It’s been an educational week! Little more than a week ago I’d got our dear leader’s home county wrong. I’d thought he was a Buck but he corrected me and said he was a Berk! But wherever he hails from, he is still our leader and I thoroughly recommend that you pop over to his blog, wherever it is, in order to locate his post of the day and thence the posts of the growing horde of Sixers from all corners (or, as the world is actually not square, the curvy bits) of the world, including the gyrating escapades of the illustrious Gill Heavens (well, actually, she doesn’t gyrate herself but somehow manages to induce paroxysms of a gyratory nature in her clients). Me, I’m more sedate (unless I’m standing up) and so comport myself in a more fitting manner.

Whatever, be that as it may, it’s time for another six which I’ve somehow managed yet again. So without further ado:

1 Out With the Old

Not satisfied with (or by) my greenhouse, I’ve had a couple of what are called “grow houses” tucked away round the other side of the house.

These are – or were – years (about 30) old. The “glazing” was polycarbonate. Past its best. I’d planned to “reglaze” them last year but discovered that whilst the nuts and bolts could be separated, the eight screws which I needed to unscrew in order to get the old out and the new in on the tops and fronts had seized up, irremovably welded to the framework. I should have discovered that before I bought the pack of new polycarb panels but I didn’t so now have a pack of polycarb panels in the garage awaiting some brainwave project.

My first thought last year was to replace like with like but when I tracked down the manufacturers, they wanted £1000 for the pair of replacements. To add insult to injury, they quoted a delivery cost of £35! Each! No way was I paying £1070 so the old folks home continued to deliver somewhat leaky service through last year. But the top of one and the doors on the other sort of collapsed so something had to be done. And they would not eat cake. So they got guillotined, destroyed, smashed and recycled.

But a phoenix arose from the ashes.

Proper glass. Shiny. Built in irrigation. I just need to connect a hose to the connector you can just see at the very top right of the shiny new unit. Money well spent though it took me a couple of days to put it together.

And in those couple of days, my “friends” at J Parkers, Thompson and Morgan/Van Meuwen, Dobies, Hayloft, Mr Fothergill et al joined up to sing a rousing chorus of “Why are we waiting?” and, accompanied by a cacophony of doorbells, delivered more than enough to fill my new construction.

It’s half full before I pot things up. I think I’ll be kept well and truly out of mischief for a few days. Meanwhile, the cold frame is also somewhat full.

Gill’s Mum is the yellow label on the bottom right.

Now some might count that as four of the six but I’m a generous type. The above is one. Now I’ll move on to more boring stuff.

2 The Holly and the Cherry

Well it fits the meter anyway! The shrubby prunus I featured a couple of weeks back have finished flowering and are now leafing up. And this fastigiate cherry tree of variety forgotten has taken over the flowering duties. Preceded front left by a holly (or Ilex var. unk. if you prefer) which I’ve included as a bonus simply because it has started berrying again. This berried on the west and north sides before Christmas but has now decided to berry on the south and east sides. Added bonus for me as well as for you.

You may have to look closely to see the dots of red. But they’re there.

3 Jacobinia pauciflora

A native of Brazil. Not hardy so I grow it in a container. I’m watching the forecast. Although it’s flowering now, I may leave it in the greenhouse for another week or two, just in case.

4 Red and White

All featured before. Two Pieris with their masses of white flowers and strikingly red new foliage and a Ribes. They go well together and deserve a second mention.

The two Pieris are the tall one and, with an intermediate bit of red, the low one. Two different plants. Planted together. I think I mentioned them last year.

5 Droopy

Clematis montana something or other and other. Again there are two planted together. They were trained across the top of an arbour but, as part of project 1 (please catch up) they’ve been detached and are hanging down so that I can get the heavy machinery at the overgrowth invading from behind the garden fence. Must admit they look OK in their droopiness.

 

6 Tattifilareous

However you spell it, a bit of garden tat. Well I like them so there! In the background a very nice red azalea is now flowering its little socks off. In the foreground some giant metal lilies. I got a lily beetle off one of them the other day. I may have introduced (inadvertently) some decoys. In which case I’ll like them even more.

 

Right! I’m off to answer last week’s comments on my blog and then do some potting up.  I may be gone for some time! But, until next time, enjoy your gardens.

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PS. It is with some pleasure that, as the embarrassing debacle that is Brexit (wot means Brexit whatever that means) didn’t happen yesterday (again), I can still address Fred as “fellow European” rather than as “some forriner” for some time to come. One can but hope that becomes forever.

PPS. “Jacobinia” the plant has no connection with Jacob Rees-Mogg, arch-brexiteer and server of his own interests when he isn’t being honorary Minister for the Eighteenth Century. I just want to make that point clear. Mr Rees-Mogg, among other things, has such a degree of imagination that he named his sixth child Sextus. Poor chap will probably be ribbed in school with cries of “Come in number six, your time is up.” Or worse, might end up being next but one on line after Alex Pettyfer.

PPPS. It must run in the family. The aforementioned Rees-Mogg’s sister is named Annunziata. She’s standing in the forthcoming (if Brexit still hasn’t happened by then) European elections on behalf of the new Brexit-supporting party launched by one Nigel Farage, honorary boot-licker to Donald Trump and general pain-in-the-butt. Seems she doesn’t think brother Jacob is sufficiently good at being a brexiteer and so is hoping to trump him.

PPPPS. For uninitiated forriners, “Bucks” come from Buckinghamshire and “Berks” from Berkshire. “Berk” can mean something totally different but I’m not trying to insinuate that Mr Propagator is that sort of berk, even if he seems totally incapable of understanding the relationship, or lack thereof, between the quantity of plants he propagates/buys/rescues and the size of his garden. I suspect that I may be developing a similar ailment.