PLANTS IN FLOWER: Cowslip, Primula, Winter-sweet, Eucalyptus, Nepeta, Roses, Hebe, Lungwort, Beauty Berry, Himalayan Honeysuckle, Viburnum.
In the middle of the month there were a few really warm, clear days. Making the best of the benign weather, I planted out masses of spring bulbs, notably hundreds of poeticus narcissus in the grass along the driveway. Nearby, on the steep bank beneath the hazels, lots of self-seeded foxgloves are springing up. I also planted a number of new shrubs along the driveway at the same time: a witch hazel, two flowering 'Buffalo' Ribes for their early yellow blossom and a white-flowered, ornamental cherry tree which I had taken as a cutting from a friend's garden.
In the wide herbaceous border, I added a variety of new alliums including the tall 'Violet Beauty', the purple 'A. Aflatunense' and the whitish-green 'A. Multibulbosum' to the planting scheme and put in some of the small pure-white allium 'A. Cowanii' amongst the day lilies around the pond. I also planted a few of my precious evergreen African iris, the tall yellow 'Chelsea', alongside the roses, although I am nervous about their hardiness. As always, it was a pleasure to plant up a number of terracotta pots with a selection of spring flowing bulbs: hyacinth, white narcissi, the stunning metallic 'Allium Christophiii' and some fragrant miniature daffodils.
Finally, I cut back all the shrubs around the courtyard and tidied up the raised bed ready for the Spring. I cut back quite a few of the hellebore leaves to enable them to show their flowers off to best advantage when they emerge in the next couple of months. I could already see a few green shoots of early crocus and the buds of the red pulmonaria appearing amidst the fallen leaves. My wonderful, evergreen para-hebe which tumbles over the edge of this bed is still in bloom with it's miniature white flowers. At the end, I mulched the whole bed with dark, composted bark to keep down the weeds and provide a good foil for the white snowdrops and hellebore.
I raked the rotting leaves from the gravel in the courtyard and driveway and threw them into one of the old sacks which was used to deliver the bark chips, so as to turn them into compost for the vegetable garden. However, I left quite a lot of seed head on the plants all around the garden, including many of the allium heads as food for the birds, rather than cutting them down as part of the general tidying up: I will wait until March next year to do this. I brought indoors all my geraniums and tender plants and then, having wrapped up my least hardy plants in thermal fleece for the Winter, I was satisfied that I had put the garden 'to bed' for the Winter.