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Wordless Wednesday - overwintering ladybird

January 30, 2019

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Product Review - Gro-Sure Smart Ground Cover

I was asked a few weeks ago if I wanted to trial some Gro-Smart Ground Cover, which is made by Westland. I hesitated a little before agreeing as I am not someone who generally mulches areas of the garden. One look at my weed population will confirm this but I do like to have self-seeders and mulches will keep them controlled as well as the weeds. After some thought I realised that it could be really useful in my vegetable borders where I do want to restrict self-seeders from colonising. A short time later a bag duly arrived.
The first thing I noticed is that it is incredibly light. I braced myself to lift the bag and it was really easy to lift.

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So goodbye lavender edge......

Let me rewind to 2007 when the front garden looked like this:
I declared this front garden boring and decided a knot garden was what it needed. I sometimes wonder if I should have left well alone. Yes it was dull, but the front garden seems to have been a constant battle I have never really won. I could just have mown it once a fortnight, yet that was just not what I wanted to do.
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A plant reminder of a good day out

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Last year I went to the plant fair at Felley Priory with gardening chum and we wandered around the garden oohing and aaahing at the various plants. One plant that caught our eye was Pulmonaria rubra 'Rachel Vernie'. It has this wonderfully bright fresh green leaves with a narrow margin of cream/white around the edges. The variegation is nicely subtle and it adds to the feeling of light.
The flowers are a good clear red, I would call them scarlet. This is a seriously good looking plant. We stood and admired this plant and both made a note of the name. At this point I confess I did pretty much forget about it. I would have remembered had I been pulmonaria shopping at some point, but it drifted into that c…

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