The garden end of April 22

Looking down the back garden the row of blue boxes at the bottom is increasing.

The bees have kept us busy and there have been swarms and sunny days.

I am glad I planted the thyme under the cherry tree it keeps down the weeds and adds a splash of colour. I added two other varieties of thyme to the wild variety I found in the grass. I fought valiantly for some years to keep back the native variety but I have given up now and the other varieties have been completely smothered.

The bees seem indifferent to the different varieties and the thyme is always covered with honeybees, bumble bees and other wild bees.

Looking up from the bottom of the garden, our red Hazel is at its best just now. Its leaves don’t stay this colour but change to green, so we have to appreciate it at this time of year.

On the left of the photograph one of our Judas trees is coming into flower.

They are such beautiful trees and are pushing forth blossoms on their trunks as well.

We bought a Gleditsia triacanthos ‘Sunburst’ in 2016. We did know that certain varieties had vicious spines but this variety is “inermis” – meaning unarmed in Latin or to put it another way, thornless.

So I was quite surprised to see these sticking out of the trunk. I hope it will not be repeated.

I was tempted to plant this tree for the bees as it has been vaunted as producing flowers with a high content of nectar. Now that I am looking closer into it, I find some sites telling me that it is dioïque and others that it is only the male flowers that produce nectar. So I do not really know what I am going to get as it has not flowered yet and it is getting very tall. It might be quite a delicate mission, if it ever flowers, to get up close enough to the flowers to find out if my tree is male, or female or can produce both types of flowers.

Some plants are much easier. My aquilegia spring up every year without planting or care and flower before I have time to notice them.

Other plants make themselves at home, whether you want them or not. When we first arrived here we had very little in the garden and a UK gardening magazine I had bought had offered free Oxalis bulbs stuck to the front cover. They were duly planted but I did not take to them. They looked too much like the weeds I was trying to conceal. I did nothing to propagate them yet they still keep on popping up here and there.

So I was delighted to see the carder bumble bees on them, I had never noticed they were attractive to bumble bees. Actually, they look rather nice with the Cerinthe and forget-me-nots.

The blackcurrants are in flower. I think this is a little male Osmia pollinating them for us.

At this time it is the little grey Anthophora bees that create all the noise in the Cerinthe with the bumble bees that are my favourites.

Meanwhile, April has been busy in the garden or rather the bees have been keeping us busy.

The bees do not always decide to swarm so low down but it allows for a gentle transfer into the hive which suits every one.

Colour in April

This part of the front garden border provides lots of colour near the house but I have not planted anything there for years.  I first sowed forget-me-nots in the garden over ten years ago and that one sowing was all that was needed to ensure their appearance every spring.  Sure they will have to be hauled out later in the year as they get untidy, but it is nice to see them again in spring.  I am getting a bit worried about the white alliums though and I think I might have to be more severe this year.

Kourosh flung a handful of Honesty seeds in front of the green plastic composteur and that has created a bright screen that I expect will be self perpetuating.

The Honesty is very popular with all the pollinators and I see a lot of orange tip butterflies on it.

This is a male Anthocharis cardamines.  They look so good against the purple petals,  I wonder if he is just showing off.

The purple Iris outside the front walls are beautiful and provide lots of colour but I have a difference of opinion with Kourosh here that they create too much work.  After the flowers have past I find that Iris stems provide ideal nursery spaces for all sorts of weeds and prevent efficient strimming along the base of the wall.

Contrary to the Iris, is the Choisya “Sundance” which is in flower just now and is a workhorse.  It gives you perfumed flowers and the yellow, evergreen foliage light up the winter garden.

Another impressive evergreen is my Lonicera tatarica.  It is in flower just now and survives in a dry, shaded spot in the back garden.

I don’t keep too many pots, but I love to have pots of Camassia on the patio at this time of year.  They attract a lot of bumble bees, so as soon as the sun is out in the morning we are out with a coffee and the bees are on the Camassia.

The queen bumble bees make a lot of noise as they go about their morning tasks.

The Anthophora bees are frequent visitors too.  This could even be a female A. plumipes as we have only the grey females here.

In the back garden it is the Victoria plum tree that attracts the bees at the moment.

I am pretty sure that this is an Andrena fulva.

However, this one I am not so sure of, but it might be an Andrena flavipes or Andrena nitida – see comments.  All comers are very welcome on the plum tree.

Another flower attracting all comers is the thyme.

I started this thyme off to cover a difficult patch between two tree.  I had already tried other options but this is thyme taken from patches growing wild in the garden and I have supported it by covering the edges with wood chip.  The tulips are from a previous idea and I’ll let them fight it out themselves as they seem pretty determined.

I am very happy with its spread and I am considering using it in other places to inhibit weeds in sunny spots.

This is a clump of self-sown Cerinthe.  Probably the biggest draw for solitary bees in the garden at the moment.  It is so thickly sown that it has completely suppressed weeds (well the nasty ones, I am not counting the borage and a bit of fumitory).  So, I cannot ask for more colour or more bees from this clump of flowers.