Bulbs and blossom

Many of the bulbs growing at Stokesay have been in the ground for nearly ten years now and have bulked up nicely, making masses of lush stems for us to pick from. The spring snowflakes are looking especially airy and starlike this year, and we’re so pleased to see that most of the fat hyacinths which we’ve planted over the years are coming back and multiplying. The same is true for the delicate snakeshead fritiallaries, even those growing in the vole-busy grass beneath the Amelanchier trees. These trees are especially pretty today, spangled with tiny white buds on the verge of popping open onto a froth of snowy white bloom.

But this is really the moment of the narcissi in both gardens. The well established plantings at Stokesay are producing a mass of creamy yellow, white and peach heads for us to pick, and several beds have had to be lifted and divided to freshen the bulbs up, and to give them more space to expand into. We’ve stopped planting new tulips, as we found them very labour intensive for a crop which only gave us two or three reliable years and which is also prone to disease, and instead have been indulging our curiosity for all the many wonderous and varied types of narcissi available to grow in gardens. This year, four big new beds at Downton have so far yielded delightful crops of new kinds, our favourite of which is call White Lion, an icy looking concoction of frills, seen in the image below alongside a rogue Yellow Lion…