The Fight Back

On a beautifully sunny morning like this morning I can almost forget the losses caused by this harsh winter – an Acer, a hardy Hibiscus, a very pretty Coleonema, and as time goes on there will be more no doubt. But on the plus side, it may be that fewer nuisance bugs have made it through, at least that is what I am firmly, if not foolishly, hoping.

On a lighter note, the snowdrops I thought the builders had “done for” have actually survived, bless their tiny hearts and have struggled up through the compacted soil that surrounds the new patio. Every year I plant snowdrops “in the green” or at this time of year from purchased pots, but they have never succeeded in naturalising. My ex-neighbour of some years ago had great clumps of them (destroyed by the current incumbents unfortunately) and I cannot understand why mine don’t go forth and multiply. Is my soil so different? – too cold, too poor; there’s no evidence of squirrels. We do get the odd one, but they don’t stick around for long – not if I have anything to do with it, so I can’t blame them – I need to do more research.

My faithful winter jasmine is blooming and has been for some time alongside fabulous yellow mahonia, the winter heathers are staging a defiant come-back and the sweet box, though unspectacularly adorned, smells amazing – oh, and I found a solitary Vinca flower hunkered down beneath the protecting herringbone branches of Cotoneaster Horizontalis, also a worthy survivor.

The delicate petals of winter pansies, though buried for a couple of weeks beneath the snow, pelted with rain, frozen solid, thawed, then frozen solid again, and again, and again, have survived intact and confound even the most optimistic of gardeners.

The snow-melt and torrential rain have confirmed my annual mud patches and once more I’m slipping and sliding along what is left of the lawn. Not being a lawn person, the state of it most benefits the starlings and I am happy enough with that, since it only provides for me, a path around the bottom of the garden and the pond.

I visit the garden most days, not to work, it’s far too cold and inclement, but to watch and to wait, and to do what every gardener has done for centuries – look forward.