Wonderful Delphiniums ....... I just love delphiniums, even though they are hard work, magnets for slugs and this wet windy weather makes it a fight to keep them upright I cannot resist the grandiose blue, purple, pink and white spires. I love the muted shades of the ones in the photograph but also the brilliant sharp blues, the eyes that look like bees- somehow they are just worth the trouble.

Delphiniums grow easily from seed, and flower the same year. They need extensive slug protection but once established grow into very sizable clumps putting up massive flowers spikes. Don't think what you bring home from the garden centre is it,  with one or two flower spikes, once established Delphiniums produce up to a dozen flower spikes from the one plant,  which look fantastic in the border.

It is essential to stake delphiniums in a way which supports them so the whole plant sways in the wind. If you stake just the bloom, it will often snap, the whole plant has to flex.

When the main stem has flowered cut it back and you will get secondary shoots. Delphiniums are herbaceous which means they die back completely in the winter  and they do require a fair amount of attention. As always, gardens are as individual as fashion; what one person loves another hates. I am sure many gardeners will read this and shudder at the thought of Delphiniums but  I cannot imagine a garden without them.

Pelargoniums make great plants for the conservatory tolerating high temperatures and making a colourful display. In a conservatory Pelargoniums will grow quite tall and busy reminiscent of those seen in Europe trailing off balconies and displayed in gardens. They will overwinter in the conservatory and then can be brought into flower in late spring. I found it hard to find plants which would survive the fluctuations in temperature in a conservatory, and the Pelargonium fits the bill.

Taking cuttings enables you to get new plants for free, and is very easy. From now on wards is a good time to take cuttings. Below are some photos of Pelargoniums just in case you are not sold, and a slide show on how to take cuttings which is:

1. Cut off a piece from the plant non flowering just above the third joint from the growing tip. 2. Fill pot with seed compost and firm down - air pockets will prevent the cutting from rooting and stand in water so the compost becomes wet. 3. Drain  insert cuttings and firm in. 4 Put in warm light place, away from direct sun, and do not cover either propagator or bag, in this way these cuttings are different. do not watter. 5. About week or so later water from below again, repeat until rooted about 2/3 weeks and then pot up into their own separate pots.

This method works the slide show has a tray of Pelagonium cuttings in different stages and the ones on the right are growing on nicely and by next year will be good bushy plants. 

In my ignorance, I thought Vita Sackville-West was a gardener of grandiose design and would have nothing to say to a gardener of today with a modest garden and not a lot of time. By chance I came across a copy of "In your Garden" first published in 1951. I found it in a charity shop in Guernsey ( a further Blog on this, what a wonderful island full of plants and amazing flowers) and was hooked once I started reading. Its appropriate to Blog this today  23.06. as it is 50years since her death.

The book comprises of her series of articles which appeared in the Observer and her  writing is easy to read and with great imagination. Vita Sackville-West can describe a plant to inspire your gardening interest just by her prose, a real talent among the instant images of today with photos and TV. There are some plants in the book I have never heard of and just by her description I am on a trail to find them. Her ideas are practical and make sense today. I was taken by her idea of growing Clematis laterally by pegging it down as I am short of walls for them to grow up. I liked also her descriptions of thymes being willing to grow in poor thin soil as a awkward spot immediately came to  my mind which has so far defied my efforts to plant into it.

I don't buy many old gardening books as they can be dry and hard to related to, not Vita Sackville West I will look out for more and I recommend her as a good gardening read.

This week, passing through Birmingham, I thought to take a look at the Botanical gardens. Unfortunatelydue to the torrential monsoon weather it wasn't at its best. The plus side was I had the garden all to  myself. I suppose it is comforting, in a strange way, to know that even experts at Botanical gardens can't fight the weather and there were less flowers than would be usual for the time of year which all gardeners are complaining about. The Aruncus (left) looked very spectacular, a bold statement which on first glance can be mistaken for Astilbe but closer inspection shows it to be Aruncus which is a moisture loving plant so no surprise it looked good in the weather. There was also a nice patch of Nepeta planted on mass (right) which looked good and is a great alternative to Lavender which needs good drainage and no winter wet.

Despite the awful weather the sight of the rain on leaves is lovely.....