If I was really smart, I would have made raised beds so that you don’t have to lie down or hold them by the neck to see their exquisite formations. I like narcissi, tulips and all the rest, but for sheer staying power and absolute reliability, they are outrun by the Hellebore and the Erodium. I think that if there was only one spring flowering plant for me, the Hellebore would come in in a tiebreaker with the Erodium. I left so many behind, which occasionally breaks my heart, but I am slowly and steadily adding to the few that I brought with me. Such good house guests.Īnd then there are the Hellebores. They are a beautiful emerald green presence, and happily die back in the summer to re-emerge in the winter. Easy to grow from seed, three years later, they are seriously clumping up, in fact I will need to chop some bits off next year as gardening is a little smaller scale here in Oloron. These Erodium pelargoniflorums are one of my early year favourites. First flower, Erodium pelargonifolium, February 2022, Oloron Sainte Marie Of course, weeks will pass while the stems elongate and finally the buds break, but it feels good to be at the beginning of that process.

Having planted about 60 Allium nigrum and atropurpureum bulbs in late November on the stony, garrigue slope at the front, it was grand to see all of them, bar a few, poking through so strongly in early Feburary. I do quite a lot of laughing, some of it hysterical! And the air is sometimes blue, but only in English.Īllium nigrum coming up, February 2022, Oloron Sainte Marie I love it, and the point of the blog? Is to share some of the ups and downs, and hopefully, for readers to enjoy it and laugh with me. It’s a delight and a constant source of renewal and enjoyment. So, plants can be a bit challenged as can humans. Damp, sometimes very cold, winters and springs can give way to very dry, hot summers with occasional sharp and very wet storms that batter everything. But, although the growing season is long, it is a tricky climate to master, and will always trip you up. Where it faces South, it bakes like a biscuit, but in the shade, and especially by the banks of the canal or ruisseau that flows at the bottom, it can offer more gentle conditions to shade-lovers. and so it is chockful of giant washed river stones, and very free draining. The ground is essentially the old riverbed of what is now the Adour River.

Photo credit: Hyacinthe Garcia April 2015

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