Last Saturday the urge to visit a plant nursery was very strong but somehow it still felt too early in the season to see the best of what most nurseries have so we left it hanging. Not knowing now what to do on that day I checked out our blog to see what we did around the same time last year and there it was, a visit to one of our top favorite places to buy plants: Beeches Nursery. Blogs are great like that, an online diary that you can reference to remind yourself on things you have done before.
So if we visited this nursery around the same time last year and we came home happy then it shouldn't be too early to visit it then, and so Saturday became a Beeches Nursery day!
We've blogged about this fabulous nursery several times before and have sung them many praises. Our general opinions about the place still remains the same: that it is a very well organised nursery that are of full rare and unusual plant treasures! A 'Cornish Nursery' in the east of the country!
Anyway on to the shopping!
As usual we spent hours browsing through their rows and rows of plant sales tables, polytunnels and their large greenhouse which contains some of the more obscure plants they have, as well as tender ones.
Gorgeous, touchable plant originally from Cyprus - Sideritis cypria. Will need a sheltered spot though!
A Dan Hinkley collection, the hardy Begonia emeiensis
They have a good selection of Impatiens, most are hardy too
Not so rare but looks great with its stressed flush - Mahonia nervosa
Ribes speciosum
Major want! Two came home with me - Trachelospermum jasminoides 'Waterwheel'
Woodland plants selection
The great Astilboides tabularis - highly recommended!
Veratrum selection
Trillium selection
Podophyllum and other woodland plant selection
The wonderful Pelboykinia watanabei - another woodland plant we highly recommend and we're fortunate enough to have it now self seeding in our garden
I liked this one a lot but decided to leave it for now - Euphorbia characias 'Black Pearl'
Dainty airy foliage - Sophora molloyi 'Dragon's Gold'
This is one of their display containers with mixed planting which highlights how lovely and exotic looking Beesia calthifolia (left) is.
Just loved the foliage of these two Tasmanian beauties and one of each came home with me...
And what did we came home with? A good lot as usual, consisting of understory and woodland plants, shrubs, and small trees which includes two replacement plants, Aesculus parviflora which we inexplicably lost last winter much to our great surprise and a Piptanthus nepalensis which we lost in the garden fire. Our other purchases were:
Several ever reliable Epimedium and you can also spot in the middle Gunnera perpensa
Supposed to be an Agastache rugosa 'Golden Jubilee' but I'm very doubtful as the leaves look very different from the Agastache that I'm familiar with. The description of having large and ornamental leaves seems spot on though...
Whatever it is, I like a lot!
Ozothamnus rosmarinifolius 'Silver Jubilee' - just realised on this lot I took home a silver and a gold jubilee!
Ozothamnus 'Threave Seedling'
Polygonatum humile
Try and try and we might succeed this time - the should be easy but for us it isn't Gunnera magellanica
We have the double,why not get the single too - Sanguinaria canadensis
Impatiens omeiana 'Pink Nerves'
Thalictrum ichangense
Not much to look at now but it will quickly look much better. The not so hardy but so exotic looking, with its potentially huge and glossy leaves Pseudopanax laetus (syn. Neopanax laetus)
And finally, it's been on my wishlist for quite some time and for some strange reason remained elusive until now. The much hardier Pseudopanax arboreus (syn. Neopanax arboreus). If you like the look of P. laetus but want a much hardier plant then this is the one to go for. This plant has toothed leaf margins while P. laetus tends to have smooth ones.
Another fabulous haul and most satisfying visit it was to Beeches Nursery!Mark :-)
