14th May | The Garden Diary

FJW 1955-2007

CHW 2015-

JCW 1897-1939

CW 1940-1955

2025 – CHW
Unlike our other big clump which was cut down to reshoot; Azalea kaempferi by Donkey Shoe is splendid.

Magnolia ‘Charlie Coates’ by George’s Hut. The usual drooping branches but the first time this one has flowered properly.

Rhododendron ‘Van Nee Sensation’ beside it.

Magnolia laevifolia ‘Michelle’ is a small flower but more yellow in bud than some other forms.

Rhododendron yunnanense virtually leafless as usual at this time of the year.

Azalea ‘Maja’.

Celtis tetandra getting away.

Magnolia ‘Maxine Merrill’ growing in full sun.

2024 – CHW
A day photographing 50 Veteran trees which we have to help as part of our new Woodland Management grant.Symphoricarpos cut down on the lawn to get rid of all the ivy.

Just a few tiny bits of the ancient Rhododendron russatum survive in the Rockery.

Berberis amurensis var. latifolia (BSWJ 8539) is not much of a flowerer above the Lower Rockery. You have to look hard to find the odd flower from the stem. Planted in 2011.

Jack Tidball’s wedding tent on Beach Meadow.

Primula japonica ‘Miller’s Crimson’ outside my office window.

Gorgeous new leaves on Fagus sylvatica ‘Pendula Aurea’.

Viburnum burejaeticum flowering here for the first time.

Azalea kaempferi just coming out at Donkey Shoe.

Halesia macgregorii is now out.

A really dead 25-35 year old ash tree at the bottom of Old Park.

We have finally got two (out of three) Crinodendron hookerianum ‘Ada Hoffmann’ to flowering size in Old Park at the second attempt.

A decent clump of new rhododendrons in Old Park but the mapping of new planting form Jaimie’s handwritten notes has not yet quite got this far.

Azalea ‘Berryrose’ very fine on the top part of the drive today.

Rhododendron ‘Winsome’ is quite some show further down the drive.

The huge clump of Rhododendron ‘Sappho’ in 40 Acres is looking as good as ever.

Very few broadleaved elms have survived, still less produced their ‘rabbits money’ seeds.

A cloud of shedding alder seeds covers a puddle in white down and seedheads.

One of the digger moved camellias is showing signs of settling in with new growth.

In the wooded belt at the top of the Inner park I watched a squirrel munching his way through sycamore flowers. The ground was covered in nibbled flower tassels.

2023 – CHW
Jaimie supplied the flowers for St Just in Roseland Church’s Coronation Celebrations (as well as Caerhays). Here is how St Just looked.

With single purple-red flowers this lilac in Monica Trudgeon’s garden is, I think, Syringa vulgaris ‘Charles X’. Not a named variety which I have come across before.

I had not seen John Whitehead, the former keeper and farmer at Summer Lodge, for 27 years. His granddaughter, Rebecca flew him down to Newquay as his Christmas present and they stayed in the Rabbit Warren.

A self-sown seedling of Aesculus wilsonii which had, unusually, escaped the mice.

2022 – CHW

More new things leafing up and flowering.

Magnolia sieboldii ‘Michiko Renge’ – a M. sieboldii seedling selected by Todd Gresham in 1961 in Japan.

Beside it Magnolia sieboldii ssp. sinensis which is not as large or well coloured as our original M. sinensis.

Magnolia ‘Silk Road’ with a single flower (M. tripetala x M. tripetala x M. obovata).

New growth on the newly planted Rhus punjabensis.

Carpinus x schuschaensis (C. betulus x C. orientalis) introduced by Roy Lancaster in 1972. It is making a decent tree in Kennel Close.

New pinkish leaves as impressive as ever on Quercus bushii ‘Seattle Trident’.

Sorbus alnifolia nicely covered in flower.

Sorbus japonica just coming out. A real show to come.

x Sorbopyrus auricularis (Pyrus communis x Sorbus aria) flowering here for the first time. A peculiar mix but both parents recognisable. A rare and not especially interesting collector’s item.

First time flowering that I remember of Crataegus grandiflora. Huge flowers and well named. This large growing species is from [?]. (Again the reference book does not mention this species).

A young Acer sterculiaceum subsp. franchettii with leaf colouring as on our original tree.

2021 – CHW
Lots of showers – all good!A young Quercus rubra ‘Aurea’ in leaf. Two others newly planted in Kennel Close succumbed to last summer’s drought.

Quercus franchetii with new growth and flower showing. We trimmed this tree last year to shape it up as it had a hefty secondary leading branch.

Another of our surviving Rhododendron royalii hybrids is out – this time a yellowish form.

Labelled Enkianthus chinensis this is much more like the superb Enkianthus deflexus. Labelled wrongly I believe when comparing it to other deflexus.

Magnolia ‘Green Bee’ now full out.

We have seen buds before on Eucalyptus crenulata, but this is the first time I have actually seen flowers.

View 14th May 1897 – 2020

One thought on “14th May”

Georg Ruf says:

6th January 2024 at 1:38 pm

’16. 05.14 We have many, some dozen Davidia in different places. Davidia germinates with us in moist sites with good soil along temporary brooks, but grows slowy in shade. On dry sites upgrowth of seed is rare, but happens. There trees often shed a lot or most of their leaves in dry summers, that means every second. I transplanted two dozen of small, self-sown two to four year old plants on more apropriate sites.
Cephalotaxus harringtonii self-sows on moist sites also a lot (hundreds) and much too tightly, only sparsely on dry and stony sites, but even there plants grow up. They are very resistant against drought and grow on nevertheless. This conifers also resist snow-burden and wind and retain their shape; so they might be usefull as a windscreen.

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