The Rata Tree & a tray of Cosmos

The needs and wants of a gardener

From behind me I can smell the scent of the old rose that tumbled down from its ancient trellis last spring. Around me bees hum. I am seeking some shade and it’s not even 10 am. It is going to be a warm day and I feel hot already. This feeling is most likely due to the extra layers I put on when I first came out to garden this morning. Regardless, I’m sitting just taking it all in. It has been a week where I had very little time in the garden either through weather or work. As always I’ve missed it. So come the weekend I have many needs and wants for the garden, mainly I want to garden. I want to get the remaining plants in the flowers beds. I need to start moving to general maintenance of the garden as it is on the cusp of getting away from me. The combination of rain and sun means that while the garden is lush, this lushness dose not confirm itself to plants, the weeds are being to riot as well.

I got up early to do some gardening. We have a full day ahead and I want to do my work before it becomes a stress of wanting to do but running out of time. There is something beautiful about this time of day in the garden. Everything is waking. The dogs slop out then back inside. It is too early for them. Things in the garden slowly start to hum. A thrush buries her head in the pea straw near where I work while bees sup excess water in the trays of my seedlings. For some reason bees love dirty water. The quiet is momentary disrupted as the Tui who has returned to guard the about to flower Rata tree swoops past with speed and precision. It chases a small sparrow who dared to enter its tree. It moves fast like a dart, clipping wings on trees as it gives chase. I find myself ducking even though it is some distance from me. The Rata flowering seems early. I like to think of it flowering at Christmas, but I have learnt over the years it flowers on it’s own schedule not mine. It is a sign that summer is near and that I do really need to keep on with my planting out of my annuals.

I have a few things I have ordered online to plant. The last plant order I tell myself but I know that come the next newsletter from Kate at Seaflowers nursery I will be busy filling my online shopping cart. What I have to plant are easy to plant. There is a lovely new to me, Eryngium pandanifolium 'Physic Purple' plus a rudbeckia and another salvia. Kate has an excellent collection if anyone is interested. Salvia’s are a good bee friendly plant. Along side these I plant the marigolds that I picked up last weekend. The label says strawberry blonde but all I see starting to emerge is the deep red of a strawberry, I hope the blonde is to come. These all go in the new flower bed I made this year. It is to be a tangle of dahlias, sunflowers, cosmos and cornflowers inspired by a garden photo book I have. There are of course other plants that either snuck in or called this bed home before I started my project. Things are starting to grow and I will need to be patient and wait to see what form and shape this flower bed takes.

I have many cosmos and cornflowers to plant. My delight at many growing from seed is now a bane of my life as I need to find homes for the trays and trays I have created. I do love a good forest of cosmos and last year I admired (something I don’t often do ) the plantings of the local council in front of the train station. There were masses of cornflowers, like a wave of colour. I am attempting to create something similar around the garden table with a small bed of plantings. Here I’ve put cosmos and cornflowers and the odd dahlia. At the moment my main battle to keep this looking presentable is with the birds as they toss and through the pea straw around. I swept it back to the bed, they toss it back out again. The remaining cosmos and cornflowers will find home in the many gaps I still have in beds that either will need thought as to what to do or are waiting for growth from perennials I have planted. In some cases I want to keep the space so I can see how things I have planted will grow. This makes a mass planting of annuals a quick fix and it will make my bees happy. They like a forest of annuals just as much as I do.