A walk round the garden this week in between rain and 50mph winds, reveals signs of great hope: buds and bulbs fighting their way to emerge! Amidst the bleak mid-winter, these pops of green are quite simply a joy to behold!
The emerging buds on the Hydrangea macrophylla are always reassuring at this time of year. It’s often a nervous wait from late Autumn until early Spring to see what makes it through the Winter and I always worry about my Hydrangeas. These buds though brought me great excitement this week that come late Summer, we’ll have fabulous blue blooms to adore!
Second of this week’s joys is the emerging Viburnum x bodnantense ‘Dawn’ – isn’t this just a fabulous sight on bare stems? I must try and photograph this as it develops as it’s so pretty.
It’s easy to miss the shoots of bulbs pushing through at this time of year unless you get up close and personal with the garden. I would have missed these Allium stems pushing through from the daily scan of the garden from the window but imagine my delight when I looked closely and discovered these and Daffodil and Gladioli stems peeping through!
Regular readers will know that Lupins make the list of my top six favourite plants and although they are a perennial, I lost a few a couple of years ago as I cut down all the foliage in Autumn and we then had a pretty harsh Winter which killed them off. I now leave the foliage until early Spring to cut back and seeing these emerging leaves this week literally stopped in my tracks! I love Lupins and was literally doing a happy dance when I saw these gorgeous, tiny leaves.
Healthy foliage on the base of the Shasta Daisies promises hope of more stunning, pollinator-friendly flowers this summer. I really want to move all the clumps around the borders but they are so hard to dig out – luckily I love digging!
My final one for this week’s #sixonsaturday is weeds in the borders. I photographed this as it’s always good to know that even when the garden looks dormant, nature is not: if the weeds are growing then it’s all going on under the soil!
Do feel free to me leave a comment on these six as I love to chat about plants and gardening or let me know what is starting to emerge in your garden right now which is giving you signs of hope!
Enjoy reading other #SixonSaturday blogs for information and inspiration as gardeners around the world share six things from their garden on a Saturday. #SixonSaturday is hosted by The Propagator, and you’ll find lots of links on Twitter on the #SixonSaturday hashtag. You can find The Pink Wheelbarrow on Twitter at @PinkWheelbarrow.
The Pink Wheelbarrow 
Good signs of spring. I’ve got a few lupins coming back through but looking to grow some more from seed to bulk out.
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I would have a garden full of lupins, I love them and am gradually increasing their volume year on year!
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They filled a good gap in early summer when most of my bulbs had gone over and other flowers weren’t out.
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I always cut back and get a second later flush which isn’t as prolific but still fabulous!
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The daphne photo is gorgeous. Nearly like an apple blossom. I noticed some of my glads hadn’t died back completely over winter & now, seeing yours, wonder should I cut them back? I’ve never known the glads not to die back. That hydrangea is so darling.
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Gosh you have a lot coming through. No sign of my glads yet.
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I’m another lupin fan. I’ve also noticed the tiny leaves have started to come through. I grew them from seed two years ago, but there were some which died over last winter. I’m not sure why that is. Perhaps they are not a long lived plant in general.
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