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Sally Nex

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Sally Nex

Tag Archives: scented leaved pelargoniums

This month in the greenhouse: April

21 Tuesday Apr 2015

Posted by sallynex in greenhouse

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

mice, pelargoniums, pests, Potimarron, scented leaved pelargoniums, sowing, squash, Uchiki Kuri

greenhouse1

Heeelp….!! I’m running out of room…

As always in April, there’s a traffic jam in my greenhouse. Outside, the cold frame is jam-packed with evicted seedlings but still they keep coming, as April is second only to March in terms of how much needs sowing yet you’ve still got the tender plants sheltering and taking up space, to say nothing of last month’s seedlings taking their time over growing big enough to go outside in their turn.

Still, so far, so good and there are lots of promising little things going on.

greenhouse2Uchiki Kuri squash seedlings, for instance. Aren’t these lovely fat little things? I do think they’re gorgeous. They’re getting in urgent need of potting on – amazing how quickly five fat squash seedlings can fill a 10cm pot.

It took me a long time to realise that Uchiki Kuri were the same thing as Potimarron – a French squash I’ve grown before and absolutely loved. They taste of chestnuts – a smoky, savoury flavour quite different from ordinary squash. I’m growing these just to make sure that they really are the same thing and not some Japanese upstart imitator (with apologies to the Japanese, who thought this was their heirloom squash and have no doubt been cross with the French ever since).
greenhouse3I have had great success overwintering my little collection of scented-leaved pelargoniums this year: this one is P. quercifolium, with pretty leaves the shape of oak leaves. I took quite a lot of cuttings this spring too as I was potting the parents on and trimming them back in their start-the-season haircut: and most of them have taken, so it’s going to be a bit of a scented-leaved pellies summer. These are going outside to harden off just as soon as there’s space in the cold frame…
greenhouse4And finally I thought it might give you a laugh to see the tip that passes for my potting bench, in one corner of the greenhouse taking up valuable room when actually it ought to be in the shed (but we didn’t get around to building it this winter).

In case you were wondering, the peanut butter is for trapping mice (I keep the last scrapings from our breakfast spread, which is why it’s three pots – only a little in each one).

Three casualties so far in the gardener-vs-whiskery ones skirmish which followed the clandestine savaging of a mangetout pea sowing one night, but it’s all gone quiet again: I even dared to put in the beans a week or so ago and nothing’s gone missing (yet). So I’m hopeful that they’ve learned their lesson and are staying clear.

I do hate trapping mice – it’s far less humane than our feral cat which is my usual control method. But they make it impossible to grow any legumes (or sweetcorn, come to think of it) if you don’t – so I grit my teeth and get on with it. Artemisia leaves laid on the floor of the greenhouse are supposed to keep them off, as is mint – they don’t like the smell, apparently. I’ll give that a try next time – but I’ll keep the traps handy, just in case.

February flowers

15 Tuesday Feb 2011

Posted by sallynex in Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day

≈ 12 Comments

Tags

geraniums, pelargoniums, scented leaved pelargoniums, snowdrops

It’s a bit chilly and rather damp, but the garden is slowly, imperceptibly, filling up with flowers again.

The bulbs are getting my gardening fingers itching: clump after clump of snowdrops has appeared in the long grass and I didn’t even realise they were there. They’ve hung on in the face of decades of neglect (I’m told by my neighbours it’s over 20 years since a gardener lived here): and though I’m also told they aren’t nearly as plentiful as they once were, I’m planning to do something about that. I have visions of sheets of snowdrops underplanted with aconites and cyclamen dancing in my head…

But for now I’m just enjoying what I have. It’s even better in the greenhouse, where the overwintering geraniums are putting on a fabulous show and cheering me up no end (do they ever rest, do you think?) and even my little scented-leaf pretties are shyly unfurling a few petals.

So, in the wind and the rain, I’ve been out today taking a few photos for Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day, hosted by Carol at May Dreams Gardens. Enjoy!

Scents and sensibility

06 Thursday May 2010

Posted by sallynex in Uncategorized

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

pelargoniums, plant fairs, scented leaved pelargoniums

Hold onto your wallets! Plant fair season has begun!

Despite their utterly lethal effect on my bank balance, I can’t resist a good plant fair. I go to all of them: the one at the village hall, the fundraiser at a local garden, and most of all the rare and unusual plant fairs. I don’t often get a proper Rare Plant Fair coming to my neck of the woods apart from the London ones, which almost always seem to happen when I’m nowhere near London. But a very close second are the Plant Heritage plant fairs run by local groups and always packed with choice nurseries from all around the area (and sometimes considerably outside it).

So it was last Sunday when we had a single rainy day amid two weeks of relentless sunshine and that was the day Plant Heritage’s Surrey Group held its plant fair (the first of three! Oh happy days…) There was much sploshing about with umbrellas and dripping hats: the stallholders were stalwart and resolute and Very Very British. And would you believe there was quite a crowd of galosh-wearing gardeners, also being Very British about the weather and shopping like mad.

I’m not allowed to buy any more plants for the garden at the moment. Not that it stops me, but I’m trying not to stock up my borders too much more as it’ll all just have to be dug out again after we sell the house and that will just make me feel guilty.

So I was munging around feeling frustrated when I caught sight of this little corner of an un-named stall.


I am usually a little snobby about pelargoniums. They’re all right, but have something of the granny about them even if they’re in trendy shades of plum purple (the only ones I can bear to have about the place. Or maybe white).

But these, dear reader, aren’t just pelargoniums: these are scented-leaved pelargoniums.

It’s at times like this I wish this were a scratch-and-sniff blog. Take those leaves between your fingers and rub gently. Your fingers will come away redolent of smoky cinnamon; perfumed with the scent of rose-petals; tangy with lemon.

Pelargonium ‘Little Gem’: rose-lemon scents

The flowers are small and delicate and not at all showy, just as I like them: I can even forgive them for being mostly pink. As with most plants which are all about the foliage, they have such very interesting foliage, too.


Pelargonium ‘Crispum Variegatum’: another lemony one
It’s not often I like a variegated leaf, but this is not variegation for the sake of variegation. Small and interestingly crinkled, the leaves give off a spicy citrus scent if you brush past it. This one can apparently be trained to shape: now that might make topiary interesting.


Pelargonium ‘Lara Jester’
I think I like the rose-scented leaves best: they certainly have the sweetest perfume. I covet ‘Attar of Roses’ and one day will find it again: it remains the one that got away after I decided a few years back that a huge plant for just three quid was one too many for the car boot. How wrong can you be.

Other scents are definitely more savoury and might best be described as ‘interesting’ – certainly spicy rather than conventionally perfumed. But one day I shall build up enough plants to pick and dry the leaves for pot-pourri, and then they will come into their own: I dream of lemony P. graveolens, or P. odoratissimum which is said to smell of Granny Smith apples. ‘Prince of Orange’ – does what it says on the tin – ‘Copthorne’ – smells of cedar – and P. dichondraefolium, smelling of black pepper, are close behind.

As it was, I came away with P. ‘Ardwick Cinnamon’ (white flowers, leaves the scent of cakes in autumn), P. ‘Cy’s Sunburst’ (variegated gold with a lemony fragrance) and the intriguingly curly-leaved P. graveolens ‘Bontrosai’, with a perfume of roses. I always said I wouldn’t start collecting plants, but I fear I may have succumbed.

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