Frary's Fresh Flowers

Up here in Aberdeen the first roses of the year (in my garden at least) has come out. It's on a small bush at the back of one of the half barrels. It's peachy (colourwise) and around the size of a small egg.

Last week at the botanical gardens in Dundee the roses were all out and many were starting to fade. Dundee is only 60 miles south of Aberdeen but it seems to be much warmer - more tropical - they had Yucca trees outside in flower!.They had Rosemary plants on North walls thriving! (More to come on that) It was almost like being back in Tenerife (well if I was totaslly drunk it might have been). In fact the weather yesterday was hot all day and I got sunburn for the first time in maybe 6 years - in Aberdeen! (Last time was Rome and that was seriously scorching)... where was I... weather - today was warm and overcast - perfect planting out weather so I spent the day doing the fuchsia cuttings in the morn in the greenhouse then the dusty millers, verbascums and gentians into the garden in the early afternoon... but more on that another time - roses - yeah - Dundee- afraid the picture was a little blurred so not up to usual standards. This was the nicest rose I saw in the botanical gardens.

So how is our rose garden doing... um - out of 18 roses (for under £50 in total) only 1 has kicked the proverbial and become just an expensive twig. The others aren't really throiving yet but that is because it is their first year and it takes a year before shrubs bed in. All (except the one) are showing some signs of growth so we are still hopeful of a good (cheap) rose garden - though of course I never promised Jiurie a rose garden.
This is truely a rose garden not a scrappy patch of ground.

And now we are going to take the son't dog (Arthur - golden retriever) out for a walk so I can spy on the local gardens and see if anyone else has got any roses out. Watch this space

It turns out that many of my favourite plants are biennials - there's teasel, great mullein and foxgloves. They are all large plants between 4 feet and 7 feet tall typically, with copious tiny seeds, thick stems and thick leaves.

As predicted the foxgloves in the front have turned our moss garden into a veritable glade of wonder. They are all self seeded from half a dozen plants put in 3 years ago - one of the first purchases from B&Q when we moved in. wild-type pink ones but they didn't seem to do as well.) White is certainly the dominant colour for this year.
By the by in the picture below my wife isn't pixie sized (though she is only 5ft 2) it's just that I shot through the flowers of course.

The photo doesn't really do the garden justice - the greenery gets lost in the background and the white flowers get lost in the white walls of our cottage. Actually it is two cottages made into one - which is a bit greedy of us really but that was how it came. It is particularly greedy as we don't have any kids living with us at the moment (though the Graduate will be here from tomorrow until she gets a real job). To think that this place probably housed maybe a dozen people at one time and now it is just Jiurie most of the time. Makes you think really. Not sure what it makes you think but it does make you think.
Anyhowthe foxgloves have not only soread downwind from the original plants they have managed to spread upwind a little bit too so that they are starting to grow under the trees too.

The flowers themselves are attracting a lot of bees - both honey and bumble - and the flowers are well shaped for the bees to crawl up inside for the nectar while tiny hairs inside the flower scrape at their backs and wings. I only noticed the fine hairs when I took a photo of a wild-type purple flower but unfortunately it doesn't show up too well in the blog photo. Time for a scan maybe (tomorrow). The white flower definitely doesn't show the hairs clearly.

Apologies friends - there has been almost a week without a post. That is mainly because we attended our 2nd youngest's daughters' graduation in Dubdee, then satayed a day in Galsgow (where our youngest is studying) and then met my parents in Greenock (they are on a N Europe Cruise... why would anyone want to stop in Greenock?) and took them down the coast to Largs and then across the water (on the ferry) to the isle of Cumbrae for fish and chips at Millport.
There will be a few photos coming up - we went to the botanical gardens in Dundee to take pre graduation photos - kind of like people do for weddings - and had a nice day out.

Then today I spent half the day tackling the jungle that summer has brought on. The grass has riotted between the daffodil leaves - they all got the lawn mower treatment today, while the buttercups have tried to overrun the strawberry patch and others in the rabbit-fenced allotment - they got the pull and twist treatment today, while over the fence the willowherbs, the nettles and the docks have tried to reclaim the wilderness from the potqatoes, the comfrey and the fruit-trees - they all got the machette treatment (cane knife treatment) thought the nettles fought back soo that I can still feel my right hand tingle as I type8 hours later, whuile the cane knife tried to take the top off my middle left finger as I had over sharpened it with the whet stone.

So it has all been go followed by a few hours at the beach with the son's dog trying to get him to swim out to the seals at the mouth of the River Ythan.

But back to the garden. Where do I begin - the fuchsias rampant, the fuchsia cuttings - most have taken!!!, the foxgloves - a real swathe of white and pink forming a wildlife glade, the dreaded Giant Hogweeds threatening the river bank, the basket tomatoes - we have a few fruits growing, the seedlings in the greenbhouse - half still alive, half dead, the dusty miller sedlings are growing great, the seedlings in the incubator - doing great - unplugged them and put into greenhouse (still in incubator) and they baked to oblivion in only 4 hours AAAAAAGHHHHH- the pollarded rowans, the rose garden (or lack of) or the biggest and best revelation of all the lupins.

Lupin hill is a real mass of colour. They have absolutely run riot these last two months. There are only 5 plants but they have each formed a huge great bush of colour.

There are lupins along the sides of just one cutting between Aberdeen and Dundee- just south of Stratcoe - and I saw them blooming again this year - much wider dispersal along the cutting but each still looks like just the one stalk to one plant. I didn't get a picture but should have done. It was this bank that inspired me to put our lupins on the bank. They are just at the one cutting and none of the others - on both sides of the road so I am fairly sure that they must have been planted deliberately otherwise why would it be only on othis one cutting.
At the Tesco's roundabout in Ellon there are also one to two dozen lupins appearing this year. I don't remember seeing them before and they are all widely separated - maybe 1 p lant every 2 metres or so with just the one spike each (so probably either first or second year spike) so I think that they two were planted. When the graduate daughter gets home with car #2 I will pop up there and get some piccies. There are also some purple orchids further along the bank and they must be natural dispersal as I can't imagine the road-people planting those (apologies if I am wrong).

I would type a big long post about roadside plants but my shoulder is sore from swinging the cane knife, my arm tingles from the nettles and my finger hurts from the cut so I'm a physical wreck after only one day in the garden - so much for being a professional - the old hands would laugh at me and call me soft (as I am) but I will get harder so that by the time I go back to Libya in 2 weeks time I'll be a finely tuned instrument ready to go soft again.

Home time - I'm on my way - almost - from misery to happiness today and I'll actually arrive back in the light instead of the dark so I can take a good look round the garden before I even get to go inside. Normally I have to look round under the security lights and can only really check to see if the plants are still there or if the bunny mowers have taken them. I then have to wait until the next morning (usually late as I love sleeping late when I'm back in the big (super king) sized double bed that is still warm in the morning. This isn't a good trait for a gardeners as we are supposed to be up at the crack of dawn but I'm afraid I'm a night owl - always have been, always will be.... till I have to make my living at it.) to go out and check the damage from pests/weeds.

Jiurie tells me that she wants to be a full time gardener now - we have a convert! - and that she's been keeping up with the weeding. Also she's been moving plants in and out of the greenhouse (though she did get the hardening off the wrong way round for a few night - plants in the garden during the day in the greenhouse during the night - not the other way round). I'm expecting the garden to be like something out of "Better Homes and Garden" but I know that it more likely to be like something out of Mad Max - especially over the fence where the giant hogweeds are gaining a hold in their battle against the nettles , the docks, the willowherb and the nightshade. But hope springs eternal and I'm sure that it will be a restful three weeks in the sun with barely a kiss of rain (except when planting out) with all my fuchsia cuttings springing up (90:10 odds that they are all rotted), my pricked out seedings standing straight and true, my seeds in the propagator lush and strong and all's well with the world.

At Casa Frary

it'll be

and

not

and

Today is Father's day in the uk so I treated myself to some seeds on behalf of my on and daughters - I'm sure they would have bought them for me if I'd been in the UK.

Thompson and Morgan sweopt the boards at the RHS online survey so they've got 10% off until tomorrow and then all of these seeds are on sale at 3 for the price of 2. I've got 10 pakets for a tenner including the postage- though I'm not sure how they worked out that 4 packets were free and not 3 were free but I'm not going to argue with them.
Description Value
1 Helenium puberleum Autumn Lollipop - 1 packet Price each: £1.49 1.49
1 Love-in-a-Puff giganteum - 1 packet Price each: £1.49 1.49
1 Lychnis chalcedonica Dusky Salmon - 1 packe Price each: £1.49 1.49
1 Paulownia tomentosa Imperialis - 1 packet Price each: £1.49 1.49
1 Polemonium pauciflorum Silver Leaf Form - 1 packet Price each: £1.49 1.49
1 Saponaria ocymoides - 1 packet Price each: £1.49 1.49
The following products have been made free of charge
# Description Value
1 Harebell - 1 packet Price each: £0.00 0.00
1 Bupthalmum speciosum - 1 packet Price each: £0.00 0.00
1 Cacti & Succulents : Sedum Rock Garden Mixed - 1 packet Price each: £0.00 0.00
1 Edible Flowers : Viola x wittrockiana Sugared Almonds - 1 packet Price each: £0.00 0.00
Subtotal of items 8.94
Discount 0.89
P&P 1.99
TOTAL £10.04

As I said yesterday my parents didn't push me to do anything in fact I didn't really have much of a relationship with my own dad - he was working shifts and then we didn't really hang out together when work and school breaks did coincide. None of the men in the Frary family are talkers (except when drunk) and we were raised in the Victorian manner of not talking at the table at meals. That is one of the few things I regret about my childhood - that we never really talked at the tables (in fact we rarely had family meals when i was growing up that I remember) and I still find it very difficult to talk while I'm eating. - read yes, but not talk. I wish i could like the Rotumans do but when I was growing it was always - "No talking at the dinner table". Hopefully I haven't passed that on to my weeuns too much (though I suspect I have a bit).
I only remember going swimming once, going to the pictures once (to see Dr No at the Tower - the flea pit - near Riby square) and playing football on the ploggers (the local rec) once with my Dad. I'm certain that there was more done but nothing sticks in my mind. There were occsional games of cards or board games but that was about it. For one thing we never had a car so there were no long car journeys but there was the annual holiday in Humberstone or in Mablethorpe. I do remember my dad on holiday during the day - we would fly kites and his (aand our) back would burn bright red in a day or two and then the entire skin of his back would peal off. We would always lose the skin from our ears and our noses.

The only horticultural/gardening anecdote I have of him (and my ma) was that they had a flaming row one day. My mother had a very quick temper wheras my dad rarely lost his temper. They had a big row. He stormed off (like I would do). And my Mam took a hammer and smashed in every window of the greenhouse. She then came in and, hand shking, had a cigarette - the only time I ever saw her smoke.
Now I don't know why they had a fight (but I have my suspicions).

And that's about it. not many memories really - hopefully my kids have more memories of me than that (as I stayed at home and was a house husband for around 7 years and we fo on a lot of trips together - always have. I suspect that my son doesn't have that many memories as, like father like son, we probably haven't spent that long together since he turned around 13.
my wife thinks I should be talking to him a lot more and telling hiom what to do. My Mum thinks I should have done that with my Dad too. What I don't think either of them realise is that once a man has left home, and certainly once they are married, then they shouldn't be taking direcion from their Dads - they should be making it on their own and taking their own decisions. At least that's the way I see it and maybe that's the way I'cve been crought up. Anyhow once your son leaves home he's a man so he's shoiuld be making his own decisions.
Ah well that the world according to me for this father's day.
Can't wait for the seeds to arrive.. home tomorrow - ooooooohhhhhhh I'm excited.

Ever had one of those days - well one of those weekends... in fact one of those weeks... when you know your life is going no where?
well that is how I feel most weekends in Libya and the closer I get to going home the worse it gets as the closer I get to going hime then the closer I get to coming back.
During the week it ain't so bad as I am working - not hard but working. I only have the evenings to brood themn but Fridays and Saturdays I have the whole weekend to brood on what I could be doing in the garden - what I should be doing.

this weekend has been even worse because I am going home on Monday plus I spent last weekend watching the DVD - the Victorian Flower Garden - and this weekend I spent it watching "the Victorian Kitchen Garden". it is a series from the 80s that i never saw originally. Well worth watching. The kitchen Garden Series went through a month per programme so I saw all the things I should have done in June - all the planting I should have done. And then there were the two main people in the series - one was a Professor in Botany - I should have done that, the other started off as a journeyman in the 30's and worked in walled garden for 20 years then ran the garden himself as a nursery for 40 years... I wish I could have done that - 60 years growing things - but that is now impossible unless I live to 100 which I wouldn't mind as long as I am never the oldest person alive - ever (because my wife is 9 years older than me).

Both of their fathers and their grandfathers were head gardeners - i.e. they were born into gardening families and were working and learning as soon as they could walk or talk i.e. they knew what they wanted to do and have done it and have been happy doing it. I really envy that. I didn't really know what I wanted to do as a child nor as an adult and it is only recently in the last few years that I knew what I wanted to do - to grow flowers.

Much as I would like to I can't blame my parents - that would be the easy way ou - again I have often been envious of children who were pushed as they grew to be the best at their chosen professions. But then there are those who were pushed but didn't get to be the best. And there are those who are pushed and pushed but could never be the best at that because they are genetically incapable - either physically or mentally not gifted in the particular field they were being pushed in. That must have been hell for the child (and i can now appreciate that it could be hell for the parent too). So that is why i do not, could not, blame my parents. They didn't push me, I didn't push me.

I see the same in my children - we have always tried to encourage them in whatever they wnted to do but never really pushed them. They have found their skills (well the girls have - the son is still drifting like I did) and though they may not be driven or may not be certain of what they want to do they seem to be getting there.
#My son is too much like me in that he doesn't know what he wants to do or isn't prepared to push himself. he starts many things and never finishes them. in that he is not like me. When I start something I usually finish it even if it is at a lower level than I should be capable of I still finish.

So why is this relevant - well I am just drifting now - I feel like I am waiting for my third life to begin or is it fourth (student/teacher... raising family... chemist/manager...) as a gardener and waiting for the spark or the crisis point that flips me from the current mode of manager into the desired mode - floriculturalist - is playing on my nerves. I know what I don't want to do... I know what I want to do so why can't i flip from one to the other?

I know, it's risk aversion. I have always been risk averse (though you might not think so from my CV) as are we all to some degree but I have gone too far back into my comfort zone that it is starting to suffocate me. However the risk I am contemplating is such a giant step outside the comfort zone - way way beyond the risk zone that i just can't do it while there are still a couple of dependents that need supporting.
perhaps next year, perhaps next year - I can see that mantra going on for another 15 years until I retire and it is too late to flip.

And now I start to fel like this is one of those moany letter I used to write when I was a student - it's a kind of a "no-one understands me" teenage moan - I'll start listening to coldplay and Travis and all those other miserable bands I can't stand if this goes on. Therefore I need a blast of something uplifting... and then I'll try to find something flower related to slot in above... hearts and flowers of course it has to go in somewhere up above (and that has brought a smile to my face - actually physically has).
Heart shapped leave any one?

Heart shaped flower beds maybe?

Well i don't need an Inkspots moment - I don't want to feel sad and introspective... I need... I need... I need...
Al Jolson.

Here's another intriguing weed of an abandoned plot in Tripoli. It looks very much to me like a poinsetta though they aren't found wild here - at least they aren't mentioned in my Wild Flowers of the Mediterranean book by David Burnie.
Poinsettas ar members of the Euphorbia family and the flower has some resemblance to Euphorbia rigida wih three part ovaries hanging down but I,m pretty sure that this isn't E rigida.

Got it - I think - thank you wikipedia - Euphorbia heterphylla - the Mexican fireplant - the desert poinsettia (certainly in the right place here then) or the wild poinsettia. It must be a garden escape here I think. It's a ruderal - that is an early colonizer of disturbed ground so that would fit in with where I found it. I grow and like several ruderals in Tipperty, nost notably Butterfly bushes and poppies - and they are reknown for being tough and for having easily germinated and great abundance of seeds with a low nutritional requirement for their seedlings - everything the novice garder needs to ease their way into seed growing.

Poinsetta are very common as a hedge in Tenerife but I have yet to see a plant here in Libya. When you look at the history of the poinsettia it is a very interesting story - see Wikipedia for an outline of it - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euphorbia_pulcherrima - basically one family - the Ecke family of California - dominated the trade in the US (and still do - 50% of the worldwide market even though they no longer grow any themselves) because they discovered a propagation technique and wouldn't pass it on.
http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2007/11/19/news/top_stories/16_57_3111_17_07.txt
http://www.pauleckepoinsettias.com/html/per_story4.html
Even more interesting is how they got the US to associate the Poinsettia with Xmas by TV product placement in the 60s and 70s. The plant is native to west coast US and has been associated with Xmas in Mexico for centuries (so I read and probably believe... not certain) but to move it mainstream and to make it essential - and they are still giving out 6000 plants a year in product placement is genius. It even has it's own national day in the US by act of congress!!.

Personally I have almost no emotional connection with poinsettias - I just don't associate them with Xmas except for seeing the ones that my Grandma always to seem to get each year for Xmas (in the 70's) sit on top of the B/W TV and quickly dry out and drop it's leaves. Sad and forlorn they looked and that almost put me off potted plants and house plants as the plastic stems left behind looked so miserable and such a aste of money. Of course I discovered cacti who love being under watered and being inside on window sills and that saved my interest. But if you want to win my favour around Xmas don't give a poinsettia, I dinnae like them - or rather I didnae like them - now I know more anout them it might be interesting to give them another try.

I'm going to ponder on this business model and see if I can't apply it ourselves - gain a technical monopoly and then use product placement, and then franchise the business. Just got to get the right plant... the blue rose?

As I've said severeal times - one of the joys of being abroad is to find something that is the same as at home. In these two cases they aren't quite the same but close enough to bring a grin to my face.
First we have purple bindweed - Convolvulus species. This one is a bright purple that you can spot from 50 to 100 yards away. Real bright. The one that I am familiar with in the uK is pure white - parachutes we calle dthem. If you know the plant then you know why. You pluck the plant with stalk and then press at the base of the sepals and the plant pops out and up to float down like a parachute. I used to do this mainly on the chain link fence between Old Clee school (the primary school I attended and ladysmith road at the back of Findus and Christian Salvensens cold store, The cold store is huge - I mean absolutely enormous - size of sevral football fields and used to be the biggest cold store in Northern Europe. I only wenty in once I think but I can't remember if it was while I was working for BirdsEye (QC ing the peas over 2 separate summers) or when I used to work in the coldstore at Grimsby Frozen Foods (while I was at school and over the holidays - best time was to go out on the deliveries and make the road trip round eastern Lincolnshire delivering frozen burgers and chips to restaurants at Cleethorpes, Mabelthorpe and even down as far as Alford - all flat all country - loved it - 7 hours or so driving around talking to Carl about the Brothers Band and stuff.)

Anyhow it wasone big freezer.

Another plant in Libya that is so common in the Uk is ivy. It isn't so common in Grimsby - I don't remember seeing it at all except for a couple of the big old Victorian mansions around Bargate and People's park - certainly not in the marsh areas of Clee and Old Clee where I (and my family) grew up. Now - around Aberdeen and around our place there is loads of ivy - I know because I planted it. Helix hedera. It's growing like billio (what ever that is) and it's going to be a problem according to most of the plant books because once you plant it then it's almost impossible to get rid of it.

But I have never ever seen it flower until now. Chicken's egg sized - This one of the several other species rather than the wee one you get in baskets at the garden centre (hedera helix - english Ivy) possibly cNanary or Moroccan ivy. It i growing over a garden wall so it could be any of the imported big leaves ivy. Now I need to keep an eye on my ivy to see if it flowers and produces ivy berries. (remember that the ivy bears a berry as black as any sloe).

Now despite my story from yesterday - ow I almost killed my wee 'uns on the mudflats of the Humber - I love to be beside the seaside. In fact if you discount flying I have never been farther than about a 100 miles from the sea EVER.
And the furthest I have ever been would be in Libya at the deset for a weekend - approximately 100/120 miles from the Mediterranean. I have lived and worked in the UK (no where is further than about 100 miles from the sea) Fiji (no where further than about 20 to 30 miles from the sea), Angola - either in luanda (a coastal city) or Soyo - at the very mouth of the Congo and the Atlantic ocean, or offshore (never more than about 50m from the sea) and even all my overseas holidays have been to islands (Phuket, Tenerife, Japan) or coastal cities - Rome & Amsterdam - or cities close to the coast, Paris or Houston. So when it comes down to it - apart from flying where I have crossed the US and crossed Asia) I have never been further than about 100/120 miles from the sea.

Clearly I need to get out a bit more instead of blogging and sharing piano rolls with you from 1909.

One of the wild plants I came across close to the Banff Aquarium was Scurvy Grass (I'm 99%...75%... 50% certain it is a scurvy grass - probably Cochlearia officinale) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scurvy_grass) which is a Brassica - closely related to the cabbage/cauliflower/broccoli/sprouts group. THe brassica vegetables were developed from sea-side plants. The thing they all share is salt tolerance. I'm not sure which scurvy grass this is as I haven' time to trawl through the book bibles (The Concise British Flora - Keble Martin - the best there is http://www.amazon.co.uk/Concise-British-Flora-Colour/dp/B0000CMK3I/ref=cm_lmf_tit_7_rsrrsi0, or the best pocket guide to carry with you - Wild Flowers of Britain and Northern Europe (Collins Pocket Guides Series) (Paperback) Fitter, Fitter & Blamey (the middle Fitter - Alistair was one of the lecturers at York Uni when i did my Biology degree - I'm sure I took one of his courses but can't remember which and I am certain that he wouldn't recognoise me or know my name) http://www.amazon.co.uk/Flowers-Britain-Northern-Europe-Collins/dp/0002190699/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1245190584&sr=1-6
because they are back in the U.K.K.K) or the modern bible (Wikipedia) because it is 12:22 and I am up at 7 tomorrow.

Anemones well these are anemones too...
Okay I cheated - these are sea anemones - probaly called after the flower - from Banff Aquarium up on the NE coast - on the Moray firth and all from the local area.

this last one also has a lobster sat in there hiding among the rocks. You can quite understand why people often think of them as plants rather than animals - their tentacles wave in the current like flowers in the wind. That is an alternate possible source of the name anemone as the word derives from the Greek word for wind. One anemone that was really waving and rippling in the breeze like grass flowers was in the UV lit case that was for the deeper water animals. - very psychadelic.

Anemones even bud off youngsters like many plants but unlike plant they can "uproot" themselves and move away from areas that are too crowded or are subject to extended drying out or are just plain inhospitable for some reason. These can also fight other anemones.
If you look at the beadlet anemone below (Actinia equina) you can see a ring of bright blue dots beneath the tentacles. These are called acrorhagi and are sacs of stinging cells that can inflate like balloons so that anemone can fight each other. It really is a sight to see.Check out the photo on this link of an agressive anemone!!! http://www.arkive.org/beadlet-anemone/actinia-equina/image-A13068.html
Now I had never seen an anemone until I was in my early 20s and went to Millport with the Uni (island on the west of scotland) and I'd never seen a rock pool until then but it was one of the early ambitions. I think it because kids science programmes, or school science programmes, would also show kids in wellies looking into rockpool and seeing all manner of exotic things like anemones and crabs, fish and seaweed. Growing up at the mouth of the Humber we saw sand - mile after mile after mile of sand (and mud and sewage) - the tide goes out at least 2 or three miles at Cleethorpes and it is straight sand - and sand is not very intersting at low tide (in terms of wildlife) as everything either swims out to sea or buries itself. later on i learned to appreciate the ecosystem in sand, the pink shells and the worms, the cockle beds and the razor shells but at the time I wanted exciting rock pools with things like anemones.

Anyhow one of the summers we went with the kids to Cleetorpes (actually Grimsby to visit my parents) I took Jackie judy and Freddy out far on the sands towards the low tide mark - it would have been around 1992 when Judy was 5 or 6, Jackie 6 or 7 and Freddy around 9 ish. We went way out on the sand probably trying to reach low tide which was way out in the estuary. Then we started to walk back towards the Cleethorpes leisure center about two miles up the coast. So we we had gone out on solid sand. We came back towards shore and hit a couple of hundred yards of soft mud.
As we walked through the mud got softer and softer and we started to sink quite quickly. I was getiing pretty scared because a few people have died on cleethorpes sand when caught by the tide and when I was in my teens there was a major incident when a group of horseriders got rapped by the tide and were drowned - horse riders with their horses. That has to be really dangerous if you can't get back with your horse. Anyhow more scarey because I knew that is any of us fell over then they would sink face first in the mud (and there used to be a high percentage of sewage in that mud) and I wouldn't be able to stand over them to pull them out because I would have sunk deeper and deeper too, and quicker. As the mud got softer and softer we would sink quicker and quicker and I had to shout and bully the kids to keep them moving because as soon as they stopped they would have started to sink and be trapped. I had to lead from the front as they were so much slower and to show them that it could be done. Gawd but they were complaining about the mud. I honestly thought that there was a distinct possibility that one of them, one of us, could die. Bullying them to keep moving worked as no one stopped as they were obviously terrified of me that day.
As it was we battled through the mud and reached firmer sand so stomped ashore with mud 2 or 3 inches thick clogging our shoes and boots. We washed off and everything was fine. I have never been so relieved (and I never did tell my wife - until now - as to how close to death I brought all three of them)
I don't know if they realised quite hoiw bad the situation was and how close we were to being in a serious situation that day but I know I have never forgotten it and I have never taken them near a mudflat again.
Rocky shores - sandy shores fine but any sign of mud and I know my heartrate quickens.

I think on this occasion - our visit to Banff Marine Aquarium - the anemone knew we were coming so he set up a special acrorhagi just for us - hanis.
Anyhow this is a gardening blog so I better also stick a picture of a plant to compensate for all this Animalia talk above.
Dandelion in stone.

Above we have the anemones from the rockery - Anemones blanda - and as you can see they form an early source of nectar for the emerging bees in the spring. Those in the rockery are a little more purple than the ones in the "woods" and that may be because of the added light or it could be just because there is more light during the photo so it is overexposed.
But about the plant itself. I have seen the white wood anemone (A. nemerosa) in the woods in Aberdeen, at hillhead around the back of the student accomodation - the first time I have ever seen it in the wild. But A. blanda is a different species knoen as greek windflower. These are (I think) called "blue shades" and they are cheap and cheerful so seem to be included in all the "Spring bulb" collections in the different catalogues. The swathe of blue is quite intense against the stones, the greens and the pinks of the heathers. In the April sun it was a site to see.

In the wooded areas then the anemones are gradually spreading and contesting with the golden celandines... and once again I am aware that I aqm talking about Spring plants of two months ago when the summer blooms like the fuchsias and the foxgloves are all about to burst and that's a little depressing - only one week to go - one week today.

The blue among the golden yellow celandines is a joyful sight - or even a joyful site.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anemones

I have three sets of photos of anemones and here is the first - a purple Anemone coronaria. They are very closely related to buttercups and to pasque flowers (love em) all part of the ranuculacea. These are (I think) some of the De Caen varieties and I grew them from the pea-sized dried up bulblets (not really bulbs) that went in the ground last year. That was the second year that I had planted them and they all came up each year but these are the first that have come up the second year. That's suprising because we had a really cold winter with two significant periods of snow fall so I do d not expect them to survive. On the other hand though last years were planted in a much sunnier and drier spot thatn those the year before. I had thought from the first year that I would have to use them as annuals (and they are reasonably cheap - 20 for £5 - when compared to other bulbs) but I prefer perennials (to decrease the amount of planting tht needs to be done each year). If they work out well (if they are still blooming when I get back then I'll start to build up a patch of anemones.
The bulblets are frequently cheaper than 25p because you buy them dry so they seem very suited for Tesco and B&Q and the like. At the moment - today - they are 99p for 50 bulbs at Van meuwen!!!!! (but it is the end of the planting season so maybe they won't survive or even bloom this year... I'm tempted, so tempted, to give them a try...especially as it is only 99p... plus postage - but they also have a couple of other great deals on.

Here's a story on today's Yahoo (though why it is a story todday and not yesterday or any other day I do not know - Anyhow...)

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/22/20090612/tod-oukoe-uk-japan-flowers-b7e5c6f.html

Tokyo fights burglars with flower power
11 hours 20 mins ago

Print Story A Tokyo district plagued with burglaries has turned to planting flowers to beautify its streets and help stamp out crime. Skip related content
"'Operation Flower' began about three years ago. By planting flowers facing the street, more people will be keeping an eye out while taking care of the flowers or watering them," said Kiyotaka Ohyagi, a Suginami City official.

"The best way to prevent crime is to have more people on the lookout."

Suginami, with a population of 528,800, saw a record 1,710 break-ins in 2002.

When a neighbourhood watch group found that there were fewer burglaries in buildings on flower-lined streets, Suginami decided to kick off Operation Flower and asked volunteers to plant seeds on side streets and in front of their homes.

The flowers are part of a wider crime prevention campaign. The district also has 9,600 volunteer patrollers and 200 security cameras set up in areas where there are frequent break-ins. It also emails crime information daily to residents.

Suginami says its efforts have paid off, with the number of burglaries falling to 390 in 2008, down almost 80 percent from 2002.

"Our residents are very conscientious about preventing crime, and they are very active," Ohyagi said.

(Reporting by Yoko Kubota; Editing by Chris Gallagher)

The flower above is one of the commonest flowers outside shops in this part of Tripoli (the posh part - Gergaresh)along with a lot of petunias - a lorra lorra petunias. I think it is a Hottentot fig (which was one on "the list" from my childhood days of skimming through flower books - particularly the Oxford book of flowers and the Fitter, Fitter and Blarney bbok - later blog I guess).
The colour is a little out from the books, as is the leaf shape but the colour is more to do with the crappy camera - it was much redder in reality. I love the name "Hottentot fig", it rolls off the tongue and is the main reason that it was on my list.

Whicheve mesembryanthemum it is then it is a succulent closely related to the ice plant I blogged about last month at:
http://frarys-fresh-flowers.blog.co.uk/2009/05/12/mesembryanthemum-crystallinum-6103436/

I took a sprig of the ice plant up to the office to thye scanner and had a bit iof a strange time with it. The skin is not covered with salt crystals like I thought but with structures like little balloons - or bladders - that's the word I was looking for, bladders. They have a very thin skin and when you press they burst and drip out salt water. I can confirm the saltiness of the water from a taste test.
That meant that as soon as I tried to scan any details then any presuur just coated the plant in salt water. it does not look nearly as intersting or as fascinating in a scan as many of the other plants and not nearly as stange or as cool as it does as a real actual living plant.

Even in detail view the scans don't look interesting - shame.

Tomorrow I'm going to go out for a wee walk... oh no I'm not we don't have a scanner here... oh yes I am - I'll just have to go into the office.. (He's behind you!!!! I'm turning into captain hook I think.}

Now here is a real classic from Fred Lowery called "Whistling in the Wildwood".

He is an artist that is not nearly as well known as he ought to be (in my humble opinion). The man is a legend in the field of whistling - the Blind whistler (for he was almost blind) and I read his autobiography - "Whistling in the Dark" 2 years ago - inspiring. He's the most well-known person I know of (apart from me of course) who doesn't have his own Wikipedia page. I guess I must learn how to write a wiki so i can put one up for him.

if you like these tunes (which are garden orientated) then you should check out http://www.whistlingrecords.com/ which has over 100 MP3 available for download of various whistlers. (unfortuantely the site is undergoing restructuring as I write in June 09 and not available which is a real shame as it was a great little specialist site).
I'm going to post a few more when I get back to the UK and I can get some suitable Pacific flower pictures up (he has a few classic |"hawaiian" tunes in his repetoire.
I can't tell you how much a dose of the blind whistler will relax me after a head day at the laptop (what a softee I am eh?)

Lemon pokey... FUKD anyone else noticed that it says FUKD top left when you write a post? Well I do feel a bit FUKD but let's push on regardless.

Anyhow I decided to post a couple of songs because I'm feeling lazy, pressured (at work) and it seems like an awful long time until I get back to the UK. My wife is feeding me titbits of information to keep me keen - she jknows that I could never lever my barden at the moment. maybe when it is worn out and covered with weeds I'll move into a fresher, younger garden. maybe something with virgin sod if I'm lucky - ooo er Mrs.

Where was I - songs.
All these two have the word Wildwood in the title and I'm poosting them because they are all old - so out of copyright in the UK - and because our front moss garden is turning into a wildwood. I'm not a huge fan of early country/bluegrass - though I do like western swing - Gene Autry and Roy Rogers, Tex Ritter - if that is in anyway connected (which it isn't really except that they both mixed into C&W - adore hank Williams - that's definitely more Western swing than Country)...

Here we have the Carter family with "Wildwood flower" and we have the Coon Creek Girls with "Flowers in the wildwood"

The foxgloves are a classic woodland/glade plant and they have shot up in the last few weeks. They have rested over winter (see the photos above), evergreen and deep rooted - and the sun and (relative) warmth is sending them sky high. Jiurie reckons that they will be flowering when I get back in 12 days (and counting).

It will look magnificaent as they are forming a real patch of luxious vegetation.

As the sun sets into the sea over the great peak of El Tiede, it is time to say goodbye to the sub-tropical paradise of Tenerife, spelled backwards efirenet, as we listen to the dulcet tones of Spike Jones and his Wacky Wakkians... sorry I drifted off a bit there but it is time to say good bye to Tenerife from the Godd Blog FFF. I've just about exhausted the photos that I brought with me to Tenerife and it's time to return to the more mundane worlds of reality.
let's just throw out there the final few remaining photos of the cactus park in Puerto de la Cruz ( i really do need to talk more about cacti - they were the first collection of plants I ever made as a teenager) but that is for another blog.

of the streets in Puerto de la Cruz - bananas - definitely need a blog about bananas esp. in Fiji - Sigatoka disease and the like

Flowers and religion - surely not another post about being closer to god in a garden etc...

a stupid prejudice I have against grafted plants - even though every rose we have in the garden is a grafted plant - but willows? Don't seem right....

And the very final one for now from Tenerife is another textural photo - the texture of a palm tree with bark like dripping wax as if it had been used as a giant natural candlestick...
Thank you for joining on this journey to 2007 and business as usual will be resumed soon (2 weeks today I'll be walking back to happiness across the tarmac at Aberdeen - 2 weeks almost to the hour).

Y'all come back now...

Tucked away in Puerto de la Cruz, with virtually no publicity that i could see except for a a bill board outside the entrance, is an English-style garden known as the Sitio Litre,
http://www.tenerifetimes.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=112&Itemid=74
Once agaian - a place without a prominent website - or of there is I canna find it - so it difficult to direct to to a useful history. there are snippets all over the web but nothing substantial so I guess you'll just need to drop by next time you're in town.
It is definitely worth it for the botanical minded aong you, also dfor the eweary traveller looking for somewhere to have a quiet sit down in the shade (though a tad expensive for just a sit down I seem to recall. I very nearly didn't go in because of the expense)
And why should you go in - first there is the history - it is the garden of an old house from 1730-ish with associations with some of the greats - Agatha Christie, Humboldt, Oscar Wilde - then there is an orchid house with over 350 different species.
I'm not a fan of orchids but even I found a few interesting ones like these the one doing the Al Jolson impersonation is particularly good...

And then there are the bonsais including the pomegranete bonsai with fruit.

Interesting specimen trees include the oldest dragon tree in Puerto and a genuine cotton plant with real cottos bolls - the first I'd every seen in situ.
And then there is the shade - Puerto may be on the north coast - the cooler, wetter coast of Tenerife but it is still at the same lattitude as the Sahara desert and despite the cloud and occasional rain it is still danged hot when the sun is out and you are walking about with nothing to do.

There are other interesting plants to look at - a lot packed into a realtively small (but steep) garden of terracing.
not least just before you leave (or just as you enter if you are quicker than I) there is a nice display of Bromeliads many of which were flowering in January - several of which I'd just bought from Homebase in the sale - none of which survived more than a few months due to overwatering and their roots rotting. But here are what they can look like in flower in the beautiful Sitio Litre.

Above Puerto De La Cruz is an historic town called La Orotava which has several grand houses (now turned into tourist places) which are stopping off places for the maturer tourist such as ourselves. We looked around several including the Tenerifian famous house called the Casa de los Balconies from 1622.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casa_de_los_Balcones
The first two photos are from that Casa (I think - you can definitely see a load of balconies)  with the stags-horns ferns and a big Arum in the courtyard. This time it's not Colocasia esculanta - taro  doesn't produce that long stem above the ground it only produces the corm underground). This big plant - well over 2 metres tall- is what the rotumans call swamp taro - i.e. only very poor people eat it (my wife said dismissively) or I guess anyone will in times of hardship. Swamp taro is probably one of the Alocasia which are closely related to Taro but not quite taro. Wikipedia confirms this so it must be true (ha!)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alocasia_macrorrhizos
The whole stem can be eaten (actually an extenssion of the corm that form the root) but only after a lot of boiling. Like rhubarb, taro and several other plants leaves Alocasia is chock full of oxalic acid which gives you an itchy mouth and can lead to hallucinations among other symptoms. We won't be trying it soon - especially as it won't grow in Tipperty and needs far too much water for libya.

Also in the Casa de la Balconies was a mini musuem that I don't remember anything about about and a lace workshop and shop. I remember leaving Jiurie to wonder around the lace shop -  there is a lace training school there too - very interesting.

As i said yesterday everywhere has their website nowadays and here it is... http://www.casa-balcones.com/ingles/index.html 

Below is a photo taken at a companion Casa across the street from the Casa de la Balconies. This was the Casa del Turistas and we were touristas alright. We looked at everything. There were displays about the native garaunches (pre European contact Berbers - thought here must have been contact with the Romans who got out this way), sand painting and pottery etc. I'm sure we bought tiles and numbers for the house from there - which still haven't been put up after 2 years.
Now when we go on holiday I don't bother to pretend that we are above the tourist status - that we are somehow bewtter than everyone else because we are "indepeendent" tourists - I just go with it and be a tourist - I look at the museums, I look at the shops, I look at the tourist places and enjoy it because that is just what we are - tourists. I mean I can't even pretend that we have stumbled across a place because I read the tourist guides and the pamphlets and then drive around looking for something I/we've picked out - now sometimes we do find places that we weren't looking for but they are still tourist places deliberately set up to attract people like us even if we weren't looking for them in the first place e.g. the high cafe near Masca, or the view points at the sides of roads. We may not have been looking for them and so we have stumbled across them but they were set up with tourists in mind so are not exactly hidden treasures.
Okay not sure where that rant came from but it came.

Actually I'm not sure if this photo was from there or from another Casa further down the town - the one with the wedding Marquee in the back...
Anyhow you can see the big Echiums that are towering above me and the quite lush vegetation up in the valley of Orotavia in Tenerife.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chamaerops_humilis

This palm has amazing bark but - thinking about it now - it may  be just the way that the gardeners have but away the old leaves. It's as if there is a frill all along one side of the tree - like a baleen whale jaw stuck into the ground. And it was on all the trees.

This tree was in the Jardin Botanico in Puerto De la Cruz (where me and jiurie stayed) has a nice wee botanical garden which is worth spending an hour or two going around - it isn't that big but it is very shady so probably nice in the summer. I went in January - still good to get out as I was on my own for that week - spent most of it in a cheap apartment reading books as Jiurie had to go back and I needed to be out of the UK (for tax reasons).
If I was writing the blog then I could have taken a zillion and one photos of the interesting plants but as it was I took only a few of the stranger ones that caught my eye.
Suprisingly I can't find that much about it on t'internet - surprising as pratcially everything has a website now.  I guess the problem is that I expect everyone to post in English though there is no reason that they should in that Tenerife is in Spain (though it was occupied by the English for a while). If you try in Spanish you come up with a lot more connections eg
http://www.fotos.es/de/jardin-botanico/
The closest i can get to a history is:
http://www.webtenerifeuk.co.uk/PortalTenerife/Home/Disfruta+con+los+niños/Mas+sobre+Tenerife/Naturaleza/Flora/Jardines+y+parques/Jardín+Botánico.htm?Lang=en There must be an official website somewhere out in the ether but I'm blowed if I can find it.

Anyhow the gardens were set up in 1788 for the purpose of acclimatising plants to spain on their way back from Latin America - like a half way house or a pre-selection. It also then had the effect of trialling new crops and new plants for use in Tenerife. The British set up botanical gardens all over the world for the same purpose - a couple of the notable successes with this approach is with tea and with rubber.

As it was I only took a few pictures of what (to me) were the unusual plant - like the bark above and like these clumps of Haemanthus flowers - bulbs that send up the flower first and the leaves second (closely related to the Amaryliis flowers so familiar around Christmass int he UK)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haemanthus.
Now I know that I shouldn't think this but plants that send up flowers first and leaves afterwards seem a little bit wrong - not doing things the correct way - the English way - of struggling through the winter then sending up leaves that are lashed with the spring wather and eventually struggling to poduce a tiny shattered flower and a couple of poor fruit at the end before they give up with exhaustion and fade back into the earth for the winter - that seems like the right and proper way to do things. All this sending up a lush flower without any effort defeats the old Protestant worth effort of constant struggle before dieng worn out and exhausted.
I think there are a few that do this in the UK too - thopugh I can't name them off the top of my head. Work-shy loungers I call them - not proper miserable flowers that we are used to on the east coast.
I hope you realise that I'm not just having a go at the flowers and that my tongue is firmly planted in my cheek.

The one other photo I have with me from the botanical gardens is of the thorns on a bush. Now that is the proper way to do things - big f-off thorns like a rose or a bramble or a gorse - a real he-man's plant. Forget the pretty flowers let's just poke things into other things...

there are many weird things in Tenerife - not least the fighting chipmunks in the National History museum.  For example - a bonsai pomegranate tree with a real pomegranate fruit on it - I found that weird. And some of the architecture is very Jetsons-style - see the petrol station below....

And then there is the black sand - may not be strange to some of you but us Brits (and pacific islanders) used to silicon sand or oral sand the black sand was decidely weird. It even sounded strange - crunchy - when you walked over it.
And there are several weird plants like a Dragon tree that bleeds blood when you cut it and is over a thousand years old (supposedly) or this plant below.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Echium_simplex
This is, I believe, Echium simplex - the Tower of jewels, the pride of Tenerife - and a form of bugloss (similar to Borage)
I bought a packet of seeds while I was there - ever the optimist - as I'm told that these are the hardiest of Tenerife's buglosses and that they are actually hardy in parts of the UK.  We have our own native viper's bugloss in the UK http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Echium_vulgare but I think I have only ever seen it as a garden plant and not as a wild plant.

IAnyhow - Tower of Jewels - think I might put them in the greenhouse over winter and not trust to hardiness and Wikipedia if I can get them to germinate. It is a biennial (like the foxgloves and the Great Mulleins we have already) so I would only need to store them for one winter at  a time. I'm considering putting in a wee coal stove in the greenhouse for winter - would only need one lump over night to stave off the frost (and to help my fucshias survive the winter - plus the extra carbon dioxide wouldn't hurt - need to lay duct along the spine of the roof and out the front but I'm sure I can manage that wioth a swiss army knife, planty of duct tape and lots of elastoplasts as per a normal DIY job from me.
Oh - and a hammer too. Got to have a hammer. That way everything instantly becomes a nnail o matter what it was before.
And the alligator - the chainsaw - for that delicate fret work that might be needed. There - have it - I could build n Ark with a swiss army knife, duct tape, a hammer and an alligator. Or the Titanic. (I see the last survivor of the Titanic died this week.)

Echium - as you can see the flower spikes are spectacular - that is Jiurie walking under the curved spike and she is 4 steps or so above the plant already!.
This plant is endemic to Tenerife (i.e. originally found ONLY in Tenerife - now they are found in many places thanks to Gardeners and collectors (like me) and a great example of the specialisation and giantism that can develop on relatively remote oceanic islands - it is a kind of floral equivalent to Darwin's finches in the Galapagos- each island in the Canaries having their own particular specie(s) of Echium. Here's a brief introduction to those who want to know more about the Macaronesian Echium radiation. http://www.rareplants.de/shop/prodtype.asp?CAT_ID=556
I must admit that I had never heard the northern Atlantic Islands called Macaronesia before and will try to drop that into the odd conversation that I never have.

and maybe we will end up with our own Echium with a rival to Jiurie as the "Jewel of Tipperty".

now I was going to write a nice long blog tonight but I called home and heard all about the growing that I'm missing in Tipperty, the poppies, the heather, the roses and all the weeding that has been done so got jealous/down and then I heard anbout all the money our daughters are expecting to fall off the trees and I got angry - I planted apple and pear trees not efffing money trees! !! I am just so angry and the international dialling line isn;'t working so I can't phone home to scram at them.

So what I will do instead is try to calm down and unclench my jaw before tmy teeth finally collapse into dust (one of the problems with being a rotator is that I'm never at home long enough to get decent dental treatment - my teeth are falling to pieces at the moment - literally - and the anger isn't helping).. where was I ... relax... relax - think beautiful flowers.

While trying to identify the Dombeya yesterday I came across the article I linked to - http://tenerife.sun4free.com/island/exotic-flowering-trees.html - and it cleared up a non-identification and a misidentification I had made previously on the blog.

The blue flowering tree which I posted - flowers like hare bells or polemoniums - turns out to be Jacaranda. What a great name - I'd heard it several times but never imagined that this was the tree - for some reason I always thought it was a yellow flowering tree. Jacaranda...

The tree i missidentified - well I thought that it was a Carob - the locust tree. now that it has started blooming it most clearly isn't. It is a flame tree - Delonix regia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Poinciana
The pods are around 2 feet long andf hard and dry with beans in side. -

The flowers are spectacular - big, brash red and very  unpea-like and yet they are in the same leume family. The leaves are very typiocal 'rain tree' type leaves - pinnate - and now I am getting angry at the photos - the camera is so crappy that you can't really see much beyond a yellow blur but can I afford to buy one - no - because I'm supposed to pay for car insurance for a year for someone who will use the car for maybe two weeks- so much for colling down - can you hear the sound of teeth splintering?
That's me.... grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Although in reality I'm just looking foir an excuse to feel sorry for myself for an evening I guess...

Exotic tree, Tenerife, northern shore, garachico, brilliant place to paddle as the beach is a lava flow where the sea has sculpted rock pools then the town has added walk ways over the pools and steps down into them - so that the atlantic swell flows in and old while you paddle (or swim - we didn't have cosssies so paddling with the fish grazing on our legs and then darting in to suck up the algae as you stepped away - really nice place - with an old fort on the harbour too). We stopped just for the hell of it paddled in the lava pools then went round the craft fair (buying a set of glass plates with stained glass of flowers - will photo and )put up the piccies next time I'm home) and the church. Tea and icecream at the cafe under the trees - ah magic days. Jiurie is the yellow jacketed one in the bottom centre of the last photo - I think she was negotiating for jewellry or for a witch doll- thing - made out of cocnut parts (or other palm tree - possibly date palm.
Anyhow I spotted the tree at the side of the church and, in my best hibiscus patterned holiday shirt - posed for photos. I have only posted the botanical photos - none of the rock pools or of the craft fair because this is a gardening blog (sometimes) but now that I think about it I I wish that I had brought the photos of the rock pools with me, or the fort.
Anyhow I was thinking hydrangea  but it actually turns out that it is one of the Malvacae so is closely related to the hollyhocks and to the Hibiscus.
 
The description below is taken from http://tenerife.sun4free.com/island/exotic-flowering-trees.html but more about that article tomorrow.

"The Dombeya or Pink Snowball (Dombeya X cayeuxii) has large amounts of the most beautiful flowers, which hang down and look very much like hydrangea flowers, earning a related species the name Tropical Hydrangea. The Pink Snowball is often grown in parks and gardens and on city streets of Tenerife and flowers in the winter months."

Let's take a quick break from Tenerife and I'll post you a couple of photos that the family took-
the first is from Vika in Japan - Azaleas. Komagome (one of the subcities of Tokyo) is famous for Azaleas (and for the tree lined streets  Gingko trees which formed a ceremionail path between it's many shinto shrines).
Each city has it's particular totam flower and Komagome has it's Azaleas.

THey line the main JR circular rail line (the Yamamoto line) which runs through Komagome and is one of the busiest rail lines in the world. A train every five minutes so you just need to turn up and barely wait and hen you are away.
When I had a fight with Jiurie (as we always do when we are away) I sat and went the way round clockwise - took about an hour. And then I was still mad so I got on and rode all the way round again but anti clockwise. Vika said she'd always wanted to do that but never did. Perhaps she needs to get married so that she can have a fight and end up doing just that.
Anyhow I asked for more photos of Azaleas but she said they just disappeared -"it seems Global Warming is playing havoc with the blooms! will find other species to photograph!".Funny thing is - it's playing havoc with the weather here in Tripoli too. I never thought that I would see a climate change in my lifetime but I think we are - hopefully it isn't exponential or runaway. The winters are definitely warmer now than when I was a kid (despite the last two) and there is barely snow  compared to the old photos that you see of Aberdeen.... but this could all just be a flutter (like the mini-iceages and the wet and warm spells in the C14th that led to the vikings growing wheat in Greenland..but i digress for once... outside tomatoes are still rubbish in Tipperty though even subartic which is supposed to be able to ripen in the Artic circle - not for me it won't... and sweet corn or sweet potatoes - forget it up where we are....

Other photo before I drift off into more scientific ignorance and why I think it is too late to do anything about global warming - we are like fruit flies on oranges to trying to make them ripen quicker - we might think we are making changes and the fruit is ripening but the orange would keep on changing whether we were here or not... or maybe we are more like moulds on am orange - each one individually microscopic but put us all together and we end up making the whole thing rotten... there's a nice metaphor.... other photo.

This one from Tipperty courtesy of Jiurie - the Alliums in the front - next to the battered hebe - with self-seeding californian poppies in the back and the Geums (don't like geums, indifferent to the poppies but I do love those Alliums. They are a great cut flower - long stiff stem and some of them dry magnificently.