With the May rains came the columbine invasion. It happens every spring, and you never know where they will pop up next, but this year they have excelled themselves and are everywhere: over the back fence in the guerrilla garden, in the front bed beside the main road, in the paving outside the kitchen door, along the top terrace. And in all shades. They are very promiscuous. I’ve also grown some species aquilegias from seed, and this year they are flowering for the first time. I’m now wondering if they will ‘co-mingle’ with the local wild bunch and produce even more lovely shapes and shades.
*
Now meet the cultivated bunch: the first three grown from seed from an aquilegia specialist grower, and the last one a plant ‘rescued’ from an abandoned allotment plot. The yellow varieties seem to gently flower all through the summer.
Tish Farrell 