Slow Life Blog from the Lake District
  • Home
  • About Me
  • Contact Me

Joe Swift’s Howler

5/7/2010

0 Comments

 
Picture
I turned on the coverage of the Hampton Court Flower Show on BBC2 tonight, anxious for news of Philippa’s Girlguiding Centenary Garden (it turns out that we’ll have to wait until Friday’s show before Philippa’s garden is featured). The programme began with Rachel de Thame and Joe Swift enthusing about the highlights of the show and Joe Swift told us very excitedly that a species tree Dahlia, the Dahlia excelsa had flowered for the first time in the UK, in the Heritage Plants collection.
There then appeared on the screen a picture of a mauve dahlia flower with a yellow centre. Exactly the same flower in fact as in the photo here, which was taken in my garden a few minutes later. The plant in question is six feet tall and is one of three in flower at Yewbarrow House at the moment. I bought the plant from Crug Farm Plants several years ago and it is the first of the tree dahlias to come into flower. The RHS Plantfinder lists 4 nurseries which stock Dahlia excelsa, although none of them have any stocks available now, so it is indeed a rare plant, but it is one which has happily flowered outside at Yewbarrow House ever since I first obtained.
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.


    ​About Slow Life

    The idea of Slow Life is to take the principles of Slow Food, which are “good, clean and fair”, and extend them to life in general.

    Here in the Lake District, the air is clean, the pace is slow and the atmosphere is calm. If we don’t grow food ourselves, we can buy it in friendly small shops, where you know the quality is going to be the best.

    This blog is a celebration of the Slow Life, with forays into the world of design, music, the arts, gardens, and my particular weakness, Japan.

    Archives

    June 2017
    December 2016
    August 2015
    May 2015
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012
    June 2012
    May 2012
    April 2012
    March 2012
    February 2012
    January 2012
    December 2011
    November 2011
    October 2011
    September 2011
    August 2011
    July 2011
    June 2011
    May 2011
    April 2011
    March 2011
    February 2011
    January 2011
    December 2010
    November 2010
    October 2010
    September 2010
    August 2010
    July 2010
    June 2010
    May 2010
    April 2010
    March 2010
    February 2010
    January 2010
    December 2009
    November 2009
    October 2009

    RSS Feed

Home   |   About Me   |   Contact Me

Jonathan Denby's Slow Life blog from the Lake District

© Copyright Slow Life 2020. All rights reserved   |   cookie policy    |   Site by Treble3
  • Home
  • About Me
  • Contact Me