Thursday 1 June 2017

Whilst waiting for a Planting Fairy, I Spy a Phormium.

I had hoped to get the final few plants planted today, I placed them where I wanted them for now and ran out of energy, so sat down hoping to find some.........

The gardener I used before to help me create the Arid bed has become very unreliable, probably because he has gone 'fulltime' gardening and is picking the big jobs.

So there I was sitting down looking at this


can you see what I spotted........                       in the Phormium?


A flower spike, not 1,


not 2,



not 3,

not 4,


but 5 flower spikes that I can see. I know its not really that exciting to you, but for me it is.

Back in 2014, I created a new bed and planted the Phormium


I had no idea it was going to grow as big as it has



and its not the prettiest of plants but what I love about it, is, how it hides part of the garden. Its tall and erect.  Since hubby had the 'motorway' put in straight down the centre of the garden it is very difficult to put in 'surprises' round corners,especially when there is none, (corners that is), so to a certain extent this does that.

I actually don't 'look after it' very well, in fact I don't look after it at all. Occasionally I throw some chicken pellets on it and even more occasionally I remember to water it, other than that it just grows.

So I have done some reading up on Phormiums and according to the 'bumph' I have read it looks like this could do with being split after its flowered.

Hysterical laughter !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

That is not going to happen, but what I did come across is one guy uses an old saw and saws down into the ground taking off  'fans' of leaves from around the outside. I thought this was genius idea and a damn sight easier than digging half of it out and as you know I am 'it has two chances, live or die' type of girl.

I will keep you posted.


3 comments:

  1. How nice! Like the phormium telling you it's doing just fine and thanking you for it :) when we had one and it flowered we didn't bother doing anything to it, splitting etc. The seeds are likely to be viable btw, had several sprout the following year and had to weed them out.

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  2. Oh my goodness, I'm not sure I want a couple more of these. May cut the flower spikes off at the end of the season rather than have this happen!!!

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  3. Good luck with your flower spikes and I hope you will post photos when they emerge!

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