Late April

"Time ceased, as if the spring

Had been eternity...

For ever, as of old,

The sunlight and the darkness and the singing."

- Ruth Pitter

Asphodels on the edge of woodland

It's that magical time of year when we pick a warm evening to visit the asphodel woods and I add to my picture files yet more images of these mysterious, ghostly figures haunting the shadows. In the distance, there's usually a nightingale's song or a cuckoo's call lending further enchantment to the scene.

A bi-coloured hawthorn tree

A flush of warm weather at the beginning of April eventually gave way to days of piercingly bright sunshine and an equally eye-watering cold wind, thanks to the relentless north-easterly which scoured the fields white and tore young leaves from their branches.

Luckily most of our native blossom was tenacious enough to hang on, making a blinding display against blue skies.

The 'may' trees come out early here, decorating hedgrows and scenting the air with a slightly astringent tang that enlivens the senses.

Each day brings new surprises as soil spaces gradually fill up in the beds, lessening the opportunity for weeds to grow, and we struggle to recall exactly what is planted where.

Paulownia tomentosa
aka the Foxglove Tree

Our friends from a neighbouring valley, whose garden I photographed in March, rang to say that their paulownia was in full bloom if I wanted to take its picture.

This is already a tall tree with slender spreading branches and the brown buds have now opened to reveal downward pointing 'fingers' of lilac flowers, which are faintly scented.

Its leaves, too, are well-shaped with heavily etched veins adding to its exotic appearance.

Nearby was an ebullient lilac tree, covered in flowers of an almost identical shade. Last year our lilacs were noticeably lacking in blooms but they've more than made up for it this season and we've filled a succession of vases to enjoy the heady scent indoors.

More swags for the sitting room

Rose chafers (Cetonia aurata)

Rose chafers

Our garden has always had an abundance of insects, including these emerald-green chafer beetles which buzz quite loudly when they're on the wing.

They don't appear to do any noticeable damage to our roses but we used to worry about the huge number of rose chafer grubs that were resident in our compost bin, having been told they were a pest which would eat through plant roots.

Rose chafer grub - a good guy!

In this regard, we're indebted to Chris Luck of the Anglo-French website Planetepassion for putting us right some years ago when he featured pictures of this useful grub, allowing us to identify it and appreciate how it benefits the garden.

Although our soil is extremely fertile, it's odd how few worms seem to live in it. Back in England we were used to digging up worms with every clod of earth. Not so here.

What worms we do have seem to originate in the leaf-mould bin, perhaps because it stays damp there whereas the flower beds are apt to dry out quite quickly in summer.

Chafer grubs, on the other hand, relish all the green waste in our compost bin and reward us by producing finely sieved 'black gold' for recycling in the beds. 

Maturing compost, turned and mixed, with some
water added before being returned to the bin
(with grubs) for another few months of
natural break-down

Compost

Christina always dreads the moment when I suggest 'turning the compost' as she does most of the heavy forking, while I busy myself chucking out stones, walnuts, thick twigs and potatoes, which tend to grow shoots rather than break down efficiently.

It may take us a couple of days to finish the sorting process but it provides us with great satisfaction when we shovel the completed, crumbly compost into a fresh bin!


Walnuts

Plenty of greenery now but walnut trees are slower to come into leaf

Early walnut leaves

If it wasn't for having a digital camera with a telephoto lens I might easily miss some of the finer details that nature provides when plants are waking up again.

I first noticed the colour of these emerging leaves when I was trying to focus on dangling walnut catkins which were then more obvious.

These striking tonal effects last but a day or two and need strong sunlight to show up the full range of tints. By next week they'll probably have succumbed to a uniform shade of green!

Quince blossom - Cydonia oblonga
found in orchards or even growing semi-wild
on the edge of local woods!

Quince

Not to be confused with Japanese flowering quince (aka japonica or Chaenomeles), this is a tree of the rose family which produces exquisite cup-shaped blooms.

Gardening writer Anna Pavord describes finding these blossoms for sale in an achingly trendy Fifth Avenue store, where they could be purchased for a mere $40 a branch!

Here in rural Charente Maritime they're usually grown for their pear-shaped fruits which are high in pectin and traditionally used for making quince jelly. They're also delicious when cooked up with apples.

Box hedge blighted by caterpillars

Caterpillars

Much as I love our insect friends, there are occasional infestations which prove they can sometimes be too much of a good thing!

Having avoided box blight over the past ten years, our little hedges have been quite badly affected by a moth caterpillar which spins webs between the branches and feeds off the leaves.

The RHS has a useful page on this particular pest, Cydalima perspectalis, which we first noticed last summer. We sprayed it with a product from our local store but unfortunately it came back this year, worse than ever.

So we've resorted to carefully spraying with Rose Clear Ultra, bought in the UK recently and probably banned in the EU...  Controversial, I know, but something I've used successfully on roses and other plants, in very localised situations. It may call for two applications to really eradicate the caterpillars this time.

Euonymus Caterpillar
Yponomenta cagnagella

We had a graphic illustration of just how bad these infestations can get if you don't intervene early enough.

Walking past a nearby hedgerow, where we regularly admire the bushes of spindleberry in autumn, we saw with horror how they were festooned with white webbing.

Closer inspection revealed that the webs were full of caterpillars with black spots, later identified as larvae of the European Spindle Ermine Moth, a well-known pest which can cover euonymus shrubs over a huge area.

Check out Google Images for some very scary photo's!!

Rose 'Astronomia' - a newcomer
bred by French growers Meilland

Roses

On a calmer note, it's lovely to watch the first roses appearing in various parts of the garden, not just in sunny areas but also in semi-shaded spots beneath trees.

This is where the hedging rose, Rosa rugosa, comes in useful because it flourishes in sun or part-shade, tolerant of dry soil - and even, dare I say it, a certain amount of neglect!

Rosa rugosa - robust, good for mixed hedges
and easily raised from rooted suckers

I've noticed a few aphids on some of its tough little leaves but they are soon shaken off and its buds don't tend to attract greenfly like other, more highly bred roses.

You can almost tell from looking at this flower that it will be beautifully scented... we have at least three varieties of rugosas and they are all strongly perfumed.

If I have any gripe, it would be that these velvety blooms just don't last long enough.

Popular on the seasonal menu... a tranquil early-morning scene!

Marais lambs bred on salt marshes along the estuary

Early April

"When daisies pied and violets blue

And lady-smocks all silver-white

And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue

Do paint the meadows with delight..."

- Shakespeare

Would the Bard have known about 'cuckoo-buds' of oil-seed rape?

What could be finer than setting out on a bright April morning, with the dew wet underfoot and leaves just beginning to unfurl their Spring green?

Cardamine pratensis
Lady's Smock

Whilst some countryside plants will have changed since Shakespeare's time, many are reassuringly familiar - like the Lady's Smock or Cuckoo Flower on the right, which favours damp meadows and has been much in evidence these past three weeks.

It's common in wetlands throughout Europe and our local variety has a subtle tinge of mauve to its petals.

Certainly it's less obtrusive than the almost fluorescent blooms of rape seed, happily colonising banks and waysides from last year's crop!

Fumaria officinalis
Common Fumitory

Despite its name of common fumitory, this fragile wildflower is less ubiquitous in our verges and vineyards but rather endearing once you look closely at its little spurred flowers in two-toned pink.

It would be great to find a taller, more stalwart version for the garden but the closest we've come is to grow the cultivated toadflax, Linaria purpurea, which is usually available in purple but can also be found in a pale shell pink; this variety is known as 'Canon Went' and has delicate foliage which easily fits between other stouter plants.

 Wildlife

Also full of the joys of Spring, our neighbour's newest donkey - Balthazar - decided to get frisky with his stable-mate, Baladin, who is a Poitou donkey almost twice his size.

Never mind that they're both males, it looked like simple horse-play despite all the biting and at one point little Balthazar ended up square underneath his friend... hours of fun and frolic!

An elegant Racka ewe
poses with her lamb

Meanwhile, our local lambs have been growing up fast and there seem to be few left to gambol amongst the daisies.

One exception is our neighbour's rare-breed ewe, a Hungarian racka, which has just given birth to a curly-coated lamb with rather coltish legs.

Wikipedia tells us they are a multi-purpose breed, used for milking, wool and for meat, whilst their 'quiet disposition' makes them suitable for amateur
enthusiasts. (Over here, a local lady spins their wool to make some very appealing soft toys.)

Dicentra spectabilis
or Bleeding Heart

Perennials

This year our dicentra has obligingly produced its flowers so that they arch gracefully over the path, catching the early-morning light and creating an irresistible photo.

When you look closely, their blooms appear to be sewn from softly cushioned satin, and that little white drop at the bottom of the 'heart' often holds a bead of moisture, adding to its jewel-like effect.

We also grew a white version of the plant which is pretty but not nearly so eye-catching.

In the background are mounds of white iberis and mauve aubretia which provide useful edging.

Penstemon digitalis contrasting
with Lychnis coronaria

One of the best things about early spring is watching the emergence of bright new foliage on perennials which may have become a little ragged and browned-off over winter.

Lychnis is a plant which seeds itself all over the garden and I spend time removing many of its babies before they reach adulthood.

But here there's a happy combination, where it's found itself next to the claret-coloured foliage of penstemon 'Husker Red' and I can't bring myself to pull it out just yet!

Brunnera macrophylla -
probably the variety 'Jack Frost'

Brunnera is an understated perennial but no less valuable for that as it stands out in the shade under trees.

Ours is currently blooming alongside annual myosotis, or forget-me-not, and you'd be hard put to spot the difference between their blue flowers.

But this brunnera has the added advantage of shapely silver-blotched leaves which still look pretty long after its flower-sprays have gone over and the dried up clumps of myosotis have been dispatched.

Plant Supports

From left to right: Peony, Anchusa azurea and Lavender

The willow supports that Christina wove together last month are starting to prove their worth now that perennials like peony and anchusa are growing fast.

We've also tried a simple version on one of the lavenders to try and keep its branches from splaying out. This happens quite often when a cat - not necessarily ours - decides to jump into the middle when giving chase to some luckless mouse.

The other option is to stick a thin bamboo into the middle of the bush but this might be dangerous if your feline gets carried away and fails to see it!

If you don't have enough walls, use tripods for
those roses which tend to have lax growth

Tulipa 'Ballerina' - still flaming brightly

Tulips

A sudden flush of hot weather has brought all the tulips out together, none more flamboyant than Tulipa 'Ballerina' which is in its third year now.

We've kept these bulbs in the same copper container through summer and winter, without doing much except giving them a feed and water from time to time.

Other bulbs which thrived in their first year haven't done so well in the second season and this might be because they sat in poorly drained soil during winter.

Tulipa clusiana
'Peppermint Stick'

If the bulbs have small flowers but are still basically intact and healthy, it's always worth drying them out and replanting them in a sunnier, better-drained spot, giving them some fertiliser (like blood, fish and bone) to build up their vigour once more.

The species tulips, like Tulipa clusiana here, are meant to be petite and that's really the essence of their charm.

Being so small, they can easily be accommodated at the edge of a sunny border and just left to naturalise, returning at the end of March without fuss or fanfare.

Out and About

With days getting longer and evenings staying light until after 8 pm, there's more reason to go out walking and absorb all the sights and sounds of the burgeoning countryside.

The danger of stray hunters taking a pot-shot in the gloaming is thankfully past and animals like this normally shy roe deer are emboldened by the growth of lush grass to camouflage their movements.

Vines just breaking into leaf

Vines have reached that lovely stage when the first buds are breaking and downy leaves are fanning out to catch the sun.

It seems the red grape varieties are slightly in advance of the white and there's even a touch of pink in their buds as a foretaste of what's to come.

What started as a cold wet spring has developed into something full of promise for the weeks to come. Fingers crossed it lasts!

Perfect weather for sowing... will it be sunflowers this time?