Titanarum

Bulbs, what are they like? Wonderful. My freesias are going like the clappers. Yes, I planted them three months early. Yes, they are placed on a south facing windowsill with a radiator below. Yes, they are reaching for the sky growing taller by the minute. But who wants stocky freesias? Isn’t slim, fragile elegance what freesias should be about. And scent, of course. I am yet to find out about the truthfulness of the product description. It did say ‘intensely fragrant’ and being a trusting soul I believe what I read. The written word has authority, in my book. So to speak. It is easy to rubbish writers as Wikipedia addicted, cut and paste merchants. But I don’t go along with that. Writing is a noble profession, and copy writers are no exception. And as for the explosion of text and images thanks to internet and cable tv, doesn’t that just show how far we have come? Billions more can read and write now. Let’s think back to the time when scribes had to copy each word on a piece of vellum, just before Gutenberg’s wonderful invention of moving type in 1455, and count our blessings. Anyway, back to the bulbs. My freesias will not disappoint. And if they do they’ll share the fate of that horrid hyacinth on which I wasted so much energy. (See picture).

Garden Monkey, a blog new to me until recently, has moved. Go visit. You never go wrong with a monkey. 

Here’s for all you arty types.

Imagine this: A square lawn of neatly cut grass enclosed on two sides by a curved hedge of purple blood beech no higher than the average adult chest. To the back the front of a contemporary house built from white painted brick. To the left a wooden trellis supporting a sweetly scented honeysuckle and a rambling pink rose (also scented). A young mimosa rises from a cut out circle in the lawn. Lime green columnar cypresses on either side of the dark wood door. I want that. And some other person has it. Just down the road some fancy garden architect has built this garden and a very lucky woman who lives in the house tends it. My jealousy is acid green. There’s something about the pink roses and the blood beech which is totally irresistible. And when those bluish tones are placed near lime green, the beauty of the combination arrests the eye. Meanwhile I’m growing mould on the window sill. I’m also trying to grow freesia bulbs in the propagator but my house is badly insulated and the radiator beneath is emitting heat so fierce my hair frazzles if I sit anywhere near it. The freesias don’t have a chance and still I try. I never give up, me.

Can’t help it. The propagator is now on the window sill. Against all advice. Well, nearly. Been searching the net for info on what I can start growing this time of year and the results, dire as they are, do reveal that ageratums are up for it in December/January in a temperate climate. Ageratums, dontchahatem?! Little poodles of lilac fluff with nothing to say for themselves. Low growing, ugly things smelling of nothing. Who’d want to grow something like that? Judging from the number of cultivars available, quite a few people. The kinds who put them in beds with busy lizzies, pansies and French marigolds, no doubt. Or place them in hanging baskets, where they sit rigid as rigor mortis, among trailing lobelias and fuchsias. I despair. Fortunately ageratums are slow to germinate and tend to suffer from powdery mildew. But that doesn’t stop some people from fussing over them and keeping what should be dead, alive. There are alternatives, apparently: exhibition onions and leeks. Yeah, right. Hmmm. The only plant I feel like planting right now is, surprise surprise, freesia. My packet of bulbs will go in this morning, ready or not. The instructions tell me March. Under cover. How do they know? I’ll show ‘em.

Anyone for freesias? I love ‘em. Sweet scented, delicate, elegant flowers, freesias. Was lucky enough to find a pale lilac bunch reduced to £1 yesterday. Cut flowers have become a new passion of mine lately. Can’t seem to stop looking for them and bringing them home. They’ve probably been grown in Kenya. Is it bad to buy flowers that are flown in from other countries? Is it ethical to feed a demand for an industry that requires irrigation in places where drought occurs? I should have asked myself all those questions when stood in the shop. The reality is that I didn’t even look at the labels. All that mattered was the scent and the colours and the price. It could have been grown in a greenhouse on Greenland and I wouldn’t have known or cared. Until now, when the packaging is at the bottom of the bin. Me, me me, I guess. Or just not knowing whether the people who plant, grow, harvest and package the freesia bulbs, have a better quality of life as a result of that industry and the wages it affords. Mind you, I never buy flowers unless there’s something wrong with them. That’s not feeding a demand. That’s caring.

No milk for my coffee when I got up (blame: man with munchies hitting the cereals), so had to get some. Our nearest shop is 10 minute’s walk away if you shoot through the very narrow, ill lit, heavily littered alley connecting the low rise estate I’m on and the open prison.
The alleyway gained notoriety a few years back when a prisoner due for release was killed there early in the morning. The shot to the head had been silenced so they reckon it was a professional job. The victim was a former IRA man and revenge for blabbing doesn’t seem unthinkable. The whole area was turned into a crime investigation scene with no go taped areas and everybody getting a visit from Scotland Yard. Very exciting. The perpetrator is still around, to my knowledge, but unlikely to kill me as I’m only blabbing to my friends and not about anything important.

Anyway, that was the alley I walked through to get to the corner shop. Elated I listened to the birds and felt the gentle misty rain on my skin. Past the open prison it got busier. A paper boy, a road cleaner, lots of cars heading for Ham gate into Richmond Park. One man was running to get the bus into Kingston. I strolled, happy as a bee on a fat flower.

A van load of horse manure arrived yesterday. A steaming mixture of straw and compacted poo it smells of ammonia, an aroma I find strangely attractive. Already half of it has gone. A small number of allotment holders can’t get enough of the stuff. I’m usually among them but as I’ve hit a phase of intense laziness I’m leaving it for the others this time. We will hopefully get another load in the spring. But spring is the worst time to spread it, especially the freshly produced stuff. Manure shouldn’t be used until it has rotted down. And that usually takes at least a year. I just bung it on. Despite my erroneous ways my raspberries, in particular, keep on going, setting large and tasty fruit long into September. One of my neighbours has been growing runner beans in pure fresh manure trenches all his life. And they certainly don’t suffer. And let’s not forget the Victorians, who used the stuff to keep cold frames warm enough to grow produce in the winter. But according to text books on the subjects using the stuff before it has rotted down properly releases the wrong sorts of nutrients in the wrong amounts. Deary me.

Plants have eyes too. That’s right.

Land of Milk, Honey and Free Money - There could be mileage in this one.