Soon the Tuis will be here en masse

The first of the flowering cherries is just bursting into flower so Spring can’t be far off. Tuis love the nectar in the flowers of the cherry blossom and they will arrive and fight over the best place to sit and gorge on the nectar. It is always a delight and it amazes me that if I go our with washing to hang on the line they virtually ignore me. But if I go out with my camera, they suddenly become very cagey.

The days have certainly lengthened but the weather remains wet and cold. We always seem to get colder weather after the Winter solstice. It wouldn’t be so bad if there was more sun but many days are overcast and bleak which makes it seem colder than the temperature says.

I still have lots to do in the garden with cutting back. You can see in the foreground of this photo the hydrangea heads have not been cut off since last summer. That has to do with how miserable it has been to be out in the garden. The few reasonable days I have spent adding mulch to the garden, trimming the buxus and weeding the garden under the kitchen window - where the heucheras are. I love the colourful leaves of the heucheras and I bought a new on out, wild rose, so I weeded that garden to plant the new one out there. I always look for heucheras that I buy that have more than one head so I can divide the plant and get two for one. As the name suggests this one is a deep pinky colour in the leaves.

While I do have spots of flowering annuals/perennials I tend to look more for foliage plants these days as they give a longer bang for the buck and create areas with their contrasting textures and shapes that are less work and more pleasure.