The Only Way Is Up?

The Sicilian Honey Garlic has gone from a floppy mophead,,,

                          15th June

.....to a quiver of arrowheads.

26th June

Something else with ascending flowers is the foxglove.

It has been dry for several weeks but now, with three days of intermittent rain, lots of plants will be putting on a spurt of growth. 

 

Halfway to Paradise

 

Allotments are anomalous.  Neither country nor town but a bit of both.  Some of the most dramatic displays are accidental.

These flowers are probably scorzonera (Scorzonera hispanica) in its second year, although "World flora" thinks rough hawksbeard (Crepis bienis) is more likely.

They are also a halfwayhouse for plants that wouldn't fit into a small town garden but can be given room here. Lysmaachia punctata, Large loosestrife can be a bit of a bully in an ornamental border, but has found a place on the bank of the burn where it can outcompete the geraniums and nettles. Did it get here as a garden escapee or was it given a helping hand?

Now here was a nice surprise in the corner of a neighbour's plot.  I couldn't resist taking a snap to identify it as Jerusalem sage (Phlomis fruticose) when I got home.  You would need a lot of space to fit this into a garden planting plan.  Maybe it was a garden reject or maybe it just appeared and was tolerated. 

There's a lot more going on at allotment sites than the formal rows of vegetables, and the place is a lot richer for it. The pollinators are definitely in favour of a more laissez faire approach.

Bee Magnets

 The garden is just buzzing today. Some bees have latched onto the new Buddleja globosa as if they are trying to eat them like marshmallows

A surprise to me was the attraction of the Stachys byzantina for this bee.

But top attraction for weeks now has been Cotoneaster horizontalis.

Allium Purple Sensation has an undeniable appeal for the bees as well as the human eye.

Just as the foxglove which is a more conventional source of attraction.

Also in contention for novel source of nectar is another allium, Nectaroscordium. (The name is a giveaway)

Even more common or garden plants like sage put on an enticing display just now.

Also in the herb patch is humble allium chives 

And still to come into full flower Pyrocantha.  Those bees won't know which way to fly first!

Wild Wild Flowers

Here's the current state of play  in the wildflower meadow:

Yellow is still the order of the day, but these are mostly  buttercups now instead of dandelions.

There is some white too with the cow parsley

White clover

And white, so called 'sea campion'

The oxeye daisies, red campion and sorrel deserve a mention too.

And then there are the beneficiaries for whom the garden has been created.  Happily they are much in evidence.

 

Here Comes The Summer

 

Broad beans flowering, runner beans planted, salads setting off.

Brassicas putting on a spurt, onions and carrots on the go.

It won't be long before the garlic is ready for harvesting.  The potatoes have been mounded.

One crop currently in full flower: blackberries. The bees are loving it.

The blueberries flowered earlier but are fruiting up nicely.  

After a cold miserable spring we seem to have flipped to a hot dry summer at the end of May. Whoopee!