I had a lovely surprise in the garden today. Two completely different things, both quite remarkable. The first one is rather small but very welcome. Some years ago I used to buy a gardening magazine and in those days they offered a plant, for free with me just paying the cost of postage. One of these was a tree peony, white flowering. I planted it next to the little fence in the front garden, it flowered for a number of years. Eventually it got smothered by the hydrangea growing nearby. In the spring I decided to dig it out and hoped that it would survive. It got very leggy so I gave it a severe haircut, there wasn’t much left of it but I planted it in a large pot nevertheless. I kept looking at it, it looked rather dead so today was the day to act. I wanted to pull it out of the pot and compost it. However as I looked I saw a few little buds and I was delighted. It is worth waiting a bit longer, there must’ve been enough life in the roots.

I gave it some new soil on the top of the pot and now will just wait.

The next surprise is even better. It is a long time ago that we went to Istanbul for a long weekend and of course we went for a number of tasty meals. On one occasion we had fresh fruit as a dessert and of course I collected the dark brown seeds from the apple-like fruit. At home I planted them in a pot and two of them germinated. I found out the name of the plant – Eriobotrya japonica or loquat. It grew to a lovely large tree and is very happy in the front garden. I knew when it should flower and bear fruit but I didn’t think I would see any flowers on my tree. Until today that is.

I’m not sure if I will have any fruit but even just to see it flowering is great.