I am glad to say that a few plants are making a show in the garden and, despite the cold and wet they are putting on a brave show. Of all the plants I have put in the garden in the past 3 years, six unnamed double pink hellebores on a north-facing bank have proved to be worth their weight in gold. They began flowering in November and are now at their peak. They are now large plants and covered in hundreds of flowers of a good pink, spotted within and ageing elegantly to green.

The mild weather has, famously, led to some early bulb flowers but the newly planted bulbs, because they were planted in October or November and consequently formed roots later than the established bulbs (and corms), have been a bit later. There were no Crocus tommasinianus in the garden here and I finally corrected that last autumn and the first are just starting to bloom. Though this has smaller and slimmer flowers than most I like it because it seeds freely and seems less tasty to vermin than others.

Now in its third spring, the Corydalis solida ‘Beth Evans’ have established well and are starting to fill in and cover the ground. I am not sure about the combination with yellow daffs (I would prefer white daffs really) but it is good to see something other than yellow, white or blue in spring.

I need to mention at least one snowdrop so here is Galanthus vernalis ‘Viridapice’. I brought a few bulbs over from my garden in the UK three years ago and planted individual bulbs or very small clusters so you can see how these have increased. It is an easy and vigorous plant with distinctive flowers with green tips to the outer tepals.

corydalis solida beth evans, galanthus vernalis viridapice, hellebores, pink corydalis, snowdrops