White in the Garden

Waterfall of Spiraea 'Bridal Wreath'. a bit sparse this year because of last summer's drought

This month is usually the white period in my garden, not by design, simply by accident. Sometimes the whites don't coincide. This year. The Magnolia stellata, a small- flowered camellia and the damson  blossom were over too soon for the pear and spirea flowers which are out now, together with white Bergenia 'Silberlicht', not to  forget Camellia 'Lady Vansittart' which I am delighted to  discover was named after Henrietta, a woman engineer in the 1800s who invented a screw propellor for ships. There is also  a new leucojum, or snowflake (no relation to the snowdrop) and daisies on the lawn.

                                                                                       Bergenia 'Silberlicht'                                                 Pear blossom                                  

Leucojum or snowflake

                                                          

 Soon the pink apple blossom will be out and so will the red and pink tree peonies so all thoughts of a white garden will be gone. 

While sitting outdoors shivering in the chill the other day I found a poor old bumble bee drowning in a bucket of water. I lifted her out on a stalk and put her in some low foliage. 

                                             

She looked exhausted and cold so I picked a stalk of damson blossom and put it as near to her as I could. 

                                                

She made superbumble efforts to crawl up to it and started sipping straightaway.  Pretty soon she had had enough and crawled off then managed to open her wings and fly away.  I hope she has survived to create a small hive.