Helen Stephenson's RHS Wisley Garden Pictures - May 9th, 2009 - Garden

Early May is the peak time for wisteria. It will go on flowering throughout the summer, but at the start of the season, it flowers before coming fully into leaf and is at its most spectacular. RHS Wisley grow wisteria in various locations around the garden. This first picture was a close-up of the wisteria growing near the fountain which is part of the main water feature at the front of the gardens.

This wisteria is growing up a pole near the walled garden. It's just along the path from the statue of Pan which was on the previous page. I'm not sure whether this is one plant with several main branches of whether it is a couple of plants, but the close-up of the trunks winding around the pole shows how it has been trained and winds over and under itself.

The next image shows more wisteria, but also introduces the other plant which can be seen flowering in profusion early in May - namely the rhododendrons. The rustic bridge has wisteria climbing over it, while a rhododendron bush can be seen behind it. The fish on the previous page were in the ponds on each side of this bridge.

The picture on the left shows the pink flower on the right of the rustic bridge. I didn't do my "scholarship" on this one, but a friend has come up trumps. Thanks, Paul! It's Polygonum bistorta Superbum. The other two pictures show the wisteria in proximity to the water - and I've included some reeds in the picture on the right as well.

Now we get to the rhododendrons!

Here's one last picture of a rhododendron, hiding behind a giant rhubarb-like plant, whose flowering spikes can be seen in the centre picture. On the right is a picture of some acer leaves, backlit by the sun.

Now we move onto peonies. These have quite a short flowering season, but we managed to coincide with it on our visit to Wisley. There is a bee visiting the red flower on the left. The white-petaled flower in the centre was on a large bush and was labelled as Paeonia rockii and it was absolutely gorgeous. If I had a bigger garden, I'd love a bush, but alas, I really don't have room for something which produces flowers at leat 8" in diameter!

Staying with bees for the moment, here are some more flowers which were being visited by those beneficial insects.

Here are a couple of plants which didn't have spectacular flowers on them: one is a small conifer which was in the terraced garden, while the other is a tall stand of bamboo.

Next is a picture of an iris. There were other iris around, but this is the only picture which I am showing you. I seem to recall that some of the other iris flowers were a little past their best, which is probably why I didn't have a greater selection to show here.

Here are some more purple flowers. I was just enjoying the beauty of Wisley and didn't do my "scholarship" on these, so I can't tell you what either of them are!

To finish off, here are some plant portraits. I think these may be similar varieties, and that the purple flower is a portrait of the one shown on the right above.