Electric blue beauties from the Himalayas will leave you bewitched – but good luck!

MEMORIES OF AZURE FLOWER BEDS IN NORTHERN SCOTLAND

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 IME doesn’t half gallop along as you get older and when you’re enjoying life. With this in mind, I find it hard to believe almost exactly 20 years have passed since I explored the dramatic coastal far north of Scotland.

Memorable sights there were in plenty – lofty mountains, dramatic cliffs, brooding moors,  kilts and sporrans, a plateful of haggis, towns called Thurso, Wick, Durness, Ullapool and, of course, John O’Groats . . . 

. . . and gardens exploding with the electric azure shades of classic Himalayan blue poppies.

They grow these eye-widening superstars rather well in the top half of Scotland, as I discovered during a week-long, somewhat damp June safari with an old friend while our wives were sunning themselves in Majorca.

One of the high-spots of the tour was a meander around the Scottish National Trust’s wonderful award-winning lochside garden, Inverewe, which bursts with colour and scents – and boasts a huge collection of blue poppies, botanically Meconopsis baileyi, as well as being home to towering Californian redwood trees.

Not far behind in terms of memorable moments was the Castle of Mey gardens in Caithness, home of the Queen Mother and, like Inverewe, extremely blue from those poppies.

Yet the sight which mesmerised me the most was a modest garden border at one of our one-night B & Bs. This relatively short strip was packed like a botanical treasure chest with The Blues, an overwhelming blanket of pure, piercing-blue beauty, the likes of which I’d never seen before.

I took a long, lingering look and said to myself: How on earth do the Scots grow ‘em as successfully as Southerners grow petunias?

Answer: Meconopsis hail from the mountains, so relish cool, damp places, high humidity and hate dry feet. It’s perfect Scots fare!

Their colour is like no other flower. So it’s no surprise they prompt a vast following in similar vein to snowdrop or rose aficionados.

Meconopsis, though, are in a different league. Their big, shiny azure blooms which open from brown, hairy buds, are further enhanced by a central nest of golden stamens.

I won’t disguise the fact that blue poppies are something of a challenge to bring on for the three or four years of their all-too-brief lives – unless conditions equate to meconopsis utopia which is principally a cool spot and out of the constant glare of the sun.

As well as baileyi, the two other best blues are Meconopsis grandis and sheldonii – and all have earned the RHS Award of Garden Merit gong, all reach between 3ft and 5ft and all with flowers measuring 4in to 6in across. Watch out, too, for two other superb forms in the shape of Slieve Donard and the even taller Branklyn which soars to 6ft and is named after a garden in Perth, Scotland, where it was discovered.

Add to that Meconopsis Lingholm, one of a few varieties to produce fertile seeds, Barney’s Blue which initially bears attractive pink-purple flowers that gradually change to a striking pure blue on stems 4ft high.

■ Bewitching blue – and purple – poppies: Top – Meconopsis Barney’s Blue and Hensol Violet make a stunning duo; centre – my success with growing Meconopsis baileyi a few years ago; above – another shot of Hensol Violet in flower and bud cluster.

I must also include Hensol Violet, a variant introduced a few years ago by seed specialists Thompson & Morgan which diverts from true blue to intense purple and which quickly became a collector’s must-have.

With due care, baileyi and its hybrids can be coaxed into annual flowering, though failure rates are known to be high – myself included – much to growers’ chagrin.

To sum up for the best chance of success:

■ Acid soil, like that enjoyed by rhododendrons, will produce the most intense colours.

■ Seed sowing is, surprisingly, easy and should be done in gritty compost in June or July. If you need to store the seeds pop them in the fridge.

■ Sow thinly, otherwise seedlings are prone to collapse and die if overcrowded.

■ A cool, shady spot sheltered from strong winds suits them best. Staking for loftier plants may be advisable.

■ Water frequently in hot, dry weather and feed in February and June with a balanced fertiliser.

■ Do remember – blue poppies and traditional poppies (papaver) may be related but their needs are quite different. The blues flourish in shade, while their cousins adore as much sun as you can offer them.

You’d be dotty not to like these super shade-lovers . . . but beware the zebra effect!

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ELIEVE ME, I do not relish my spring and summer purge of pulmonarias, yet it has become a reluctant “must do”. Otherwise my garden would be at risk of being overrun by these spotty, shade-loving invaders.

Multiplication is the name of the game as far this fascinating race of hardy perennial plants is concerned.

Their habit of super-spreading is so severe that I can cast an eagle-eye over the garden only to discover those vivid, multi-spotted leaves sprouting all over the place.

◙ Pulmonaria patterning: All these images are of unnamed pulmonarias in my garden, clearly showing the clarity of the spots and the beauty of the blooms.

And I’m convinced they weren’t there yesterday!

So I get to work and fork out a few dozen, despite the fact that I actually like pulmonarias – aka lungwort – as they add a special something to shady spots from late winter and for months on end, not least their funnel-shaped flowers in April and May.

These blooms can be violet-blue, pinky-purple, deep or pale red, clear blue or white alongside the spots, speckles and splashes in random shapes in silver or greenish shades.

One of my theories about pulmonarias is the “zebra effect” – their leaves are often so vibrant and patterned that I tend not to notice some of them, mimicking as they do the camouflage attributes of zebras with their distinctive black and white striped coats. Fortunately not all of these unwanted pop-ups get away with it!

Many named varieties are near-impossible to tell apart as they spread their rhizomes across the woodland floor.

There is, of course, a degree of expectation over new plants that survive my “cull” as they could display flower or foliage colourings that are that bit different – so will be well worth nurturing.

Not that hardy pulmonarias need much TLC, just as long as they grow in soil that’s not too dry.

They team up beautifully with various ferns and will relish the cool of dappled shade rather than the full glare of the sun.

There are around 14 species of pulmonaria but many more named hybrids. In the wild they can be found in woods and on hills in Spain, Portugal, Sweden, Italy, Greece, Ukraine, Russia and the UK, so they plainly have a wide and varied spread across the nations.

Let me make it clear – as dual-purpose plants, pulmonarias are right up there in the premier league. But I don’t regret declaring war to ensure their numbers are kept at manageable levels and to avoid getting spots before my eyes every time I walk down the garden path!

Most good garden centres will stock varieties of pulmonaria and among the best are Berries & Cream with raspberry-pink flowers and silver foliage, Blue Ensign in deep blue with plain green leaves, Diana Clare in deep pink with purple stripe and silver leaves margined green, Lewis Palmer in violet-blue and narrow, deep green foliage spotted greenish-white, Roy Davidson with pale blue flowers and conspicuously marked leaves, Sissinghurst White, a neat and tidy white with good leaf markings, Moonshine with shimmering silvery-white leaves and the palest blue blooms, Rachel Vernie in a livery of coral-red funnels and plain leaves edged cream, Brentor, raised in my native Devon and bearing bright red magenta flowers amid dark green leaves sparsely spotted silver, and Buckland, also from Devon, with nicely marked leaves and pinkish-red bells.

PULMONARIA POINTS

◙ Not all have patterned foliage. Some are in plain green while others are so spotty these tend to merge into a massed silvery expanse such as Moonshine.

◙ Most grow to around 10in-14in high and are evergreen, though a few varieties are close to deciduous, losing all but a tiny green stump in the run-up to winter.

◙ All have hairy leaves, mostly bristly and rough to the touch, and it is interesting to note that the foliage varies in shape according to species. Pulmonaria longifolia and angustifolia’s are narrow, mollis widens in the middle and officinalis is heart-shaped.

◙ Lungwort is so named because it was once used to cure lung, or pulmonary, disease.

◙ Propagation – if it is needed! – can be by division, root cuttings or seed which will not come true from hybrids but may provide a few surprises.

A useful updated and illustrated handbook on pulmonarias, written by Jennifer Hewitt and Margaret Stone, is available for £7.50 from the Hardy Plant Society, Check online where you will find many suppliers of specific varieties.

Stunning simplicity, ‘osteos’ are daisies that deserve a surge up the gardening pop charts

► All set for the great outdoors – three newly-purchased osteospermums in vivid colours which doesn’t diminish their simplicity. Below – a mass of long-established osteos in my garden and one bloom up-close; bottom – a refreshing pale-shade strain of Limpopo.
WHY do I adore osteospermums? In the same breath I could ask: “What’s not to like about them?”

That very second question has obviously been taken on board in mighty fashion by the green-fingered public, based on plant sales and gardening commentators.
For few flowers have enjoyed such a meteoric 21st century rise in popularity than these engaging South African daisies in a colour spectrum that seems to expand year on year.
Yes, they are just daisies, pure and simple, no singing or dancing, most growing between 18in and 24in high – a tiny minority are dwarfish reaching 6in to 8in – they look semi-exotic yet they are far tougher than originally thought.
When I was a much younger bloke I knew them as dimorphotheca – and they weren’t especially commonplace on garden centre stagings back then. Now they have been recategorised into another five-syllabled mouthful – commonly clipped to “osteos”.
Here we have an evergreen perennial which hovers between just about hardy and not quite hardy, depending on variety and where you live.

My guess is that if you’re north of Coventry – I’ll throw that city into the mix because I lived there once – you’ll be more at risk of losing them in winter than, say, in my Devon garden.
So, even with this debatable negative aspect, why have so many gardeners fallen in love with these super-daisies that grow wild in abundance along the roadsides in South Africa in similar vein to buttercups decorating our hedgerows, UK-style?
For starters, they won’t fret in a drought, they relish full sun and insist on dutifully closing their petals on cloudy days and each evening.
Another popularity point is their eight-month stint in bloom, given a decent spring and summer.
Raising new stock from cuttings is a doddle. It’s best to strike 4in-5in stems in late summer in a gritty compost, but do keep a careful winter watch in an unheated greenhouse if the temperature drops too many notches below freezing and transfer to the comfort of indoors if you are unsure.
And so to that array of colours. Call most of them dazzlers, as one of my photos clearly illustrates.
From rich magenta through to deep and pale pink, orange, primrose-yellow, white, a host of purple shades, subtle blends and mixes and even a pale slate-blue in Blue Streak, complete with blue-grey foliage.

A big favourite is Whirlygig with ornately crimped white ray-florets and powder-blue on the reverse. It reminds me of an old-fashioned ferris wheel. Pink Whirls has the same quirky characteristics but in a vibrant pink.
I’m not so sure it’s necessary to remember names of varieties as it is colour, not shape, that’s the dominant factor here as, from an outline perspective, the majority of osteos are more or less identical.
If you prefer specific identities you could search out Nairobi Purple which is white on the reverse side, Buttermilk, in palest lemon, has been awarded an RHS Garden Merit gong, and Blackthorn Seedling, one of the hardiest osteos and clad in a stunning dark magenta. There’s a bright and breezy strain called Limpopo and, for one that’s pretty close to singing and dancing, try Purple Sun in a supreme combination of lilac and apricot.
Grow osteospermums practically anywhere where the sun shines. From teaming up with summer bedders to creating their own spectacular displays, in hanging baskets and patio pots, unfussiness is their watchword.
Don’t lavish osteos with too many boosters or grow in ultra-rich soil which will prompt plenty of leaves but with fewer flowers. In short, poorer soil is the key to success, but an occasional high-potash feed will keep the buds a-sprouting.

So do enjoy your little piece of South Africa in your garden, wherever you live and whatever the amount of TLC needed when the weather decides to play awkward.

► You’ll find an extensive array of osteospermums and nursery stockists online.

Three million reasons to dig in for the NGS as they open garden gates in big charity push

WHATEVER your plans for the spring and summer, be sure the Great Outdoors guides you to one or more of the UK’s super gardens – and helps you to fill the charity treasure chest.

These are gardens which open to the public under the aegis of the National Garden Scheme and there are around 3,500 of them throughout England, Wales and Northern Ireland.

You can pick up a Yellow Book for your county for free from garden centres, libraries, some stores and other places of educational interest, so do keep an eye open.

It’s an astonishing feat of public generosity which last year amassed a phenomenal total of £3,403,960 for deserving causes.

These included the medical charities Marie Curie, Macmillan Cancer Support and Hospice UK (all £450,000), Carers’ Trust (£350,000), Queen’s Nursing Institute (£425,000) and Parkinson’s UK (£350,000).

Twelve further charities, among them English Heritage, Mencap and Support for Community Gardens, all received “multi-zero suffix” sums from garden-goers.

Some gardens have already had their gates oiled, painted and swung open to let the early enthusiasts in.

► Gorgeous gardens: Top – A lovely lakeside scene bordered by primulas at Marwood Hill, near Barnstaple, Devon. At the other end of England is this stunning scene from a garden in Morpeth, Northumberland. Picture courtesy of NGS. Below – the 2024 NGS handbook.

What I especially admire about these frameworks of beauty and inspiration is that the NGS is anything but the preserve of grand houses, rolling acres, sweeping lawns and extensive bedding schemes.

Far from it! Many gardens are modest in size, unpretentious patchworks yet bursting with colour, creativity, artistry and pride, everything you see the products of years of loving care.

My own county of Devon has, possibly, the highest total of NGS openings of any county in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. If town or village group gardens are separated, I totted up an impressive 126.

Devon, of course, is sizeable, virtually split in two by the brooding hills of Dartmoor and stretching north to the heather-laden valleys of Exmoor which it shares with Somerset.

Over many years of horticultural scribing, I’ve enjoyed numerous visits to inspirational NGS gardens, mainly in the north of the county.

Yet you can travel from Lynton in the far-flung north to Salcombe, around 100 miles away in the deep south – and everything in between embracing Devon’s contribution to NGS charities which last year topped £193,000.

Expanding nationwide, a portfolio of more than 3,500 gardens is sure to suit every taste, every appetite for the rare and unusual, the quirky and the architectural, the small or the stately – from one of my favourite counties, Northumberland, at the tip of northern England, south-east to Kent – the so-called garden of England – and cross-country to the rugged far west of Cornwall.

Remember too that many garden owners have drinks, cream teas, snacks and surprises on offer as well as picnic areas . . . and plant stalls ready for you to plug that overdue gap in the bed.

Coupled with an easy admission fee of around £5-£6, what’s there not to like about NGS?

That garden gate is ready and waiting for you to unlatch!

►http://www.ngs.org.uk

Cranesbills are cracking plants but you’ll need to linger long over a challenging choice

CRANESBILL NURSERY is in celebratory mood as it digs up its own piece of history – a ruby anniversary catalogue in praise of that diverse and versatile flower, the hardy geranium.

Not that Cranesbill has been in the same spot for 40 years, nor has its current owner, Gary Carroll, been at the helm for this length of time.
In fact, it uprooted from Redditch, Worcestershire, where it had germinated in 1984, to Tewkesbury, Gloucestershire, in 2011 and finally to Walsall in 2016 when Gary took over the botanical tiller.
Gary, who once worked as a gardener for the National Trust at Moseley Old Hall, Wolverhampton – a small 17th century farmhouse – has produced yet another high-quality handbook listing 120 species and varieties and is at pains to let it be known there are more listings on the website (cranesbillnursery.com).

So what are hardy geraniums? Not to be confused with their close but tender relatives, pelargoniums – which are invariably dubbed geraniums anyway – the hardies are strictly cranesbills, hence the title of Gary’s nursery.
They are essentially a grow-anywhere hardy perennial, blooming in spring, summer or autumn – sometimes in all three seasons – depending on variety, happy in full sun or part-shade, unfussy, tough as a rhino’s hide and relishing life in any type of soil, provided you give it decent drainage.
Furthermore, many have attractive foliage, some assuming rich or contrasting autumn tints, while others bear shiny leaves, some bronzy purple, velvety or deep-cut. Now these are cracking credentials!

But it’s the flowers that tend to send geranium fanatics into a spin.
Colours range from pure white to vibrant magenta as well as pinks, purples, near-blues, lilacs and shades so deep they appear almost black.
A random selection of Cranesbill’s photos gives a clear indication of these plants’ beauty. As catalogue browsers will see, many varieties boast delicate and intricate veining along the petals, while others have jet-black eyes or paler centres.
Take note too of varieties labelled RHS Award of Garden Merit for all-round excellence. At a flat rate of £11.25 per plant, including these award-winners, and destined to last for years, this represents sterling value.

Do remember that geraniums seldom top 18in, though a handful have height on their side, such as Splish Splash, Raven and the globally-famed and sun-loving Rozanne (24in), while Geranium psilostemon almost kisses the clouds at 4ft, with a sizeable 3ft spread.
Chiefly, though, the cranesbills stay close to soil level and some are classed as ground huggers. One, which I picked at random, is Geranium sanguineum striatum with large, ruffled marshmallow-pink blooms with fine red lines, no more than 8in from the ground and a generous flowering span of May to September.
Intriguingly, they grow freely on Walney Island off the Lancashire coast.
A handy hint is to dead-head the flowers as and when they fade to prompt the emergence of additional blooms as the seasons progress.

► Cranesbills, coats of many colours: From top – Blushing Turtle, the bizarre-looking Catherine Deneuve (left) and Czakor with elegant anthers, the hugely popular Rozanne and Inverness, Derrick Cook and Geranium striatum, and the pink double flowers like fairies’ hats of Southcombe Double, below – the new catalogue. Pictures courtesy of Cranesbill Nursery

Dig up and divide established clumps in autumn and replant in sun or semi-shade – not deep shade as that could lead to a spread of mildew. A handful of bonemeal per plant will be appreciated at the same time.
If there’s one cautionary note, it’s simply that the choice of varieties is so vast you may lapse into a state of cranesbill confusion.
Still, the upside is it’s not a bad way to get confused!
► www.cranesbillnursery.com / email gary@cranesbillnursery.com / tel 01684 770733.

A beauty in pink and yellow where home is at the edge of the world

REMOTE regions are many and varied around mighty Mother Earth – and naming a handful of the most isolated spots would include Pitcairn Island in the South Pacific, Cape York Peninsula in northern Queensland, the Tibetan Plateau, Devon Island in Canada and, nearer home, the Outer Hebrides.

But I would wager that, for sheer size and ultra-isolation, there’s nowhere on our planet to beat Kamchatka.

So where exactly is this place? Take an atlas, turn to Russia and see an enormous peninsula sticking out into the Bering Sea north of Japan and looking rather like a swollen arm.

The stats are mind-boggling – it is 500 miles long which makes it more than twice the size of England, is home to towns rejoicing in the names of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatskiy, Ozernovkiy and Uka and contains scenery that’s almost unrivalled for beauty.

Back in the early 90s I taped a TV nature programme – remember those video recorders? – about this previously secretive hideaway that’s more than 4,000 miles from Moscow and, incredibly, has no roads leading to it, effectively cutting it off from mainland Russia. Yet it is home to 300,000 people.

It’s so far-flung it must make Vladivostok seem like Vegas!

Occasionally I play back the video – yes, I’ve still got the Panasonic recorder! – and marvel at the snow-capped volcanic peaks, the geysers, numerous volcanoes – there are more than 300, many still active –  the crystal-clear waters, big brown bears at play . . . and the stunning colours of the flowers.

And that’s my big interest here, notably a hardy perennial called Achillea Love Parade, an improved selection from Achillea alpina subspecies camtschatica, otherwise and more simply known as Siberian yarrow or Kamchatka yarrow.

What I am leading to is to say you can grow a little piece of Kamchatka in your own garden. This lovely plant, which bears the familiar flat-topped plates on 2ft stems in clusters of numerous large and soft lilac-pink flowers with pale yellow stamens from June to September, grows wild in this Siberian wilderness, battling against often ferocious winds and dense fog.

Its seeds – hailed as a best seller – are listed in the Chiltern Seed catalogue (http://www.chilternseeds.co.uk) at £2.95 a pack and should bloom in the first year from a January or February sowing.

Interestingly, its lance-shaped, saw-edged, bright green, vaguely fern-like leaves are quite unlike any other in the genus – a quirk of horticulture which adds an extra layer of interest to sowing and growing. 

Elsewhere, there’s more to achillea than meets the eye. There are no fewer than 500 species of this flower arranger’s favourite, from 6in high to towering five-footers like the ubiquitous Cloth of Gold with 5in wide corymbs.

► Flowers from the wilderness: Top – Achillea Love Parade in soft lilac-pink; centre – another native of Kamchatka is Daphne jezoensis which, bizarrely, loses its leaves in summer and starts to “re-clothe” in autumn amid its golden trumpets. For this, try Junker’s Nursery at http://www.junker.co.uk; above – a map showing the huge peninsula that is Kamchatka which lies north of the Koreas and Japan.

If you fancy something closer to home than far-off Siberia, you could try a small selection of Chiltern’s dozen varieties listed in their 2024 catalogue, reviewed here in December.

Many have sweet, aromatic foliage and originating anywhere from America to the Alps.

Here’s a taster – Colorado (2ft), a best-seller said to boast all the colours of the Grand Canyon and the Colorado river, Flowerburst Fruitbowl (2½ft) in a mix of apricot, wine red and dusky pink shades, Summer Pastels, an All America Selections winner, a superb strain in numerous pastel shades but also including purple and grey, and Achillea ptarmica The Pearl, with large sprays of pure white double and semi-double flowers which are perfect for cutting and tolerant of just about any soil.

As for Kamchatka itself, if anyone is planning an achillea adventure among the brown bears I’d be happy with first refusal!

► Chiltern Seeds: http://www.chilternseeds.co.uk / 01491 824675.