Put a smile on your garden
Country Life UK|September 11, 2024
John Hoyland celebrates the renewed popularity of the irrepressibly cheerful pelargonium
Put a smile on your garden

NEVER trust a man or a woman who is not passionately devoted to geraniums.’ Garden writer Beverley Nichols’s typically tongue in-cheek, overblown remark hides a truth: how can anyone not be captivated by the exuberance of blowsy red geraniums tumbling down the facades of public houses, adorning terraces in terracotta pots or lined out in spectacular bedding schemes? These are plants that make us happy, bringing a smile to even the most curmudgeonly.

Nichols was writing in 1951, when a generation emerging from a world war welcomed the pizzazz of bright red geraniums. These are flowers that have never really gone out of fashion, but, as with all plants, the extent of their popularity has ebbed and flowed. In recent years, the focus of many gardeners and garden designers has been on more subdued flowers, species plants that have a look of the wild about them, as extravagant, colourful flowers have been overlooked, even dismissed as vulgar; but a plant as easy to grow, long flowering and cheerful as a hybrid geranium will always be a mainstay of summer gardens. And thanks to a group of geranium enthusiasts, the colourful hybrids seem to be enjoying a renaissance.

What Nichols knew as geraniums are, as any botanist or horticulturalist will waste no time in pointing out, not geraniums at all, but pelargoniums. True geraniums are hardy peren- nials, stars of herbaceous border and meadow, but with none of the vibrancy of pelargoniums. As long ago as 1901, The Gardener’s Chronicle was bemoaning the fact that ‘the average gardener speaks of Geraniums when he means Pelargoniums’. This is still true for most of us today, with the names being almost interchangeable: when most of us talk of geraniums we usually mean pelargoniums.

Denne historien er fra September 11, 2024-utgaven av Country Life UK.

Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.

Denne historien er fra September 11, 2024-utgaven av Country Life UK.

Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.

FLERE HISTORIER FRA COUNTRY LIFE UKSe alt
Tales as old as time
Country Life UK

Tales as old as time

By appointing writers-in-residence to landscape locations, the National Trust is hoping to spark in us a new engagement with our ancient surroundings, finds Richard Smyth

time-read
2 mins  |
November 13, 2024
Do the active farmer test
Country Life UK

Do the active farmer test

Farming is a profession, not a lifestyle choice’ and, therefore, the Budget is unfair

time-read
3 mins  |
November 13, 2024
Night Thoughts by Howard Hodgkin
Country Life UK

Night Thoughts by Howard Hodgkin

Charlotte Mullins comments on Moght Thoughts

time-read
2 mins  |
November 13, 2024
SOS: save our wild salmon
Country Life UK

SOS: save our wild salmon

Jane Wheatley examines the dire situation facing the king of fish

time-read
3 mins  |
November 13, 2024
Into the deep
Country Life UK

Into the deep

Beneath the crystal-clear, alien world of water lie the great piscean survivors of the Ice Age. The Lake District is a fish-spotter's paradise, reports John Lewis-Stempel

time-read
4 mins  |
November 13, 2024
It's alive!
Country Life UK

It's alive!

Living, burping and bubbling fermented masses of flour, yeast and water that spawn countless loaves—Emma Hughes charts the rise and rise) of sourdough starters

time-read
4 mins  |
November 13, 2024
There's orange gold in them thar fields
Country Life UK

There's orange gold in them thar fields

A kitchen staple that is easily taken for granted, the carrot is actually an incredibly tricky customer to cultivate that could reduce a grown man to tears, says Sarah Todd

time-read
3 mins  |
November 13, 2024
True blues
Country Life UK

True blues

I HAVE been planting English bluebells. They grow in their millions in the beechwoods that surround us—but not in our own garden. They are, however, a protected species. The law is clear and uncompromising: ‘It is illegal to dig up bluebells or their bulbs from the wild, or to trade or sell wild bluebell bulbs and seeds.’ I have, therefore, had to buy them from a respectable bulb-merchant.

time-read
3 mins  |
November 13, 2024
Oh so hip
Country Life UK

Oh so hip

Stay the hand that itches to deadhead spent roses and you can enjoy their glittering fruits instead, writes John Hoyland

time-read
4 mins  |
November 13, 2024
A best kept secret
Country Life UK

A best kept secret

Oft-forgotten Rutland, England's smallest county, is a 'Notswold' haven deserving of more attention, finds Nicola Venning

time-read
3 mins  |
November 13, 2024