Island Life Magazine Ltd April / May 2016 | Page 69

GARDENING

Cherry Amour
IN THE
GARDEN
With Tina Hyde

T

hinking back to my
childhood I realise how
much I’ve always appreciated
plants so I’m thrilled that it’s cherry
blossom time once again.
It’s such a delightful fleeting
moment of over the top beauty
that fills so many with a sense of
wonder and it forms one of my
favourite childhood memories of
spending time in our local park
enjoying this annual spectacle.
The double pink flowered
trees most probably the variety
P.’Kanzan’ were planted on
either side of a wide lawn in the
most formal part of the park
interspersed with beds of tulips,
wallflowers and forget-me-nots
and I remember taking a daily
detour as I walked too and from
school to revel in the carnival
confetti carpet of pink.
Of course we’re mere amateurs
in our appreciation of this
loveliness, in Japan, ‘hanami’
the act of viewing the flowers at
cherry blossom time is taken very
seriously, with reports on the news
of the current location of the best
flowers so tourists and residents
of the towns and cities can flock to
see the trees, once the preserve of
Emperors, artists and poets.

I’m very fortunate to have a white
double flowered cherry Prunus
avium ‘Plena’ in my garden, which
should be coming into flower any
day now, it is lovely in the daylight
but takes on an ethereal glow in the
dusk.
Cherries are a tough bunch in
many ways, growing in most well
drained soils including chalk. A
number of them flower in the
bleakest months of winter, although
their sometimes fragrant flowers
are generally much smaller than the
spring flowering varieties which for
clarity should perhaps be grouped
as the ‘Japanese cherries’, some of
which have been in cultivation for
1000 years.
They vary in form from the neat
pillar like P.’Amanogawa’ to the
graceful ‘Cheal’s Weeping’ cherry,
you’re spoilt for choice whatever
the size of your garden with single,
semi-double and double flowers
from palest creamy yellow through
purest white to brightest Barbara
Cartland pink there’s a variety to
suit most gardeners tastes. Once
the flowers are over they tend to
merge into the background until
their leaves turn to gold or tawny
orange as a final fanfare before
winter arrives.
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