123/365: The first spraying

Here are the roses getting their first spraying of the season - ahead of any signs of trouble. As far as greenfly are concerned, it's personal with J. He won't allow them house room. This follows an incident two years ago when we returned from holiday and found the roses crawling with greenfly. Yuk.

People complain that roses are demanding and prone to disease but I disagree. Provided you give them a little attention every now and then - spraying a couple of times in  the season and fertilising with Rose Plus - you get strong vigorous bushes and profusions of blooms. They are one of the hardiest plants I know, brutally pruned in the winter and then bouncing back every spring.

There are lots of buds so I'm looking forward to the first flower.

106/365: Mellow yellow

The back garden looks good at this time of year - there's a lot of yellow and the tulips are all coming out. As the spring progresses, I try to restore colour with plenty of containers but having a two week holiday early in June means I have to be careful about those which need too much water, so we never have as many as I would like. I find that when we get back from holiday, most of the best plants have gone from the garden centres.

I am hoping to try growing some dahlias this year. I particularly like the "Bishop" varieties with the dark leaves and dark red blooms.

I'll also be growing some fuchsias. When I was young I hated them, thinking they were overblown and kitsch. Now I love them for those qualities.

The "front garden" is just a flower bed and border. The flower bed has 12 roses, three varieties, and the border shrubs and bulbs. The roses look really healthy at this time of the year - all the same size and growing vigorously. I'll be a bit more judicious with the Rose Plus this year. Last year I gave them too much in May and while we had a magnificent display of flowers in May/June, they were exhausted until August.