connected by a very steep slope. The bottom of the garden being lower down is pretty sheltered. I have lots of trees so it's mostly dappled shade in the summer, and in the winter the hill ensures that the garden doesn't see a ray of direct sunlight - even the front garden has lost it now though the sun gets just high enough to hit the front windows.

The slope is what I take my user id from - when I bought the house the survey report started with "this house is built on a steep escarpment ...".

This is the view from halfway down the slope back in April - the Bergenia is in the foreground, patio with all my Spring bulbs at the top, silver birches growing top right and rowan covered in ivy on the left.

 

Thanks - that is so unusual and beautiful, @Escarpment, and unique I would have thought. I do admire how you have gardened with those different levels and can appreciate them not being the simplest to manage especially if one is feeling weary.

 

Its all knee jerk reactions, we are now told to expect more rain, because we have had a wet couple of years, if we get it dry again, they will tell us to expect more of that.
Its all climatic rubbish, gardening has always been about dealing with the conditions you have now, probably soil type is more important at defining what will grow best in you garden rather than the weather.