June garden notes

From my notebook on nature and the garden – June 2025

Snapdragon “lucky lips”, Phlox cherry caramel. rose Olivia Rose Austin, Nigella African Bride and Delft Blue, Cosmos Rubenza, Cornflowers, Lavender, Sweetpea (name long forgotten), Nigella seed pods.

June is quiet, it feels like a pause, a calming down, a deep breath, muffled somehow. The first flush of roses slowly scatter themselves to the ground and the bright colours of spring fade away. Green takes over again, not the bright, vivid green of spring, but the deeper almost-grown-up green of early summer, a little sulky and adolescent. The fields are quiet too, haymaking over, the farmers taking a well-earned rest as the crops start to grow, wheat slowly turning from green to gold as the days get hotter and longer.

I find what time I can to deadhead the roses, not just snipping off the spent flowers but cutting deeply down each stem, between the third and fourth sets of leaves to encourage fresh flowers later in the summer. My wheelbarrow fills quickly, dried flower heads, old leaves and stems and any of the spindly growth from the centre of each bush; anything growing inwards which might stop the airflow through each plant. I clear old leaves from the soil, trying not to trample the flowers growing in the borders as I go, leaning, bending, stretching to clear the earth.