Lilac Memorys

Sundays...Days of Roast dinners, reading newspapers, visiting family and friends, a church day if you are religeous, a good day to relax and watch the garden.

I listened to BBC Gardeners Question time on the BBC website. A million listeners sit down at 3pm on Sunday and listen to the questions.

For about fifty years the changing panel of horticultural experts and professional gardeners sit and answer the questions.

They only hear the question when they are asked and have to answer from their expert knowledge.

The program was from the Isle of Wight, in a Botanical garden. Gardening is a mixture of knowledge and experimentation. I got a book with a selection of the repetitive questions asked over the fifty years.

Plants for different types of soil and aspect, plant diseases, pests, how to grow fruit, pruning shrubs and roses, why plants have not flowered etc. Some of the questions were more personal like what were the panels childhood gardening memories.

The Panel reminisced...Eating gooseberry's on a coal shed and throwing a glider....picking limes with galls off a tree and putting them in a bottle....the memories of walking in Southern woods with the smells of common plants.

My nans twin Hazel says I used to stand in front of her Lilac Tree in Pickering. I cant remember that but I love lilac tree with the sweetly scented flowers. Maybe the Scent takes me back to being 3 years old...

The Weather seems to have turned again, the nights are getting cooler. The rain continues to fall often.

I will start looking this week for a house, preferably with gardens at front and back. Even an overgrown weed mess would be good.

The Flat has grown lots of plants, but the damp conditions and light have proved fatal to a lot of them.The difference between plants grown in a greenhouse with light from all sides, and here with light from one side is amazing.

All the plants will have to be boxed up soon and moved.That will be a lot of Boxes! Then Snappys Gardens blog can be about my garden. I am sure there will be room for a Syringa Vulgaris, a Lilac tree!