May 21

Laburnum beautiful this year. Bechtel crab [Malus ioensis plena] lasting well. Hawthorns good color. These tree(s) bloom together. Iris in bloom by May 12th. Poppy not yet started. Color combinations good are:

Side Garden.

Red Star Columbine [Aquilegia coerule] pretty with Hawthorn

Cherry Tulips [ Tulipa ‘Cherry Pink’?] tall & lovely just about gone—color not good with Hawthorn.

Iris pale lavender & I. ‘Susan Bliss’ good together – get darker shade near rock wall to place with this Iris. Purple violet nice with this Iris.

Elizabeth Lord Garden Journal 1937

 

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Columbine ‘Ruby Port’ looking splendid against the parterre bricks, with the yellow Roses starting to bloom.

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Aquilegia vulgaris with Foxgloves emerging in the background.

It was a soaker of a Monday with sporadic rains so far this week.  The recently planted summer annuals welcome the moisture as they get established. One thing I have noticed from reading the journal entries is that a many of the biennials and perennials including Digitalis, Papaver, Peonies and Delphinium bloomed much later for Edith and Elizabeth. In the journals,  these flowers are often mentioned in June and sometimes into July. Surely makes one wonder about the changing weather patterns and the phenology study one could run comparing the bloom times listed in the journals to the dates we see today.  I would love to have the journals for the missing decades (1945-1965) as they might provide some insight into the changes over the years.

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83 years to the day after the journal entry the Hawthorns at the entrance gate are blooming as if on cue.

Happy Gardening!

Mark