Scented Plants Not to be Sniffed At

How do you chose the best flowers to grow for scent? Well if you want good scent in the home I recommend some flowers below that cut and last in a vase and provide nice scent.

A good idea that failed in my garden this summer involved Petunias. Rather than plant the brash coloured Petunias I thought I would go for some scent and colour coordinated schemes. So I opted for these Lemon F1 plants I bought as seedlings. The idea was to grow Lemon Verbena and Geranium Lemon crispum alongside the petunias for the leaf scent. The weather was not kind to the petunias and they suffered badly in the ground. Those in pots fared better but still did not excel and had no scented plants with them. I like the idea and will try again next year probably with a different combination.

I was tempted to cut the leaves from my hellebore a bit early this year but have decided to wait a bit longer. Here is a selection of 2018 flowers from RHS and my garden.

It has taken a long, hot, dry spell in my Yorkshire garden for me to catch on to the blinking obvious.

Abeliophyllum distichum also called White Forsythia is more refined than traditional yellow Forsythia to which it is distantly related, both being part of the Olive family.

When is a weed not a weed? Well not very often if it is growing in the wrong place. If you have planted Persicaria then that is Knot a weed it is a notweed or not depending on your spelling.

Red, White and Blue the patriotic colours of the Hydrangea are augmented by pinks and purples like H. Ayeshia above as a variation on those themes. Flowering from mid-summer these shrubs give a magnificent display with very little effort. Did you see Hydrangea maritima on seaside holidays in large displays of sugary pink and sometimes blue.

Think before you allow poppies to proliferate. Poppies rob a lot of goodness from your soil.

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I hope my carrots will taste better than the pottery gnome variety. Gonsenheimer have not been grown in my garden before but as they are promoted as crack resistant I thought I would give them a go. The blurb says ‘a bunching variety producing heavy crops of smooth skinned, good flavoures bright orange roots.’  Just about what you need from a packet of Carrot seed. Sown now they can be harvested from end July until December.

It is possible to enjoy gardening without having a traditional garden. Budding new gardeners can get a lot of pleasure and experience from a simple approach to plants and growing.