THE WEATHER -

A good start to the month, warm with plenty of sunshine. Turning very cold on the 7th and 8th, with strong winds and frequent showers, some of them hail. Continuing sunny but cold for the time of year, with temperatures down to 0°C overnight. A really cold day on the 13th, with strong winds making it feel even colder with frost overnight. A beautiful day on the 15th, warm with blue sky and lots of sunshine. Getting warmer still as the month progressed, with warm and sunny weather at last on the 25th and 26th, with the 27th being the hottest day of the year so far! All change on the 28th though, with cooler although sunny weather and gale force winds which flattened everything not staked, and a few things that were! Calmer weather for the last three days of the month, remaining sunny with a few showers. Maximum temperature 24°C (84°F), minimum temperature minus 2°C (30°F).

I love Tree Peonies (Paeonia suffruticosa), as they have such wonderful flowers, and the leaves are also beautiful, flushed with blue-grey and purple tints when they emerge in spring. They are quite slow growing, taking several years to reach about 4 feet tall. This is one I bought about two years ago, and it has only flowered for the first time this year, and has only borne one flower - but what a beauty!!

Kniphofia or Red Hot Poker, is a plant I wouldn't want to be without. It has great presence in the border, with its linear evergreen leaves, and its wonderful straight poker-like flowers. The flowers are orange, forming a ring of yellow as the individual florets open. This particular plant is very old, being a piece I scrounged from my father's plant over 25 years ago. He had it in his garden for years before that, so I don't know just how old it really is!

I really love Tree Ferns, in fact I have three! They are so beautiful, especially when their fronds begin to unfurl in May, like some prehistoric creature stretching itself....... The unfurling fronds are covered in thick protective hair, which disappears as the frond ages. There is a myth that tree ferns don't form roots, and that their roots are all down the trunk. Well, their roots are all down the trunk, but anyone who has ever grown one of these in a pot and had to repot it will tell you that they certainly do form roots underground! I repotted one of mine this year, and the pot was full of roots!! Where do these stories come from?

May is of course Clematis time! Many of my Clematis are in flower now, and this one is called "Multi-Blue". It's one I bought last year as a very small plant in a 3" pot. Well, it has certainly grown a lot this year, and is covered in beautiful double flowers, perhaps not exactly blue, more bluey-pink really!

Allium "Purple Sensation" is a wonderful plant. It grows practically anywhere, and flowers as well in shade as it does in sun. I have several clumps of this around the garden, and they look wonderful growing up between other plants. The seed heads are lovely too, and very useful to use in flower arrangements, either fresh, when they are green, or fully dried, when they are brown.

That's all for this month...... Happy Gardening!!

Blackbird, Blue Tit, Chaffinch, Collared Dove, Crow, Dunnock, Goldfinch, Great Tit, Greenfinch, House Sparrow, Long-tailed Tit, Magpie, Robin, Rook, Seagull, Starling, Thrush, Wood Pigeon, Wren.

MAYTIME
Ursula Prout

Cool waters murmur as they flow
Beneath the flowering chestnut trees,
While butterflies flit to and fro,
Like petals wafted on the breeze.

Bright sunbeams gild the earth with gold,
The Maytime scene is bathed in light;
Bird-songs resound from glen and glade,
From early dawn to dusk of night.

The quietness of the countryside;
Its beauty and tranquillity,
Acts like a balm upon the heart
In search of true serenity.

So deep a peace pervades the mind;
So many anxious cares take flight,
As through the Maytime days we tread
A world of wonder and delight!