Winter Flowering Lilies

Well, the weather has certainly changed now for the worse.  Storms are whipping across the countryside and many of my pots have blown over.  I right them and then they are blown over again, so I am leaving them until the weather improves.

Where I live, on the edge of the Fens, unless everything is nailed down, it will get blown away.  This can cause problems it if happens to be an umbrella or something similar which was enjoyed during the summertime but now catches the wind and takes off!  My neighbours' umbrella did just that during one storm and I was very fearful it would land on the glass roof of my greenhouse.  Instead it hit my next door neighbour's satellite dish!  Anyway, no real harm was done but it just reminds us that everything must be put away into a shed or garage and anything that is left outside has to be heavy, like pots full of plants and earth.

A little while ago I received some lily bulbs that I had ordered for next year.  I potted them up so they did not dry out.  To my surprise within a few weeks they had poked their heads through the compost and shortly after that they flowered!  A frost then occurred and you can see below an image of the flowers, covered in frost.  Fortunately this did not harm them and they continued to flower.  Another pot which I planted up slightly later also flowered.  Talk about mixed up crazy plants and seasons!  Still, at least I did not have to put up with the dreaded Lily Beetle.

Unseasonal Weather

For this time of year, the weather here in my part of the country has been very unseasonal.  I am not complaining as this has meant lots of sunshine, dry days and mild temperatures.  As such many of my plants are still flowering.  For example, the cup and saucer vine on my trellis has reached 50 feet in height, is still climbing and has many many flowers.  I look at these each day and see no signs, as yet, of the plant being knocked back by cold weather.  In fact, we probably have only had two frosts so far this year, and they have been mild.

I worked around my dahlia plants, trying to put bulbs into the borders for a spring display, but in the end I decided to cut the dahlias down.  I have used their foliage as well as foliage from plants that have finished for the year to make a deep mulch over the tubers.  I am hoping they will come through the winter.  I have, however, dug up all my Canna Lilies and these are now safely tucked up in the greenhouse.  Last year I left them in the ground and every single one was killed by the terrible winter weather which I must confess I had not seen coming.  Not in a million years did I think we would have one severe winter followed by another.

The plants, like me, are all mixed up.  I have had two strawberry crops this year and in November rhubarb was still producing pullable stems.  I cut my autumn raspberries back, even though they were still producing fruit.  I am trying to get on top of the many jobs that need to be done at this time of the year, or before the weather turns.  I have been busy tidying and pruning.  Grape hyacinths, which always produce their leaves early, have started to bloom, months too early.  I just love their flowers but they are mixed up amongst bedding like Gazannia which I have not yet cleared away because they have not been knocked back by frosts.

I planted some lily bulbs in big pots ready for next season.  To my surprise they poked their noses above the soil within a few days and after a few weeks buds had formed at the end of the stems.  I now have pots full of pink lily flowers!  A number received a light frosting some days ago but they do not appear to have suffered from this experience.  I took a few photographs and I will be uploading these onto my website, image-by-susan shortly.  Please take a look.

I have all my seeds ready for next year.  The majority I collected as freebies from all the gardening magazines I buy every month and some seeds I collected from my garden.  I did buy a number of packets from seed merchants.  I have also ordered my plug plants ready for next year.

I will blog next time about my favourite annual bedding and container plants.

Finally, the photograph above shows my garden in November.  In the distance, across the farmers' fields, there hangs a mist but the sun has managed to break through the cloud covering, giving the flower borders a golden glow.