Valentine Roses

For St Valentine's Day last weekend, my lovely husband bought me two bunches of roses, one pale yellow and the other white.  I'm not a fan of red roses to be honest and the flowers at our wedding were pale yellow and white.

I don't know much about looking after cut flowers but I do seem to have a way with roses.  So often, bought roses end up with drooping heads and don't open up.  It's due to them not being able to take up enough water to stay alive.  Roses have woody stems which means they can only take in water on the cut edge and water can't permeate through the rest of the stem.

Whenever I am given roses, the first thing I do is snip the ends of the stems off as it gives them a fresh, clean edge to the stem.  Secondly, I peel the green of the stems for at least 10cm from the cut bottom edge to reveal the white underneath .  A vegetable peeler is the easiest way to do this.  If you don't want to peel the stems, you could bash them with a rolling pin to crush the stems apart instead.  Either will allow the roses to take up more water.

No doubt other people will have all sorts of top tips.  I'm sure I have heard of plunging cut flowers into iced water and adding aspirin to their water.  I always add the plant food that comes with the flowers and keep the water level above the peeled area of the stems.   I also change the water at least once a week.

As you can see from the photo, a week after St Valentine's Day the roses are still going strong and smell gorgeous.  The majority have opened up and there isn't a droppy head in sight.  One other tip would be to keep them in a cool spot if possible.  Above all, just enjoy them!

Blooming Marvellous!

At this time of year there really isn't much to get over excited about in the garden - well, if you live in the UK anyway.  One plant you can always rely on though is an Amaryllis which you can grow indoors.  I get given a bulb every Christmas and they never fail to put on a show.  The plants are native to South Africa and are commonly called Naked Ladies.

Needless to say, I have chucked the box away, so I have no idea what the variety of the one I am growing is.  It's the best one I have grown to date though.  They are so easy to grow, the bulbs come with a pot and some compost, so all you need is to add is some water. The plants seem to literally grow overnight.  You turn your back on them and they have grown another inch!  My Amaryllis went from bulb to two flowering stems with nine flowers, measuring about 50cm tall, in about four weeks.

The only advice I would give is to make sure you support the plant with sticks early on.  The weight of the flowers can cause the plant to toppel over as it is so top heavy.  Last year I forgot to support it and during the night another flower opened causing the plant to fall over and snap in two.  The plant kept flowering stuck in a glass of water but it didn't look quite the same somehow!

Gardening Calendars

If you are anything like me you won't have the first idea about when to sow anything.  Last year, I went to the garden centre on a whim and decided to try and grow potatoes for the first time.  I was obviously far too late as practically all the seed potatoes had gone and I ended up buying six small and wrinkley potatoes that were already starting to sprout tubers.

I didn't even have anything to plant them in and had to hastily buy some potato barrels for them.  They turned out rather well, with no help from me.  The largest potato was bigger than my fist and that was with me forgetting to water them most of the time!

Anyway, I can't remember the variety (they were red potatoes) and I can't even remember when I bought the see potatoes and planted them.  (You can see why I am now writing a blog for myself!)  I suddenly realised what I needed was a quick access gardening calendar.  I could trawl through my gardening books but sometimes you want a quicker answer.

A quick search on the internet and I found Garden Action's website.  It is perfect!  A real mine of information, including the all important vegetable gardening calendar.  According to that, I am fine for now but need to plant my potatoes in March.  All I need to do now is remember!

If you want to take a look at the site, the link is http://gardenaction.co.uk .

Walter Wagtail

I have a single Wagtail who visits my garden most days. I've no idea if it is male or female but I shall assume it is a lonely male in search of a mate. I'm probably completely wrong and it is a very happily single female!

Anyway, I find him quite entertaining as he struts around the garden. You can see why they are called Wagtails with their tail feathers bobbing up and down with every step. Their little spindly legs amuse me too, as well as their heads jerking backwards and forwards.

Watching the bird at the weekend suddenly reminded me of a rhyme my father used to say to me when I was small. I would sit on his lap and he would say, "Walter, Walter Wagtail sat upon a wall. Walter, Walter Wagtail fell down the hole!" As my father said the word "hole", his legs would part and I would drop down the gap. My father would be holding me under my arms to stop me hitting the floor though. He would then pull me up and say the rhyme all over again. I used to shriek with laughter as he would delay the moment he said "hole", so that I never quite knew when I would drop.

At the weekend, Mr Wagtail was sat on my fence posing for ages. What you don't realise from the photo is that he was actually having a Mexican standoff with my cat Dylan who had decided to sit on the patio by the bread I had thrown out there. Dylan, bless him, was convinced the birds wouldn't spot him sat there. It was so cold, he soon gave up and came back indoors though, leaving the birds to their breakfast.