A mixed bag of weather this week has left us all with rosy cheeks. Sunshine, rain, hail, sleet, gales and that's just in the last hour! There is little more irritating to a gardener than the ‘Gardeners Dance' where no sooner have you peeled off all your layers of warm clothing to avoid being boiled alive before the sun retreats, the heavens open and you're racing to put them all back on again off again on again! It's not all bad though, after a sharp shower the trees and shrubs are bejewelled with droplets of water that glisten in the sunshine.

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The spring sunshine certainly made a difference to the garden this week, not least because the gardeners were able to strip off their thermals and bask in the warm sunshine! The gorgeously scented Daphne bholua ‘Jacqueline Postill’ is still surprising visitors in the scented garden – a must have winter shrub if ever there was one! Read More...

One moment I was on the snowy slopes of Les Correz in the French Alps bathed in glorious sunshine, skiing ……..the next, in the woodland at Harlow Carr marvelling how a few days warmth has breathed colour and life back into one of my favourite areas of the garden,(well, apart from the main borders!). The rhododendrons are looking big and blousy…not only are the flowers a visual feast, but the bark on these magnificent specimens is really beautiful. Check out R. barbatum, lipstick red and the sugar pink species further down the glade. Well worth a stroll….

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Trampolining frogs are not the first thing you expect to see on a Monday morning! But there he was in all his fairy tale majesty, bouncing gently on the pond net we were to remove. Saw us and with one jump, through a hole in the net, joined his froggy friends sub aqua.

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