Correct handling of flowers refines the personality.
Bokuyo Takeda

I want real flowers, perennials which not only grow and change and die, but also rise again and astonish me.  A garden shouldn't just bloom and look pretty; it should develop like the rest of life. Otherwise it, and we, live only to be spaded under.
Emma L. Roth-Schwartz

People from a planet without flowers would think we must be
mad with joy the whole time to have such things about us.
Iris Murdoch

So plant your own garden and decorate your own soul,
instead of waiting for someone to bring you flowers.
Author Unknown

Living Nature, not dull art
Shall plan my ways and rule my Heart.
John Henry Cardinal Newman

A garden is the mirror of a mind. It is a place of life, a mystery of green moving to the pulse of the year, and pressing on and pausing the whole to its own inherent rhythms.
Henry Beston

We can complain because rose bushes have thorns, or rejoice because thorn bushes have roses.
Attributed to Abraham Lincoln

And 't is my faith, that every flower
Enjoys the air it breathes.
William Wordsworth

I didn't know what narcissism was
until I beheld my own narcissus.
Charles Kuralt

A garden should be in a constant state of fluid change, expansion, experiment, adventure; above all it should be an inquisitive, loving, but self-critical journey on the part of its owner.
H. E. Bates

The world is a rose; smell it and pass it to your friends.
Persian Proverb

Flowers are love's truest language.
Park Benjamin

The rose has thorns only for those who would gather it.
Chinese proverb

To laugh often and much, to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children, to earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends, to appreciate beauty, to find the best in others,  to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch, or a redeemed social condition, to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded.
Ralph Waldo Emerson

Quotes archive

January - This Month

Jobs / Tips

    Don't forget to Wassail your fruit trees on January the 17th.

Wassail the trees, that they may beare,
You many a plum and many a peare,
For more or less fruits they will bring
As you do give them a wassailing.

Robert Herrick1591 - 1674

    The average person consumes about 9000 calories on Christmas day against an average daily requirement of 2000. So maybe we can all make a resolution to work it off in the large gym attached to our house where we keep the plants. Do you have any digging to do? Weeding?

If you do summon up the energy to go out and dig, leave the clods of earth as they fall off the spade, don't bother breaking them up, the frosts will do that for you. Frost isn't all bad.

    Make plans. Consider plants and planting. Put canes or a hose pipe across the garden to mark out planned beds, patios or other features. Then ignore it for a few days, look out of the window and change it all totally if necessary. Planning

    If you've already decided - then get a patio or deck ordered and laid now. You'll certainly get it done quicker and probably also cheaper than later on.  Hard surfaces

   Stay off the grass when it's frosty. It will recover if left to thaw out, but walking on it can damage many of the blades.

    Order seeds and plan what you'll grow from seed this year. I think of this as buying genes for the garden. Perfectly packaged and prepared for growth with all they need to get started. Seeds are natures own genetic technology. If you've never grown anything from seed before, it's one of gardening's greatest wonders.

    Main tree and hedge planting time still. The winter months are the best time to plant any trees and hedging or other bare-rooted shrubs. These are bought bare-rooted from nurseries, this way they will be dormant, but have a more extensive root system than those grown in containers.

Why bother? Why not wait until it's a bit warmer and more pleasant and plant out of containers?

1/    Bare rooted trees and shrubs are cheaper, as little as half the price.

2/     Planting now means that they get off to the best possible start in the spring.

     Plants for January  More...