Author Archives: JDO

I’ve been spoiled for choice for blips today, but in the end I couldn’t resist this. I don’t do much with bedding plants – I’m far too lazy to grow things that need regular attention – but I do love … Continued

A couple of weeks ago my next-door neighbour gave me nine seedlings of Cerinthe major which she had pulled out of her garden, warning me that it self-seeds so prolifically that once you have it you’ll never be without it. … Continued

Having said last week that all my split and replanted irises had come through dark purple, I now have some paler ones appearing too, which is fun. This bloom fell victim to some emergency weeding I was doing this morning … Continued

Oh. Apparently I’m not allowed into this wood to walk among the lovely bluebells. Many thanks to chantler63 for setting Barriers as the theme for Wide Angle Wednesday this week. It’s entirely my own responsibility, and not hers, that I felt … Continued

When I posted this blip I said that I would rephotograph Hall’s Croft in Stratford-upon-Avon when the wisteria was flowering, and today when I went into town to run some errands I managed to grab a couple of shots between … Continued

“Triffids were at large. Sometimes I saw them crossing fields, or noticed them inactive against hedges.” Many thanks to Dollykgray for hosting Mono Monday this month.

While weeding the garden this morning I spotted a perfect dandelion head. Always more than happy to be distracted by something shiny, I fetched camera and tripod and wasted spent twenty minutes taking shots. An hour after leaving it in … Continued

Wandering around the garden this afternoon with the 31mm extension tube and the 85mm lens on the camera, I was struck by how pretty the tiny pink flowers of Tamarix ramosissima pentandra were looking. It was a silly idea to … Continued

…. is what I’m called by absolutely no-one who knows me. I bought this Passiflora caerulea yesterday: after an administratively trying morning at the salt mine I thought I deserved a free coffee, so I popped in to Waitrose to … Continued

Up till last year there was a single, huge clump of irises in the front garden – it hadn’t been touched in all the years we’d lived here, and probably not for some time before that. The rhizomes had spread … Continued