Potatoes (‘Hermes’ and ‘Belle de Fontenay”) go in, there is further seed sowing in the greenhouses and everything is kept tended. All now coming on at a rate of knots.

 

The window frames and doors of the cottage and Temple of Baucis & Philomen are repainted – some long overdue maintenance. The Wave / Sheaf and Loo inscriptions are also redone to brighten them up.

 

The Allotment and Kailyard  get plenty of attention this month with a bit more planting but mostly prepping and keeping the beds clear especially of the stubborn presence of ground elder.

 

Honesty and forget-me-not, primrose and lily-of-the-valley are flowering in abundance, persicaria replaces dog’s-tooth violets in front of the grotto, sweet Cicely, bleeding hearts and bluebells mass in the understory, but mostly it is a time to look up as cherry, apple and thorn blossoms illuminate and fill the sky.

 

Dead nettles and archangels (lamium) proliferate in the Woodland garden surrounding the base of the Pyramid, which floats above this lustrous sea of green.

 

In the Hortus the rose beds are mulched and more nepeta underplanting put in. The most important job here though is an experiment with the box hedging – a section of the blighted plant is taken out and replaced with ‘Faulkner’ cultivar which is supposed to be more resistant. If this trial works out successfully then we will repeat and replace the rest. No other areas in the garden have been affected so the hope is that if we can contain and improve this area then that will be the beginning of the end for an unsightly menace.

 

The strawberry patch outside the Allotment The Sea Leaves is weeded out and planted up as well as the adjacent trough planters. The LN stele nearby get s a tidy too, laurel is cut back and some white forget-me-nots and foxgloves put in at its base. Strawberry Camouflage troughs at the entrance gate get redone and their identifying markers and nets put back in place.

 

There is a round of planting out an assortment of last years miscellany of perennial seedlings – lambs tongue in front of the Temple of Baucis & Philomen, acanthus put in by the Seas Sheaves bench and also by the giant decorated capital at the entrance. Verbascum is dotted in amongst the brick columns by the Apollo / Saint Just lararium. There is more light here since the large sycamore came down, so it will be interesting to see what takes, what settles and thrives in place. Heath pearlwort and fringe cups go in around the base of the Golden Head of Apollo where they will hopefully establish and naturalise.

 

Camouflaged supports are put out in the raspberry beds and to hold back rambling roses along the  front garden path. Throughout the garden in various corners ferns uncoil themselves. Primula vulgaris is planted by Man A Passerby, and toadflax ‘Canon Went’ in the Pompeiian garden.

 

The Temple pond is weeded, the first of many times over the coming months, whilst the larger task of clearing the other ponds and lochan looms.

 

Running repairs are made to maintain the water flow over the stone aqueduct and Line Light Lade.

 

The entrance at the car park gets a tidy and the Heraclitus quotation sign put back in place ‘The way up and the way down…’ indicating passage via the stony path to the garden.

 

All of these things mean that we are ready as we can be for the start of a new season, for greeting visitors through the gate to the Fluted Land.