Welcome to my blog; after a truly weird weather week that had Monday opening close to a frost and only a max of 9 degrees and fog all day, two days later 24 degrees and gale force winds; the next day 29 degrees and 95% humidity and now back to 20 degrees and perfect conditions. It all makes for an interesting life but is quite hard on plants! After all this weirdness and a longish dry spell many plants are starting to look a little tired. We always try to send out fresh young plants, but as the season progresses naturally these lose a little condition, but don’t worry, after cutting back they will be raring to go.
This is the perfect time to divide and replants water irises like Iris versicolor Mysterious Monique. This is a plant that is mostly out of stock, since every time it is available my stock disappears very fast. It’s dark, luscious and interesting, but not cheap (reminds me of an old girlfriend). We have just divided our stock, they have been cut back ready for planting and I have a few plants available for sale – it’s not hard to grow and will make a great display in up to 10cm of water and full sun. You will have to be patient though and wait until next year for flowers. Water irises, in common with many other Irises, make most of their root growth in the six to eight weeks following flowering, so now is the best time to plant.
I also have some great deals available on white water lilies; most years I sell three white lilies to every one of other colours but for some reason this year everybody has wanted pink or red ones. The result is I have excess stock of Albatross, Hermine and Virginalis, all good sized tubers with plenty of leaves and flower buds at special prices during July.
Don’t forget to sit by your pond for a while and watch the incredible range of wildlife come and go…