If you haven’t yet, have a casual glance at the instigator of all this madness, The Propagator’s website. You will soon be tangled in his evil web:
https://thepropagatorblog.wordpress.com
- You gotta have faith. Sometimes with new clients you just have to ask them to trust you. This sunny little front garden on a hill doesn’t look much now, but come June or July I can see it looking great, after all those dots of green grow into magnificent grasses and Salvias and Eryngiums and Stachys.
2. Nature is so full and abundant. Lesser celandine, with Allium trinquetum in the background, just looking lush and vigorous and fresh.
3. Muscari are everywhere this week and very beautiful they are too. However, their foliage is a dull eyesore the rest of the year. Are they worth it? Yes, but only in certain wilder areas of gardens for me. Or in pots to use with daffodils and primulas.
4. I have the pleasure of working in several very well established gardens. They may be a bit overgrown and unruly, but what you gain is an immense fullness to the planting. Not one or two Pulmonarias but scores. Not a patch of Cyclamen but a quilted bedspread. Very satisfying and a great mine of propagating material. Thanks, Mrs W!
5. On Tuesday, in the pelting rain, I drove out to Essex to meet Margot Grice. She is the distributor for the HPS’s conservation plant programme. I had begged for plants to help with my St Mary’s long bed project. I expected a few. What I got was this lot. Loads. All rare and hard-to-get but considered very worthy garden plants. What treasure, what booty! Thanks a lot, Margot, and big up the HPS. If you haven’t joined yet, then do so, it is the subscription which keeps on paying dividends. I will be spreading the word about their excellent work to anyone who will listen.
6. Space, the final frontier. Unlike Captain Kirk et al, I am not boldly going, I am nervously tip toeing. Running out of room, at this stage. There are plants on windowsill, plants on walls, on pallets, in cold frames, behind the sofa, next to my daughter’s bed, on top of propagators and on the decking. Many haven’t germinated and been pricked out yet. What am I going to do for April, before they can go outside to harden off? Nice problem to have though.
Tim Hewitt, Gardener 
Space. The final impediment! I remember buying a bigger greenhouse and about a week later wishing I’d bought an even bigger one. I now have a small collection of those little things covered in plastic but with wheels. They get wheeled out of the greenhouse every morning so I can get in and wheeled back in in the evening when I have come out. Later on, a car will double up as a greenhouse, making each shopping trip about 30 minutes longer. No doubt Mr Prop will join with me in lauding your publicity for the HPS. Though please don’t mention Muscari!
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Ha, ha, John. It just gets a bit silly at this time of year, doesn’t it? I hadn’t thought of the car. Do you think my wife would notice?
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Number four is a gorgeous pastiche of vibrant colours.
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Thanks, Jane, I saw it and just liked it really. I think that everything over here is waiting impatiently ready to burst forth at the merest hint of warm weather, so more colour coming right up.
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Wow. Stunning pulmonaria! Mine is at least trying now, but ‘could do better’. Also muscari. I’m a bit mean to mine, but they are lovely. Love seeing all those plants waiting to go out.
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Thanks. The Pulmonaria and the Muscari need no I put from me, they just do their thing. The best kind of gardening!
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I agree about older, established gardens. Besides the joy you described, the abundance, I’ve also learned so much about garden design from these patches. Love the celandine & allium combo. Very woodland. You’ve had a good week despite the rain (although I saw elsewhere you’ve been physically well watered).
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Thanks, Lora. It is woodland, well virtually. It is a lovely little patch of the graveyard. Got a bit soaked on Wednesday and didn’t like it too much, I will admit.
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The pulmonaria have become a favorite of mine, blue + foliage is hard to top. As for space, I feel your pain.
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Totally agree with the “faith” that clients must have in us. It isn’t instant, and that is part of the joy. You must have cheered when you saw all those plants arrive, good old HPS, love them!
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I was just commenting on your blog, then I saw this. HPS forever! As they might have said in Swallows and Amazons.
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And then lashings of ginger beer, or am I getting my Famous Five confused?!
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Wow what a lucky client! All those hard to get plants 😀😀😀, great 6 Tim 👍👍👍
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I felt lucky, Thomas. It was a very generous gesture. They will all go in my long border at the church I take care of. Then I can start propagating from them, hopefully.
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That sounds like a grand plan, raise some good money for the church too
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Number 6 feels very familiar! My shelves and windowsills are similarly congested, and I have held of sowing too much because of how cold it’s been!
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It is definitely going to be a challenge to prick out and harden everything off without a divorce this year!
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Now that I am regional HPS royalty, I must invedtigate more about the conservation thing. Our group doesn’t go in for that sort of thing. Yet…
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I may have just been very lucky, but it was absolutely perfect for my new bed.
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Ha and here’s me going to war with Lesser Celandine. I may leave a couple of patches though. How lovely to have the space for carpets of one plant.
Good luck with finding homes for all your seedlings!
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Thanks. I wouldn’t have either Celandine or garlic in my garden, but in a churchyard they feel appropriate and I couldn’t get rid of them if I tried.
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Lived in Northumberland all my life and I have never been to Howick Hall! I am going to have to go and see Earl Greys garden some day!
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Do, it’s great.
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