Arte y Pico? Surely some mistake...

Mrs Be at Carrots and Kids has awarded me the Arte y Pico award. I'm amazed and delighted - I'm sure it's thoroughly undeserved. What's even more flattering is the fact that I rather admire Mrs Be and her ability to run an allotment, bring up five kids AND write a blog.

Here's the 5 rules bit for this award (which I copied faithfully from Mrs Be):

1. Choose 5 blogs you consider deserving of this award for their creativity, design, interesting material, and contribution to the blogging community, regardless of the language.

2. Each award should have the name of the author and a link to his/her blog to be visited by everyone.

3. Each award winner should show the award and put the name and link to the blog that presented him/her with the award.

4. The award winner and the one who has given the award should show the Arte y Pico blog so everyone will know the origin of this award. Translated, it means "the peak of art."

5. Show these rules.

Now here's the tricky bit. I have to find five peope whose blog is considered worthy of the accolade "Peak of Art". This is more difficult than it sounds, because so many of the blogs I like have already received it. And trying to check whether the other ones I like have already received it (but just don't happen to be displaying the logo) is going to a, fry my brain and b, take me all year. So here's my choice. And if they already happen to have this award, well, they're obviously doubly fabulous.

First, to Benjamin Vogt at The Deep Middle whose posts have provided my brain with an aerobic work-out. I don't think I've thought so hard about anything since Metaphysics II.

Two, Kate at The Manic Gardener for combining wit, charm and political passion.

Three, to Garden Monkey for giving me some of the best laugh-out-loud moments I've had since I started blogging.

Four, to Zoe at Garden Hopping for knowing much more than me about both blogging and gardening, but not making a huge deal about it.

Five, to VP at Veg Plotting, for services to singing. She seems to know a bit about gardening too.

Hampton Court: the edited highlights

So, to the Hampton Court press preview yesterday beneath an inky sky of thunderous intent. I did indeed get wet, several times, but it failed to detract from the general jollity of the occasion. Here are the highlights:
Best meeting and greeting moment: Being introduced to the star of the sock wars, James Alexander-Sinclair. (He was judging, so looked extremely smart. Unlike me.) And meeting Lila Das Gupta, and Camilla Swift, and saying hello to old friends like Cleve West.
Best dry moment: Sheltering under Emma Townshend's umbrella and sharing a slice of lemon cake with her in Floral Marquee 3.
Worst wet moment: Walking home from the station carrying two heavy hemerocallis in torrential rain.
Best veg moment: Michael Balston's vegetable gardens outside the Growing Tastes marquee. And the Dorset Cereals garden.
Most bizarre moment: Talking to Norman Willis, former secretary-general of the Trades Union Council, and now a monthly columnist for Cross Stitcher magazine. (US readers: this is equivalent to Jimmy Hoffa Jr joining the American Needlepoint Guild.) Emma and I met him while watching a performance artist pretend to be stung by a bee in Floral Marquee 1. You couldn't make it up ...
Best guerrilla moment: Meeting Richard Reynolds, who has pioneered the guerrilla gardening movement in south London, and who had created his entire show garden out of a skip and other exhibitors' cast-offs. (He now has a book out, called On Guerrilla Gardening, available on Amazon.
Worst gorilla moment: Staring at an enormous bronze statue of a gorilla and wondering: Why????
Best floral moment: Admiring Yorkshire grower Dave Parkinson's gorgeous Disa orchids, and listening to Dave and his wife Mary telling funny stories.
Best Dave Parkinson funny story: A friend of theirs breeds cymbidium orchids and on one occasion bred a very fine yellow variety, which he named 'Margaret Thatcher'. He couldn't sell it for love nor money. We all got the giggles at that one.
Best fashion moment: Seeing how many coats Rachel de Thame requires to present one broadcast.
Best learning moment: Talking to canna expert Keith Hayward in the National Council for the Conservation of Plants and Gardens marquee
Best conceptual garden moment: Forest2 (Forest Squared), by Ivan Tucker
Worst photographic moment: Trying and failing to photograph Forest2 by Ivan Tucker. It consisted of a grove of birch trees, beautifully planted to look like a forest glade, and surrounded on three sides by mirror. The effect was to multiply the image so you saw an unending forest stretching into the distance. Unfortunately, I couldn't find a way of taking a picture that didn't include me reflected in the mirror, complete with hi-vis vest.
Worst photographic moment 2: The picture below. You probably can't see anything but it represents, from left, Emma Townshend, Camilla Swift, Lila Das Gupta and Cleve West.

Revenge of the euphorbia

I was crashing about in the undergrowth last Thursday, picking up dead fatsia leaves that had fallen on to things, and as I emerged from the border, I felt a strange burning sensation on my left leg. It wasn't agonising, just a vague burning, as if someone had applied a cream that had irritated my skin. I didn't really think anything of it, but by the time I'd been in the office all day, my lower leg and ankle had swelled so much, I could hardly walk. There was absolutely no itching at all, just pain, which was mainly caused by the swelling. I often react badly to mosquito bites, so when I got home, I took some antihistamine. After a night's sleep, and two antihistamines, the swelling had gone down a bit, but my leg still looked very red, so I went to the doc. (I had a bad bite last year, which got infected, and my whole arm swelled up, so I'm a bit twitchy about these things.)
The doc said it didn't look like an insect bite to him, and I agreed that I hadn't felt a sting, such as you might get from a wasp, and that I had felt the burning, which I wouldn't have got from a mosquito. He said it looked much more like an allergic reaction to some sort of plant, and his guess would be euphorbia, which leaves a distinctive red weal. We marked off the red area in pen, and he told me that if it spread beyond the marks, to take the antibiotics he gave me, and to try to keep my leg up to reduce the swelling.
There was some euphorbia where I'd been crashing around (E. amygdaloides 'Purpurea' to be precise) which I had cut back a couple of weeks earlier. Sensibly, I'd used rubber gloves when I cut it back, but stupidly, I'd forgotten it was there. I'm fairly sure that's what it was, as the euphorbia is the only plant in that area I can think of that is known to be a skin irritant.
By the time of this post, the swelling and the inflamed patch has gone down considerably, thanks to five days of antihistamines. You can just see the pen marks that showed how far the inflammation extended, but there's still a very obvious dark red mark on my leg which is where, I suspect, it rubbed against the euphorbia stems. I've posted the picture below as a warning to anyone like me who doesn't take the 'Toxic!' warnings on plant labels terribly seriously.

Happiness is a day at Hampton Court

It's the eve of the Hampton Court Flower Show, and thus a moment to celebrate in the gardening year. (The show opens on Tuesday to RHS members: the public gets in from Thursday). The world may be more familiar with the Chelsea Flower Show, but British gardeners, especially those in the south, love Hampton Court. I've always found this rather intriguing. I can understand why many people have a love-hate relationship with Chelsea. It's a top show, they agree, but it can be a bit of an ordeal. Too many people, they say, too many wacky show gardens, too many stands selling tasteless/expensive/unnecessary gardening accessories.
Hampton Court also attracts crowds of people. Its show gardens tend to be far wackier (sorry, conceptual), than Chelsea's. And it is stuffed with stands selling garden accessories, including a huge Country Living marquee that, as far as I can see, sells nothing but clothes. Yet we love it. It's partly, I think, because it has the atmosphere of a traditional English village fete (albeit on quite a large scale). The showground is three times bigger than Chelsea's too, so it seems more spacious. It has a fabulous setting, beneath the nose of Henry VIII's spectacular palace, and beside the Thames, which by the time it gets to Hampton Court, has taken on a more benign, leafy, cygnets-and-ducklings aspect. Saturday and Sunday are family days, so good for taking children. Most important of all for gardeners, however, you can buy plants. (At Chelsea, you can only place orders, which may make you feel like Vita Sackville-West as you grandly order your bulbs, but is slightly lacking in the instant gratification department.)
So what are the highlights this year? For me, the Plant Heritage marquee, run by the National Council for the Conservation of Plants and Gardens is always worth a look, as they usually have around a dozen National Collections holders who are more than happy to talk about their chosen species. Last year, there was a Rubus National Collection with not only ornamental brambles, such as the white-stemmed Rubus cockburnianus, but also amazing things that you wouldn't even recognise as being related to the humble blackberry. I've never had the slightest desire to plant brambles in my garden, but came away determined to instal at least three R. Cockburnianus until I came to my senses and realised I didn't actually want to re-enact a scene from Sleeping Beauty every time I went outside. Fantastic in the right place, though, and that's what makes the Plant Heritage exhibits so interesting. You have the chance to find out about things you'd never normally see or seek out.
Hampton Court regulars might like to note that the Plant Heritage marquee has changed places this year: it's now on the right as you enter from the Thames gate, to make way for the Meteorological Office's Climate Change Dome, which I'm dying to visit. I'm hoping Emma from A Nice Green Leaf will rendezvous with me there as we intend to have our picture taken with at least one BBC weather forecaster.
There's a big emphasis on fruit and veg this year, with a Growing Tastes marquee that will include the RHS summer fruit and veg show, cookery demonstrations and kitchen gardens: no less than three of them, showcasing British, Asian and Mediterranean produce. There's also a bit of a Thai thing going on along the Long Water, with a floating market consisting of genuine boats shipped in from Bangkok by the Thai tourist board. I think that's got to be a must-see, don't you?
One of the reasons I love Hampton Court is that it's one of the few places you can find a congregation (perhaps that should be a shoal) of water-garden nurseries without having to travel miles out of London. I always head for Lilies, based near Reigate, which is where I got the Nymphaea 'Highlight' for my pond that is pictured (rather incredibly inexpertly) below. It was in flower today for the first time this year, which I like to think is its way of celebrating Hampton Court. Mine involves a large Pimms.

Garden Bloggers' Muse Day: Virgil and his bees

Fired with enthusiasm following the success of the Big Green Leaf, I thought I'd get involved in yet another celebration: Garden Bloggers' Muse Day, which is the brainchild of Carolyn at Sweet Home and Garden Chicago.
This is a poem, but it doesn't read like poetry, because it is a translation (not many people these days read Latin fluently, including me). It is from Virgil's Georgics. Virgil was born in 70BC near Mantua in Italy and the Georgics celebrate his love of country life and farming. This extract, from the fourth book, gives advice on keeping bees. It seemed to me to be appropriate, given that there is grave concern currently about the health of bees and issues such as Colony Collapse Disorder. And when I read it, I am transported to a sunny, scented Italy centuries ago.

Let clear springs be near, and moss-green pools, and a tiny brook stealing through the grass;
and let a palm or huge wild olive shade the porch, so that, when the new kings lead forth the early swarms in the spring they love, and the youth revel in their freedom from the combs, a bank nearby may tempt them to quit the heat and a tree in their path may hold them in its sheltering leafage.
In the midst of the water, whether it stand idle or flow onward, cast willows athwart and huge stones, that they may have many bridges whereon to halt and spread their wings to the summer sun, if haply the East wind has sprinkled the loiterers or with swift gust has plunged them in the flood.
Åll about let green cassia bloom, and wild thyme with fragrance far borne, and a wealth of strong-scented savory; and let violet-beds drink of the trickling spring.

A Humungous Green Leaf

Emma at A Nice Green Leaf had the brilliant idea of focusing on foliage instead of flowers on 30 June with a celebration entitled The Big Green Leaf. I love flowers, but I always fall harder for foliage. I'm not sure why. Perhaps it's the result of gardening in London, which makes one so aware of year-round visual appeal, and contrasting shapes, and plants that screen you from the rest of the world, and things that do well in shade, such as ferns and Fatsia japonica. One of the great benefits of living in London, however, is that you can take advantage of the big-city greenhouse effect to grow things that might prove more challenging in the countryside. In my case, this has led to growing Even Bigger Green Leaves, such as hardy bananas (Musa basjoo) and Tetrapanax papyrifera. I protect the bananas in winter with fleece, but the tetrapanax is left to take its chance. I also have a couple of tree ferns, Dicksonia antarctica, but I don't wrap them up either. I leave any browned fronds on until I see the new growth, just to give them a bit of protection. Indeed, the trickiest plants in my garden are the Japanese maples, which don't like very dry conditions. In the summer of 2003 they really suffered, so last year's non-stop deluge from June to August was good news as far as they were concerned.

The spectacular leaves of Washingtonia filifera . It's growing in a pot, in a very sheltered position against a south-facing fence