Lenten Roses

One of my favourite spring fowers has to be Helleborus sometimes known as Lenten Rose or Christmas Rose. Mythology states that a poor shepherd was travelling to Bethlehem. As he did not have a present for the Christ child he was sad and he wept. Myth has it that as the tears touched the ground flowers as beautiful as roses sprung from the ground. The flowers were hellebores. The shepherd picked these Christmas Roses and brought them to the Christ child as his present.
They can have white or green flowers but I love they pink shades best.

The best place to grow Hellebores is close to the front of a flower bed as they only grow just over a foot tall and their early spring colour can be appreciated. They need very little attention once you have found a place in your garden that they love. Just some leaf mould dug in when planting.

Helleborus viridis

Helleborus are able to reduce cell pressure in cold weather. This effect can be reversed with increasing temperatures. You can see this phenomenon in the morning after a frosty night when the leaves and flowers are hanging limp on the ground and with increasing temperatures they straighten up completely.

Like Monty Don another Spring favourite of mine is the Primrose.

I have variations from white/yellow to pale pink not sure how they arrived in the garden may be they have seeded from cross pollinated flowers.

I just let them seed where the please, they love to grow in the gravel paths, on rotten tree stumps anywhere that is damp and has a few hours of sun shine.

Well I'll end this post with a beautiful sunset seen last week 

'Red sky at night Sheppard's delight'