I STUCK MY FOOT IN A GARDEN - and a present

I'm not a gardener. And this blog is mainly for hedgerow plants (with a bit of seaweed thrown in).

HOWEVER . . . when I went out with my camera to advertise the up-coming stuck-foot post . .  the wind was blowing and everything was waggling about: branches, leaves, grass - and me!

I'd taken only about fifteen steps before I gave up and scurried home.

So I borrowed a garden and stuck my foot there - there where walls gave some protection from the wind.

Then I plonked myself in the only available pool of sunlight and set myself to see what I could see.

I saw beautiful red cotoneaster leaves on the branches of a bush that had been grown as a standard.

I saw beautiful red cotoneaster berries in an empty terracotta flower pot.

I saw a red chrysalis (or something along those lines) in the pot-bound roots of a box bush stood in water before being untangled. And I saw a ripple of light in the water.

I saw heart shaped leaves and dead leaves.

And I saw an old vine branch with the dried out twiddly bit that would have fixed it to something if it had found something to fix itself to.

And all this time - I didn't move a foot. Not the slightest slither. A stuck foot post.

This is the idea.

There's more about it on the Stuck Foot Post Page.

Are you a Stuck Footer? If so - there will be a link box for Stuck Foot Posts on next week's Loose and Leafy. (21st - 25th January 2015)

* * *

And now for the present. Well, it's not exactly a present. It's a 'You can have this book if you review it on your blog' situation.

Featuring over 1,000 plants
RHS Companion to Scented Plants 
is an authoritative guide
to creating beautiful,
well designed gardens
that are highly scented,
and shows how scent can turn
a good-looking garden
into an unforgettable one.
Price - £25
(But your's will be a present
if you'll review it for me
'cos you are a gardener.)

It's the Royal Horticultural Society's 'Companion to Scented Plants'. It arrived before Christmas and I really have been too busy to give it proper attention. Do you have time to give it yours?

I also have a problem with this book. It's probably to do with not being a gardener. It's ever so thick. (And heavy!) It has masses of pictures and loads of information. There are chapters about

Planning Your Garden

Planting With Trees and Shrubs

Walls and Vertical Planting

Roses

Herb Gardens . . .

those sorts of things.

And each chapter has a list of plants with descriptions.

Which is all good.

So what's my problem? I like honeysuckle to be called 'Honeysuckle' and have 'Lonicera' in brackets. I like jasmine to be called Jasmine and hyssop to be under 'Hyssop' not 'Hyssopus'. I'm a heathen. A barbarian. A street urchin. Latin is useful. Latin is important. Latin should be there. But me? If I see Latin coming first my prejudices run riot and I get cross. Which is not fair to the book.

So . . .

as many of you are gardeners, there's bound to be one who can give this book its proper credit. Volunteer to review it by saying so in the comments (by the end of February) and I'll pick a person at random and post it to you. How's that?
(I'm really sorry but the offer has to apply to Europe only - (including whatever we're called - UK? GB? something along those lines!) - postage costs!)

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WHY NOT STICK YOUR FOOT?

Wherever you stick your foot you'll find something interesting.
If I hadn't stood still, I might never have noticed Bittersweet
(Solanum dulcamara)
hiding in pampas grass.
Bittersweet, like Deadly Nightshade is related to potatoes and tomatoes.

Rashly, I said I'd that on the 21st August I'd include a link box for 'Stuck Foot Posts'.

If I hadn't left my foot in the same place I wouldn't have noticed
a small buddleia hiding behind an equally small contoneaster.
(I think it's a form of contoneaster - but maybe it isn't?)

Why rashly? Because first I went away. Then I stripped everything off my computer so couldn't use it till enough was reinstalled to get it going again.

Standing beside a hawthorn three and looking up,
haws and sky catch the eye.
But there's gorse beyond.

And I think my heart and brain got left behind in a field in Wales so I'm a bit distracted and thinking I'd like another holiday.









But I'd like to encourage you to join me by sticking your foot for Wednesday - or some time in the following days - hence this post.

A stuck foot post is one in which you choose a place to stand, put your feet firmly in one place and see what you can see.

It can be a place chosen at random or a place well loved. What's best is to find what you wouldn't have noticed if you hadn't put your foot there.

Below the hawthorn so many plants I could have written a post by choosing nothing
more than one square foot of ground.
Prominent in this picture is a teasel plant. (Dipsacus.)
They're odd, teazles.
In their first year they stay small. In their second they grow tall.
And it seems you can spell their name any old way you like.
I like the 'teasle' way. Which is probably the wrongest.

There's more information on the special page for Stuck Footers. If you'd like to be added to the page as a blogger who occasionally writes a Stuck Foot post - let me know and I'll add a link to the page.

Stuck Foot link boxes will be sprinkled through the year.

Here are the dates
August 21st
November 21st
March 21st

* * *

Other News

There are two new links on the 'Identifying Things' page.

SEDUMS (Rebecca's Bird Gardens) - Sedums can be found as much growing in the wild as in gardens and their variety seems almost endless. Try looking on walls and between the stones in car-park gravel. (I was inspired to look around for Sedum information by Amanda's post about urban wild plants - Urban Plants at the Town Hall.

BRITISH BUGS (Shield Bugs and Co.) This is a site still under construction but there's already much there. The photos are wonderful. The creatures extraordinary. Many beautiful. (The British Bugs site is run by Tristan Bantock. You can find him on Twitter at - @BritishBugs 

* * *
Here's a Stuck Foot Post I wrote in July.

If you'd like to join me in writing a Stuck Foot Post for August . . .

there will be a link box on the 21st.

It will open at 7am (UK time) and close on September 1st at 7pm.

Loads of time to take part.

Easy to remember - 21st to the 1st.

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THE BERRIES MATURE

It's possible, I suppose, a moment may come when I loose my interest in ivy. For the moment, though, it runs un-diminished. Their earlier golds have mostly vanished. Instead, there are blues and greens and browns on show. It's very hard to move on.

Sometimes, I adjust pictures a little - cut out glare from shiny leaves, take a few shadows away to reveal detail. This time, so you can tell how wonderful the variety is, so you know it hasn't been introduced by editing, the pictures for this post are exactly as they came out of the camera (except for cropping off some of the edges so you can see the berries centre stage).

Can't wait to hear what you think!

There are olive greens.

And chestnut browns.

And blueberry blues.

Some are hanging low where the new Alexanders grow.

And some hang on to memories of autumn fireworks.

There are masses and masses of them.

Beautiful.

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THE BERRIES TURN BLACK FOR CHRISTMAS

Christmas Eve.

The sun touches the elder

and the blackthorn is stark against the sky;

the buddleia has lost its senses

and a magpie pauses.

Best of all, the ivy berries have turned black for Christmas. I didn't think they'd make it but a few have managed to turn in time.

All's well with this little bit of the world.

Hope all is well with you too.

Have a very happy Christmas and a happy, hedgeful 2012.

(All photos were taken today, December 24th 2011.)

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EXPLODING IVY

December 2nd 2011

I'm stuck. I'm well and truly stuck. I've tried to understand - and failed.

Julia of Plot 108 has tried to help me out. She's given me some very useful links (here's one) - but I'm still lost. I really can't understand ivy.

I see it creeping on its little feet behind the loose bark of trees, burdening branches, pulling down walls. I know you can grow a new plant if you cut off a piece that has toes - but when it comes to its flowers and berries - I'm lost but entranced.

December 2nd 2011

Ivy persists and blunders its way into almost anything. Ditto me. In the true spirit of this blog, I will not let ignorance get in its way.

December 2nd 2011

When the berries are ripe, they will be black. They are far from this yet but all sorts of other stages are around together so, by posting before the sequence is complete, I hope these pictures will encourage you to go and look for yourselves.

December 2nd 2011

November 4th 2011

Ivy produces flowers only where it is sunny - and it is often allowed to thrive only in shade - which is why many of us are unfamiliar with what they look like. And where it flowers, its leaves change. They become elongated instead of heart shaped.

November 4th 2011

And why do I talk of explosions? . . . I first began taking photographs of ivy at the beginning of November, just when our town had a firework display. I'd always assumed the huge ones with which such events always end represent chrysanthemums. Now I know I've been wrong. They are ivy.

November 17th 2011

Just see below!

November 3rd 2011

November 4th 2011

November 4th 2011

Not all of them make it . . .

November 17th 2011

But many do - and, when they are ripe and black and it's time to sing carols about them - it will be Christmas!

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