EARLY DECEMBER IN THE GARDEN - SIX ON SATURDAY


1. Rosa Rugosa Alba hip

The roses are starting to admit that the summer is over and are dropping their leaves, although a good few are still putting out flower buds that have no hope of opening. 
The leaves on this Rosa Rugosa Alba have changed to a soft leathery tan.


The hips on the Rugosa are the size of cherry tomatoes.  But they must not taste as good - this one has been left half eaten.



2. Mahonia

You have to look up to see the flowers on this mahonia.  Trapped among some overbearing yew trees it had put on lots of height but not much width.  All its flowers are at the top of 10ft bare stems.  I've considered cutting it back to about 2ft, a few stems at a time, but I'm not sure it would survive.  I think I like it well enough in its tall state so I will leave the poor thing alone.


3. Hedera

A little white edged ivy can be quite attractive at this time of year.  It just needs keeping an eye on otherwise it starts to think it owns the place and next time you look it's clambering all over other plants.  We have plenty of the common dark green ivy in the woodland, which likes to climb up trees.  Mr B has removed sack loads of the stuff from that part of the garden. 

We were in the garden centre a few weeks ago buying pansies and suchlike for winter pots when among the cyclamen and ferns he spotted small pots of ivy for sale.  He looked at me in disbelief - why would anyone buy Ivy? he asked. 



4. Skimmia japonica rubella

This plant featured in my Six on Saturday on 2nd November, but it's back again because the flowers were looking even better than a month ago.  I couldn't pass it by without taking another picture.

 


 5. The woodland path

 Another week, another section of woodland path.  We had laid down new underlay and bark on the existing woodland path a couple of weeks ago.  This is an new section of path, laid through what had been a thicket of elder and other assorted weeds.




6.  They're here

It's so exciting I must get a life to see that the snowdrops are already putting on growth.  I don't know whether these are early or not, as I haven't been out looking for them in December before.   It wasn't until we put in the new path mentioned above that I saw these.  Snowdrops grow like weeds in this garden.  They've multiplied so much that they are pushing each other out of the ground.  I'll split these up.  I think they'll appreciate it.



That's all for this weeks Six but there are many more interesting garden's featured on The Propagator.  You can find out how to join in by clicking that link.


Comments

  1. In my experience Mahonia takes hard pruning remarkably well and are much the better for it. I hope my snowdrops are doing as well as yours but there's nothing showing yet.

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    1. If there's a shrub in the garden I don't like I will quite happily cut it hard back and they never die - but I'm always more tentative with the shrubs I like. So thanks for the advice about the Mahonia - I'm sure you're right that it will be better for a hard prune.

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  2. I with Jim on cutting back Mahonias. I once heard on gardener's question time that snowdrops do best for being divided every 4 years, and doing it in a leap year just as the foliage is dying down, and planting back straight away, makes remembering when next to do it easy. So 2020 is the ideal time. This was in response to a question from a lady gardener who had a husband who was not a gardener and did not want to do too much...so one job every four years was the solution. It made me laugh and since then I have followed that system.

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    1. I will remember the leap year snowdrop rule. Thanks for that Stasher.

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  3. Love the brown rose leaves & the skimmia. I hope mine grows to be as beautiful & healthy as yours is. Your snow drops have gone crazy mad! I like Stasher's comment about leap year splitting & shall adhere to it from now on. Your woodland path is looking wonderful.

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    1. Thanks Lora. I think the skimmia is just grateful to be released from the plastic tub where it's spent the last 8 years and is flowering to show it's gratitude.

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  4. Wow look.at those snowdrops! They are very enthusiastic, this is to be encouraged, I think.

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    1. I'm all for encouraging the snowdrops. The plant is that clearing away the weeds and making the path through the trees will give me lots of room for more snowdrops.

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  5. Lovely six! Thanks ... I would buy ivy, if I had the chance. In spite of the fact that the native is a thug in my garden. But the foliage of the more restrained ivies is so special, I always mean to plant more (well-behaved) ones! I'm also considering a mahonia chop - too big for the place I planted it.

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