Hello and welcome to my first blog and my new website which I am very excited about, but where to start, should I be witty, trendy, erudite, no I think I will just tell you about progress in the garden and share the highs and lows of being a cut flower grower in Scotland.
I have no formal training, that is the first thing to get off my chest, I just love gardening and flowers but this new found love only started when we moved to our house here in the Scottish Borders. The garden was a blank canvas with the exception of a wonderful old apple tree with a distinct lean, two pink peonies and a pretty laburnum. After 14 years the garden has gone through a dramatic transformation with a woodland garden, spring border, white border, three new long borders, a cutting garden with raised beds, 12 more beds for cut flower production, an orchard and a new vegetable garden, I commandeered the last one.
The growing season here is from April to October, but this is heavily dependant on the weather, gardening at 700 ft has its challenges but I am constantly surprised by what will grow. I have the use of a polytunnel which helps enormously as we can have very late and very early frosts.
Someone who came to visit us questioned why we had not bothered to install an irrigation system in the garden. After I had stopped laughing I explained that it would be surplus to requirements, it's OK though, he's my cousin and has not lived in the UK for a very long time. If he were here now he would understand why that is not really necessary. It is pouring with rain so I am inside planning, and writing this. Also I have time to look through the bulb and seed catalogues that are now jamming up the letterbox. It seems strange to be thinking about next years flowers before we have really got going with the flowers this year but it's a guilty pleasure of mine to look through them all, write down what I would like and then go through the list again cutting it down by at least half. Children and sweet shops springs to mind.
So today is an inside day, I will go to the polytunnel later, listen to the rain hammering down on the plastic and deal with the sweet peas that are now so tall I need to stand on a ladder to get to them. Weed between the bells of ireland, amaranthus, snapdragons and dahlias and clear the cornflowers which have served me well but now are passed their best and the outside plants are flowering plus I need to make room for the plants still waiting for a home.
I hope you will enjoy reading this.