Hello and welcome back to my blog! Today’s post is a shorter one, sharing some of the potting on I have been doing in my greenhouse during the colder days recently. Enjoy!
Oriental lilies
If you read my blog regularly, you’ll recall that I have an oriental lily (‘Stargazer’) currently in a pot. Here it was flowering last year:
This was a lily that I bought a number of years ago, when all the outdoor space the Mr and I had in a former property was a little balcony that I grew tomatoes, cosmos, sweet peas, the oriental lily and a peony on.
This lily lived in a large old horse water bucket that had a split in the bottom. I brought this lily with me when the Mr and I moved. Last year, the lily was unfortunately struck with lily beetle:
I suspect the lily became vulnerable to the lily beetle due to the droughts we experienced last Summer, which caused stress to the plant. I had planned to plant out the lily in the ground, which would make it less likely to be attacked by pests, but I kept changing my mind on where to put it.
One major concern I had was how toxic lilies are for cats and we have a number of cats visiting our garden. At the moment, the large pot means the lily is lifted away from visiting cats (and they haven’t bothered with it). I’m not sure the same would be true if the lily was planted in the ground.
I have therefore decided I will be moving this lily and nine additional oriental lilies into The Fruit Cage, where they can safely bloom, but be kept away from any cats. I will be planting them together to create an impactful display.
I got a good offer on twelve oriental lily bulbs recently and I potted them up in pots for now, as I haven’t yet started my planting plans for The Fruit Cage this year:
The lilies will be moved up to The Fruit Cage in the coming weeks and eventually planted in their final position.
Agapanthus ‘Queen of the Ocean’
I also potted up ten agapanthus in two large terracotta pots that the Mr and I were recently given:
These have been put on the patio in The Honeysuckle Nook, to join another agapanthus I have had for a few years. I planted multiple ‘Queen of the Ocean’ agapanthus in each pot to restrict their roots to encourage flowering and to hopefully give an impactful display.
Star jasmine (Trachelospermum asiaticum) ‘Pink Showers’
The final plant I am looking after in the greenhouse are four new star jasmines. These are the first evergreen jasmines in the UK that have a pink flower.
As always with jasmine, their intoxicating fragrance will float through the garden and scent the air. Jasmine is one of my favourite scents!
The jasmine will be planted out in Spring in The Window Boxes, the first bed of which I introduced in my last blog post:
There will be two star jasmines planted on the ends of each bed. They will be trained to grow up the back wall and around the windows on both sides. By planting the jasmines against the wall, they will be sheltered from cold winds and they will receive some warmth from the wall releasing its heat. In the evening, the heat from the wall will naturally help release the fragrance oils from the jasmine.
Before the jasmines can planted out, the Mr and I will need to fix the support system on the wall for each jasmine.
That’s all for today. We’re experiencing some very cold temperatures here at the moment, so I will be taking a break from progressing major projects in the garden when it is especially cold. Spring is well on the way though, and it won’t be long until the temperature starts warming up again!
The Charming Nook 
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