2025/38 - And suddenly Autumn is in the air!

 The summer of 2025 has been both lovely and a tad frustrating for the gardener in me. Lovely because we enjoyed a lot of sunny, hot days, great for the soul. Frustrating because the rainy days we've had since February (!) can be counted on less than ten fingers. And it shows!

The trees are dropping their leaves already, and at an alarming rate. When Puck and I do our daily rounds, they crackle beneath our feet. The bushes are drying out, so blackberries shrivel up before they can be eaten. So I worry. I worry about our lovely summer Oaks which line our streets. I worry about the hedgehogs. And I get frustrated with the desert that my garden has become by now.

This was my Yellow Raspberry on Sept.1st 2024. This year I picked the last fruit (which was scant but lovely) on August 2nd. And its leaves are yellow by now, eventhough I have watered it. The Redcurrant next to it has shrivelled up and died. Oh my giddy aunt! Where will this end?

This was at our 06.00 morning walkies, and you can see the leaf litter under the trees. Still. Puck enjoyed her sniff very much, thank you, and afterwards I hurried to Hunky Dory to water the pots.

Where I was welcomed by this sight. There are worse ways to die than on a flower in the night, I suppose. Its mates were busily zooming around visiting the other Scabious, no one paid it the slightest bit of notice. Poor thing. But it lives on in this blogpost.

Well. Will you look at that?! Sowing the seed in the greenhouse (2 packets!) watering it, singing to it, mollycoddling it, then rescuing the survivors from scorching by putting them in a pot, where they could at least try to survive outside. Because I watered it daily. Sigh. And what do you get? One flower. More to come, at least three more...out of 2 packets. Sometimes this gardening lark is an exercise in humility.

But at least my Hydrangeas were grateful for the water. They are going over now, but have been valiantly looking good.

Is it all sad then? Of course not! This wonderful Papyrus is looking great despite its feet now standing in almost dried out slush. And so is its family, which is colonising the north side of the frog pond. I honestly think it is one of the most attractive reeds there is, especially now that it is getting its autumn colour.

The Malus and Sedum are turning as well. I think this is Sedum 'Herbstfreude', but I am not quite sure as I got it from a gardener who wanted to get rid of it and the others that live in my garden now.

Naturalistic planting

This photo is a good example of how my naturalistic planting in the 'hot bed' is evolving. The hottest plants (blood red Crocosmia) have now turned to seed, the Yellow Achillea, which scorched, is not giving up, but the Carex grass is definitely trying to take over the entire bed. Let me tell you, it looks easy, and when you get it just right it looks bloody amazing, but it is not easy at all! That Carex was a mistake for starters.

But I'll leave you with the first Aster novi-belgii that has come out. I have many kinds in the garden, and they, believe it or not, are looking absolutely fine so far. So I am looking forward to a colourful month of September at least! 

Despite the terrible drought this has been a good summer. I will pickle the last courgette today, eat the last of my Yellow zebra tomatoes and have a few purple Plums. I hope you'll have a good weekend!

Do follow this blog if you like what I write, and there is a new blogpost on my website about a couple of meet-and-greets for when you happen to be in the area: Renée Grashoff Schrijft

Renée Grashoff 

2025/30 - Some you win, some you lose...

 July, true Summer, and my garden has exploded. This year the Crocosmia I planted three years ago have decided they would finally show what they are capable of. Finally my 'hot border' looks hot instead of lukewarm.

Needless to say I am very happy. The Lilies (both dark red and deep orange) are doing well too. But where is the gorgeous burnt sienna Alchemilla? Vanished. The yellow one is still there, but has hardly grown.

I planted the orange one behind the broom. Oh well.

The Clivia is much happier now that she is partly in the shade of the Silver Pine, and the dark red Heuchera is blooming. But I realised, whilst mowing my grass paths, that that part of my path is disappearing under the growth of that tree... placing my circle in the middle no longer in the middle. Beginner's mistake.

My neighbour has pulled his onions. There is something deeply satisfying in a harvest, I think, even if it is not my own! Lovely glaucous greenery.

Despite some leaf wilting affliction my Buddleia are blooming happily. And the Echinacea are wonderful.

I adore them! Those Fibonacci spirals!

And they make a lovely contrast with the drumstick Aliums. My pink/purple border definitely lives up to its name now.

Mind you, the yellow one does its best as well. I decided to make use of the rampant Solidago and planted a Fennel, not knowing that that Fennel would be equally as rampant. But it has quite a nice effect, don't you think?

The other corner of my plot is a mix of yellow and purple, so that it then morphes into the purple border. There is method in my chaotic madness ;-)

My daily watering of the Hydrangeas has paid off, they are not wilting despite the dry soil in that border. But I think that self-seeded red Currant will have to go... it is too near the path.

My efforts of hiding the useful but ugly water butts are paying off. My other neighbour told me he has used the seed of my special red Lily, and it has come up in his garden. That's so cool.

Okay, I'll leave you with a pic of my Rose. It is in its second bloom, has a lovely scent and was anonymous. Have a lovely weekend, and if you are curious about my author website, here is the link: Renée Grashoff Schrijft

At 07.00 a.m., when the sun suddenly hid itself.

2025/29 - Mrs McGregor's Garden

 When you are my age, you have probably grown up with Beatrix Potter's stories. Her little books were the first ones that did not only satisfy my need for cute naughty kittens and fluffy rabbits, but also woke me up to the concept of a kitchen garden. Alas, Mr McGregor scared the pants of me! But Beatrix's drawings of his garden were fascinating, and instilled a life-long love of kitchen gardens.

When maintained well, they are gorgeously poetic. The garden next to mine is such a garden. I will post a photo when you scroll down in this blog. But first I'll tell you about this veg garden.

My neighbour (mid-80's) has had this garden for over 60 years. He gardens the old- fashioned way: digging, rotating, milling, sowing seeds and planting out. His knees no longer allow him to kneel to thin out his beetroot, he says. I swear they thin out themselves, just to please him.

I would, too. His potatoes, in this terrible potato year, are a dream to behold. His strawberries were 4x the size of mine.  His cabbages produced fat healthy babies! He does everything just right.

For me, where the only carrots I grow are the wild variety (photo above) that seed themselves anywhere they please, his veg patch is a joy to look at. He, in turn, says he enjoys looking at my naturalistic chaos, which buzzes with insects. 

By the way, that bumblebee on the Hydrangea was still fast asleep when I took that photo at 07.30 a.m., while his mates were busily buzzing away.

Anyway: where my neighbour is Mr McGregor, I am Mrs McGregor. In true 20th century fashion, she hardly gets a mention in those books. I think she bakes a pie somewhere. But she certainly does not grow the veg! Well, neither do I. I love looking at them, but am pretty hopeless at growing them this year.

First my excuse was the drought. And still is. The hand full of yellow Raspberries that I managed and the one meal of Broad Beans are my successes. Along with the Romaine, Paksoi and Lettuce. But I am better at growing flowers. That is to say, flowers happily do their thing and I try to take care of them as best I can.

Despite heatwave nr 3, most flowers are uncomplainingly doing their thing. Some better than others, I must admit.

Right, time for that veg photo.

I took it this morning, from the corner of the almost emptied potato patch, looking towards my plot. To the right some succession potatoes (he's good at that), Romain, Cabbages, Beetroot. To the left Leeks, Lettuce, Onions. In the middle his amazing Strawberries (finished). Behind them more Onions. In his greenhouse Tomatoes, Cucumbers, String Beans, and Chinese Cabbage.

The monster Artichokes are mine. I had to tie them up to the obelisk after the storm we had exactly a week ago.

I braved the Ladybird larvae and dove in. They are over 2m tall by now, so unfortunately too tall for me to be able to watch the bumblebees using the flowers as hammocks in a week's time. I wrestled them to the obelisk, it was a bit like trying to get a cow to shift. Have you ever tried that? I have.

Right. I will leave you with a photo of the river near my house, the Brielse Maas (dammed off from the North Sea unfortunately, so the water turns green with algae in Summer). I will upload a new blog to my website today as well, so do take a look, why don't you? Renée Grashoff Schrijft

Brielse Meer/ Brielse Maas (same river, since dammed it is a 'meer' and no longer a river) at 06.15 this morning. My favourite walkies with Puck.

Have a good weekend, wherever you are!

Renée Grashoff 

2025/28 - Promises, promises...this summer is bursting with them

 There were promises of rain. Except it was mizzle and did not make my garden ecstatic with joy. Then there were promises of fair weather; sunny with the gentle temperature of 23°. Except it was overcast with windforce 6 and 19°.

My conclusion is that our Met Office don't know what they are talking about. But I know that us being on an island facing the North Sea (sort of) makes the weather unpredictable. 

Anyway, my balcony has weathered the last storm, as my Clematis and Pandorea are proving. The white Pelargonium though I had to heavily deadhead. As I did the red ones. A single day of storm and wet make the heavy flowers turn brown.

When I enter Hunky Dory, I am first greeted by a lovely scent of the huge Fig next to the path (it is my never visiting neighbour's and has reverted back to Jungle) and then by that of my Fennel family. It is just about coming into flower. From one specimen it has produced ample offspring, which is now all over the place. I quite like it, so it can stay, for now. But this is the limit, if it colonises even more of my garden, I will start removing it.

 And here it is: the sun has come out as I write. I immediately lowered the sunscreen, as it will become unbearably hot in my flat otherwise.

As an aside: this was an outing to the beach Tuesday: you know, when it would be fair. Instead my three friends and I were sandblasted and soaked. That beach is in Ouddorp, the nearest thing we have to desert. It is huge. To reach the sea takes a 20 minute walk.

And back to the balcony. Sorry my friend, this is a back- and forth experience. 

The cherry Tomato is producing loads of tomatoes. So far three were ripe, and tasted...mwah. I have high hopes for my other one though, as it is a zebra Tomato I had two years ago, and it was lovely.

This is Victoria. And finally, after 4 years of sulking and not producing flowers, she is looking good! She was next to the obelisk, and apparently hated it. As soon as I took it away she started growing.

This is it. I cannot for the life of me begin to think WHY Victoria hates it. The perennial Lathyrus and white grape like it just fine and are having a race to the top.

Last week I promised I would move the Clivia to a shadier spot and I have. Hopefully this suits her better.

Small, unpretentious, but one of my favourite flowers: the Mexican Fleabane. Suddenly my country has also discovered it, and it is in the nurseries. I had to sow it myself before, and failed, but this one is doing great. I will carefully remove the seedheads and sprinkle them everywhere.

I'll leave you with a photo I took in Ouddorp. There is a milk goat farm there, De Mekkerstee. Hundreds of goats, the scent and sound of them was overwhelming, hahaha. But in the middle of goat chaos was this couple having a loving cuddle. It was so cute, and they kept it up for ages. I adore goats, so had a great time cuddling the ones that came up to the fence.

Okay, this is it. Have a great weekend wherever you are!

Renée Grashoff 

2025/27 - Heatwave! Yet again.

 When I was young, long, long ago, we occasionally had a heatwave. Not yearly, there used to be quite a few years in between. It was spoken of with awe, "do you remember, in 1976...". By now we shrug when the weather woman says the word. Yeah, right, another one, well, let's stock up on icecubes.

'Frog' and 'boiling water' spring to mind. Children of today think nothing of it that Brielle is as hot as the Spanish costa used to be thirty years ago. But I remember! Our summers were cool, and you were lucky if you were not washed out of your tent in August. My birthday is in August, and more often than not we had to sit indoors because it rained! Those rare dry sunny days were celebrated. When I huffed and puffed up a hill on my bicycle near Malmedy in 1976, I could not foresee that those temperatures would become our new normal in 2025.

Right. Back to Hunky Dory. I watered my Hydrangeas early this morning, because I know from experience they will suffer today. And just when they are so utterly gorgeous.

Look at that! They are so pretty when they are half in bloom.

My neighbour arrived after an hour, to water his veg. He is into veg. I am envious of his veg. My broad beans are a disappointment...the pods look great, but the beans are flawed.

So I console myself with my flowers. At least they compare well to his.

What's left of my Gaura is doing her best to defend her space against the monster Fennel.

The Hollyhock is towering over that Fennel though, it is huge. Just about as high as the apple tree behind it.

I think it is so pretty. Hollyhocks never grew for me in my previous garden, well, no worries here. They happily wonder through the garden, next to (and on) the paths.

Wherever possible I leave them be. You can see from the spilled pollen that they are constantly visited by the bumblebees and miner bees.

I cut back the mangled fronds of the Artichokes, as my neighbour had to do a sort of jungle wade through to reach his potatoes. They tower over the Lathyrus Latifolius. Which, I am very happy to say, is starting to flower. Yay! Result! Mind you, I watered it religiously, otherwise I would have lost it.

It will be blush pink. It is a perennial.

The Crocosmia underneath is also looking good.

There is something wrong with all my Buddleia though!! Every March I cut them back hard, and they are in full flower by June. This year all have stunted growth and are frankly looking terrible.

The Clivia is flowering in the hot border. Mind you, her leaves suffer from the sun, I should find her a better (shadier) spot.

My English Lavender is doing well though. This does not mind that heat one bit.

The Trachelospermum is in flower as well. It grows up a wild plum, which is not happy with the fact I topped it. But that plum is in the wrong place and I don't have the strength to dig it out! Where is Lee Burkhill when I need him, eh?

Ah... Yes. Eventhough I try to keep water in the frog pond, is is like carrying water to the sea. Topping it up is impossible, my waterbutt is empty. And I need the other butts to keep my plants alive. So, after long unhappy thinking I have decided to fill it in with soil. I'll leave a depression, so hopefully I can keep bogplants alive. I have a Stipia that does not like my balcony planter. The Waterlily I will take home, and try to keep it alive in my pond there.

Some you win, some you lose...

It it disappointing though, I so enjoyed my old (large) pond, with goldfish and dragonflies and many frogs.

It just would not happen in this garden.

So. Go with the flow, Renée!

I will leave you with some photos of my balcony garden, which is doing very well.

Have a good weekend, wherever you are!

Renée Grashoff