Lately, I’ve been clearing in the woodland, getting ready for the snowdrop season, in between sweeping up all the autumn leaves, still a few more of those to do. Cutting back any dead bits, weeding any weeds out, generally just tidying up a bit so that the snowdrops aren’t having to compete with the winter’s detritus. When I have finished all this, then a mulch of lovely crumbly leaf mould will be spread round the snowdrops and hellebores as they seem to like it so much.
While it was still November I could see that the snowdrops were well on their way, poking their noses above ground, then suddenly I found a clump in the far left of the woodland that were actually flowering!
Faringdon Double
Farringdon is a village very near to us but has double “r” in it’s name so I am always misspelling the name of the snowdrop named after the village where it was first found. It is an early snowdrop, but I hadn’t realised that it was this early.
Faringdon Double.
By the end of November the flowers were pointing upwards like little penguins, then suddemly on Dec 2nd the flowers dropped down and were looking beautiful. They seem to have spread about a bit, maybe something has been digging in the area, the same something that has chewed their label maybe!
Rijnveldt’s Early Sensation
Snowdrops are not the only bulbs that are pushing up in the woodland, my early narcissus Rijnveldt’s Early Sensation aren’t far behind. They are usually out by Christmas and so far are looking very promising.
I am really enjoying getting out into the garden in the weak winter sunshine, I have my robin for company, he hops along behind me, pouncing on anything that wriggles whenever I clear a small patch of earth. Ladies from WI in the village will be coming in the first week of February to see the snowdrops once more, I just hope we aren’t under a foot of snow by then!
How special to have these blooming in December. Such sweet blooms would surely lure one out into the garden to explore.
Yes Peter, I’ll be out there each day now to see how they are doing and if any others have joined in.
Oh my patch of ‘Faringdon Double’ seems to be very much at the same stage Pauline. It seems to clump up well. It does seem to be on the early side this year. Funnily enough my outdoor clump is further on than the pots of spares I’ve got in the greenhouse 🙂
It has certainly increased well Anna, I only ever start off with one bulb of any variety. Something has moved the bulbs about, not me, maybe in a couple more years they will have formed a drift!
It’s lovely to see the start of the gardening year so early Pauline and I’m glad you’ve had weather conducive to being out in the garden with your companion Robin.
It started raining today while I was clearing more of the woodland Denise, but I just put my hood up and continued. After lunch though, the rain got a lot heavier so the afternoon session didn’t get done unfortunately. My robin seems to think that I’m his own personal food provider!
Your snowdrops do look very happy with their top dressing of leafmould. Some of my snowdrops flower in November but I don’t know their variety as they were bought as amixed pack.
The snowdrops do seem to do well with their mulch of lovely leaf mould Christina, it is worth all the sweeping up of the leaves each autumn and stacking them, waiting for them to rot down. They haven’t quite finished falling yet this year, hopefully the sweeping and raking will soon be over.
It’s nice to have winter flowers that tempt you outdoors to see how far on they are! Thanks for sharing. 🙂
It certainly is Cathy, the others won’t be very far behind, I’ll be checking on them all each day from now on.
I so admire your lovely drifts of snowdrops in your woodland garden. You have waited patiently for them to spread and are now reaping the beautiful benefits. I don’t have any snowdrops; but I do have snowflakes, which I have begun to spread about in the woodlands, hoping for a similar effect one day.
My snowflakes are spreading too Debs, they like the soil in the woodland as well as the snowdrops. It won’t be long before the other bulbs join in, they all seem to have their noses above ground, it is all a bit early.
Goodness, how wonderful to see snowdrops THIS early!!! All my bulbs are pushing through too, no doubt they’ll slow down when the cold really kicks in.xxx
I was certainly excited when I found them Dina, I hope they don’t mind the colder weather coming this week!