Saturday, August 08, 2009

Boring post follows, with apologies

This is going to be a very boring post unless you happen to be me, since I'm the only person who really takes a close interest in my little garden. Apologies. I just wanted to look at how it was over four years - 2006-2009 - at about the same time. The only way I could think of doing this was posting four end-of-July photos, one from each year and all taken from about the same place. 2006 was when I started taking digital photos.

Above you see it in 2006. Lilac hedge far too big; yellow-and-white marguerites in foreground looking healthy, though in the process of being swamped by those yellow nettles.


In 2007, hedge has been cut down a lot. Marguerites are looking a bit less advanced, but still. promising. I had massacred the yellow nettles (though in 2009 they're beginning to fight back).

2008 - I must have foolishly planted these yellow flowers - what are they? coreopsis? rudbeckia? can't remember - to form a pleasing contrast to the marguerites.



2009. Big yellow flowers are now choking the marguerites. You can't see it from here but I had removed large amounts of b.y.fs further along, last year, and they've more or less grown back already. It's strange - I've had some for years and they've only recently started to take over. And look at the lilac hedge: getting much too big again. But when we cut it down, we lose the blossom.
I don't particularly like the destructive bit of gardening. I like planting things and doing a little gentle weeding.
I feel I should now write something more interesting in case anyone has actually read this, so here's what I thought was a rather telling little quote from "The Jane Austen Book Club" by Karen Joy Fowler, a well-written pleasant nonsense which I read and enjoyed on holiday: "Sylvia thought how all parents wanted an impossible life for their children - happy beginning, happy middle, happy ending. No plot of any kind. What uninteresting people would result if parents got their way."
I suppose it's true. And it's a bit comforting. Maybe it applies to gardening too.
Edited to add: Thimbleanna's comment made me ask myself what those white/yellow daisy flowers really are. The BBC gardening website seems to say that the white (swamped) ones which I know as marguerites are ox-eye daisies or possibly Shasta daisies; the invasive yellow ones do seem to be coreopsis; and it denies knowledge of the yellow nettley ones, known to me as yellow nettles. Come on, Kerri; come to my aid with your botanical wisdom. I do know the names of quite a lot of flowers but these ones are so common that one hardly needs the names - pointing usually does it.











10 comments:

  1. Your garden is lovely I love lilac I can still smell it it had a great smell to it.
    Hugs Mary.

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  2. So fun to see four year's worth of your garden Isabelle! I had to look up what a marguerite is -- a yellow daisy? I haven't heard anyone here use that term. I LOVE a big jumbo lilac! I have several miniature lilacs that are wonderful, but the big ones are my favorite. I planted one almost 10 years ago -- it has beautiful blooms every year, but it's still so small -- not much bigger than my miniatures. I so wish it would be gigantic like yours -- I think maybe it doesn't get enough sun. Or maybe it wishes it were in your happy garden!

    LOVE, LOVE, LOVE that fabulous quote!

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  3. I wish from the bottom of myt heart I could sit right now in your little garden......instead I sit here in a bleak! looking garden on a freezing cold day wishing my daffodils would fill my orchard with golden yellows then I would know summer is on its way!!!

    Your garden is "a true gem!" and it is so nice to be visiting you after such a long time.

    Lee-ann

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  4. That wasn't boring at all! Can't imagine what you're calling a yellow nettle though - any chance of a close-up?

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  5. That wasn't boring. I like looking at your garden and seeing the subtle changes.

    I have a similar scene I suppose, but I have a red seat, under a large Copper Beech tree.

    Gardens never stay at a perfect height or shape, so it's about getting basic bones right I guess. That's why the seats are quite good; the paint may dim but the shape and size is constant.

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  6. I know you know I know nothing about flowers, so I will just say: lovely garden photos!

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  7. I love seeing all those beautiful photos of your lush green garden.

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  8. I find I only have capacity for so many plant names. When I take the trouble to remember one, another invariably slides out the other side. I've just got hemerocallis and crocosmia but lost a rather pretty grass and an annoying, boring shrub!

    Hey ho!

    Lesley x

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  9. I enjoyed that piece of garden history. Marguerites or shasta daisies I know and used to grow, and they are very tough plants indeed, but the yellow ones I never grew - need a close up to see whether they are coreopsis or rudbeckias. Yellow nettles are a complete puzzle.I am madly envious of the lilac - never managed to grow it. A friend does and she also has proper English snowdrops - wonderful.
    I am just back from beautiful Melbourne where the gardens and plants are stunningly beautiful, with camellias flowering gloriously, bulbs starting to flower, magnolias in full bloom, and blossoms just starting. My own garden seems full of green stuff.

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  10. I like this sort of thing, snapshots made over time. Changes which seem quite subtle from day to day become dramatic over the years.

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