THIS WEEK AT GLEBE COTTAGE
The latest from Carol's beautiful cottage garden... plus her diary for the week!
There are so many varieties to choose from – but here are some of my favourites
We gardeners look forward to the daffodils that join or follow spring’s snowdrops and primroses – but this year, lots of people say their daffodils are not flowering as well as usual. Excess rain? Not cold enough? One that seems to be coping is our own wild daffodil.
Many of the smaller hybrid daffodils in our gardens have much in common with the wild daffodil, Narcissus pseudonarcissus. Who could help but admire the pale lemon blooms of ‘W.P. Milner’, nodding gently on a spring day? Closely related to the native plant, it loves the same conditions and does well among shrubs, under trees or even in shadier spots in the rock garden. Naturalisation in verdant grass might mean too much competition for its diminutive flowers. It’s dainty, gentle and seems to have coped better with the wet conditions than many other hybrid daffodils. Charming triandrus hybrid, ‘Jenny’ has elegant, slender, pale lemon trumpets that fade to white. It’s one of the few daffodils blooming properly this year.
‘Hawera’ is even daintier and fares best in a trough, rock garden or a corner in the front of a border. Each slender stem supports two or three flat, short-trumpeted flowers, with narrow, slightly glaucous leaves. Clumps of it often increase year on year, the pretty pale flowers mingling with pale blue pulmonarias or alongside emerging croziers of ferns.
There are other little daffodils closely allied to ‘Hawera’. ‘Minnow’, with a white perianth and deeper trumpet, is perhaps a bit chunkier, flowering reliably and prolifically. ‘Pipit’ grows to about 30cm; its pale yellow flowers have even paler cups. Following on from crocus, scilla and muscari, these small, strong daffs are ideal on raised beds or small borders. When their foliage eventually dies down, other emerging herbaceous plants quickly hide it.
