"The brilliant poppy flaunts her head.......

Amidst the ripening grain, And adds her voice to sell the song, That August's here again."

-  Helen Winslow

Is anyone else finding it hard to believe we've arrived in august already? Its not just me is it? The weather has been all over the place this week. We've had cold drizzly days, days of torrential rain and then a blistering 28C day! The plants are loving it though, soaking up the rain when it falls and basking in the sun, putting on great growth and larger flowers, mind you so are the weeds! The gardens continue to look amazing and I am so happy with how they are growing and coming together. Here are a few highlights this week.

Dahlia 'Bishop of Llandalff'

Helenium 'Moerheim Beauty' and Borage in the railway garden

Leucanthemum x superbum 'Sonnenschein'

Sorbus vilmorinii

Sweetpeas in the scented garden

Waterlily in the fish pond

Shadows on the fence at home

Which plant have you had the longest? Which one tells a story or has been with you through your life? I have quite a few plants I have had for a long time, many of them tie in with important times of my life. But the plant that has real history and provenance for me is my shrub rose Rosa 'Blanc Double De Coubert'. So here is our story:

I first met this rose when I was doing my practical year prior to going to college. That year was spent on The National Trust for Scotland YTS scheme and my placement was at Inveresk Gardens in Musselburgh. It was planted in one of the borders than ran along the bottom of the garden, next to the summer house and steps down to the lower level. For what ever reason as a sixteen year old I was taken with this rose and Dave the gardener produced a rooted piece for me one day to take home. This piece of Rose was duly planted in my parents garden in Linlithgow where I lived at the time. This was 1986, which means I have had this rose or it's children for 34 years. In 1988 my parents moved to Bo'ness and one of the plants that went too was a rooted piece of this rose. In 1999 my ex and I built a house with a huge garden and I got a rooted piece of the rose from my parents plant for my own garden. I planted it next to the kids playhut where it happily grew for 15 years. In 2014 I had to sell my home and beautiful garden and leave as I couldn't afford to buy my ex out and I potted up another rooted piece of my rose. This rose sat in a pot for 2 years at the house we were renting. In 2015 I bought Quercus Garden Plants and in 2016 I needed jaggy plants to protect the Nursery stream garden from kids who kept running through the borders so I looked around at the plants I had at the house, brought from my last garden and decided my rose would do the job and I could always get a piece back when I got my own garden again. So this is the 5th generation of this lovely rose in the nursery garden here at Quercus.

Rose 'Blanc Double De Coubert' has large, semi-double, fragrant flowers of pure white, tinged with blush in the bud. It flowers early, repeating almost throughout the season with a few hips in autumn. It makes a good sized plant to 6 feet or so high and wide.

Fragrant Friday - plant combo goals - this is one I've been planning for a while. I love the deep burgundy of Cosmos Chocamocha and wanted to team it with the apricot of Rose 'Climbing Lady Hillingdon' and of course the perfume of both together is divine! Find them in the scented garden here in the nursery gardens.

There were some interesting clouds in the sky last week

We're excited to finally get the last stock bed path gravelled :D Bracken supervised David putting in some of the wood edging and then barrowing up the gravel. There's a long way to go, so it will take David a few weekends to get it finished. If you have visited the nursery, you like me will be very happy to see the back of the last squelchy path

In the stream garden and entrance garden this weekend

The fabulous and curious flowers of Veronicastrum virginicum 'Fascination'. A "fasciated" form of Veronicastrum in a lovely dark pink shade. Fasciation is a relatively rare condition of abnormal growth in vascular plants in which the growing tip becomes elongated perpendicularly to the direction of growth, thus producing flattened, ribbon-like, crested (or "cristate"), or elaborately contorted, tissue. It can occur in the stem, root, fruit, or flower head. Some plants are grown and prized aesthetically for their development of fasciation. Fasciation has several possible causes, including hormonal, genetic, bacterial, fungal, viral and environmental.

A busy day off on Monday! Eyes are fine, apart from being shortsighted, I've been shortsighted in more ways than one in my life, glasses will be in the post 🤔 Actually did some shopping in a supermarket and went to the bank and survived. The hairdresser was an interesting experience and not the pampering it usually is but I'm happy to trade that for looking more human again 

One thing I'm working on is being kinder to myself and allowing myself things I enjoy instead of finding an excuse not to. Lunch today was my favourite sandwich - a bagel with philiadelphia cheese, raw red pepper and cashew nuts plus coffee with real milk for a glass milk bottle. It's the simple things.

Enjoying the afternoon sun!

More flowers on one of my orchids

Useful plants from the garden:

Herby yoghurt Chicken with Tarragon

 

 

Serves 2

 

3tbsp mint, chopped                                                  3tbsp tarragon, chopped

Chives, snipped                                                          150ml plain yoghurt

2 tbsp oil                                                                      1 garlic clove, crushed

Salt and pepper                                                           2 chicken breasts

110g dried apricots, chopped

 

~ Mix together the herbs and yoghurt, oil, garlic, salt and pepper to taste. Turn the chicken breasts in the mixture until coated. Cover and marinade in the fridge for at least 4 hours or over night.

~ Remove the chicken from the marinade (reserve the rest of the marinade) and place the chicken in a frying pan, Cook for approx. 20 minutes.

~ Stir the apricots into the remaining marinade and spoon over the chicken. Cook for another 15 to 20 minutes, until the chicken is cooked through and there are no pink juices.

~ Serve with new potatoes and a green vegetable.

Tuesday off and ventured to the shops and out for lunch, first time in 5 months, quite strange, a bit stressful and odd, but good to do something even on a very wet miserable day.

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