"The first day of spring is one thing.........

and the first spring day is another. 

The difference between them is 

sometimes as great as a month." 

-  Henry Van Dyke, Fisherman's Luck

Unsurprisingly I'm running behind with blog writing, bear with me, its that busy time of year in the nursery, this one is from two weeks ago.

Wednesday and back to work after a couple of lovely days off. The weather was lovely and great to see customers enjoying a wander around the nursery and gardens. Rory was in and powering through potting and propagation. I was supposed to be working in the stock beds but was busy helping customers and chatting to friends who popped in. Lots of watering as we have had no rain and none on the forecast either!

So many wonderful, colourful gems having a spring fling in the nursery gardens this week

Anemone nemerosa

Anemone x lipsensis and Helleborus 'Pink Lady'

Brunnera 'Betty Bowring'

Euphorbia amygdaloides var. Robbiae

Narcissus 'Thalia'

Primula denticulata 'Alba'

Tree paeonia

 First painting in 2 weeks. So this was supposed to be an abstract gently rolling hills............. instead it became brooding mountains, not sure what that says about my subconscious state of mind? :D 

A busy day in the nursery with all three of my staff in, keeping up with all them and making sure all their queries were answered and keeping up with all the plant admin from them meant I got little of my tasks done. Still much was achieved and the company was great.

In my alpine troughs today in the nursery

Especially pleased with the primula I grew from seed

The Saxifrage was a gift from a lovely customer

The Trillium is the only one that survived the move from my last garden 8 years ago

Love spring and the emerging growth, plants and all the spring flowers

Primula farinosa

Primula farinosa and Trillium erectum

Primula farinosa

Saxifrage pubescens 'Snowcap'

Trillium erectum

We are now fully stocked with water plants. Our water plant sales area looks amazing with such fabulous plants. We have:

Marginal plants (at least 20 different varieties)

Oxaginators

Waterlilies in yellow, white, red and pink

Aquatic compost

Aquatic plant pots

Great advice

We also have all our perennials, grasses, trees, shrubs, herbs, alpines, climbers and so much more.

Compost, pots and lots of great items in our wee shop.

Sam with some cracking water lilies

I just love this part of the nursery gardens. The wildflower meadow really starts to come alive now starting with the cowslips. Don't they look incredible against that blue sky

Next will be the Campion, then the knapweed and cowparlsey, then we get to July and the grasses start to flower along with the yellow rattle and wild scabious.

The insect population in the meadow is amazing, on a warm summer day sitting listening to the chirps of the crickets, buzz of the bees and the hum of the hoverflies.

Over the past 7 years we have worked with the wild life to create this amazing meadow. The biodiversity gets better every year and at the last count we had over 45 different species of wildflowers growing and that wasn't including all the grasses!

The weeping pear I have planted is one of my favourite trees, inspired from the first garden I worked in 36 years ago. I'm hoping the tulips will spread over time, I'll plant more each year.

If you visit, take a moment to savour all the gardens but especially this wildflower and wildlife haven

Flowers on Pyrus salicifolia 'Pendula'

Behind the scenes - irrigation, and we need a lot of that at the moment! No rain for the past two weeks and none on the next weeks fore cast either in our continual development and improvement of the nursery I invested in an irrigation system for the trees in the sales area this week. Big thanks to David who installed it this weekend and now the trees get water direct to their roots

This also cuts down on water wastage as the water trickles direct from the pipe to the tree roots

Happy trees, happy planet and happy me with one less thing to worry about

Nursery dog training is going reasonally well....... walking on a lead while I'm pushing the flat trolley not so much Following in her predecessor's esteemed footsteps however she approves of horti fleece as a bed

Colour combinations

Monday and in the nursery waiting on the next tree and shrub order, lots done but the delivery turned up after 5pm, so a late finish!

Tuesday and a day off at home as David is snowed under with work and I had to wait in for the replacement nursery laptop. I did however finally get the grass cut now my mower is back after being serviced and fixed. Two cuts finally saw it back under control A walk along the river and back through the woods where all the spring wild flowers are in flower

Anemone nemerosa, wood anemone

Oxalis acetosella, wood sorrel

Dog violet

Primroses

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