Grand Day out at the Garden Center and the Aquatic Hertfordshire Fishery Center to get Koi Fish and a Water Lily. We went with intention to get two to three Fish, but we ended up getting twenty one. The fact is we wanted large Koi but as they didn't have any at that moment in time, we did settle for lots of young ones but also one yellow Goldfish. We also got a Water Lily which will be blushing pink of the variety called 'Attraction'.

The Water Lily that should grow.

In the Garden Center we wanted Beans, and a variegated Aubergine plant but we came out with plugs of Mangetout Peas, plugs of a variety of red Cabbage called 'Red Flame', plugs of a kind of Cauliflower called 'White Excel'. The matter of fact is in January I planted a lot of Veg (seeds) but from my endeavour only eight Tomato plants are doing well: Four of the Moneymakers Variety and Four of the Vittoria Variety. Four Padron Chili plants are growing well. And the rest growing well are four Courgette Plants.

However the Peas I have grown are looking poorly, the dwarf Bean died and so did my Brassica experiment of getting a Savoy Cabbage, a Cauliflower and a Romanesco from seeds. Therefore the plugs we did buy will paliate the loss of the others in a certain sense. However I still intend to grow more Peas and Beans and try again with the Romanesco and the Savoy Cabbage.

Our Bay Tree.

From the Garden Centre we also bought a Bay Tree which I always wanted for culinary purposes. I uses Bay Leaves so often that it made sense to have one in our Garden. Another useful tree we ended up with was a nice Lime Tree which was reduced in price. It is of a decent size but having grown a Lemon tree from scratch I would say that give or take this Lime tree will have Fruits give or take in three years time.

We do hope to have some Limes in the future.

As Spring is fully here and after all our storms, we add three in one week in February, I still add my Dafodills giving us flowers and some of my Tulips which were supposed to be orange (Van Eyck variety) did turn out but red. They came early and were beautiful.

So for Flowers, I did more than I usually do. They are mainly Flowers growing from bulbs, I am still waiting for my 'Eyecatcher' Irises to grow but the Black Dragon Iris is showing a growth which can mean that they will be on show this year once more. It is hard to say at this moment in time. I did plant some Black Tulips and I think that some are growing but only two out of eight. We will see what will happen on this front. There are Narcissus, Alliums which I am still waiting for to appear.

I planted purple Crocus, called Ruby Giant which have a progress that is looking promising. I have still more flowers to grow from seeds, mainly colourful field like ones to attracts bees and pollinators to the Garden.

One flower I did acquire from the Garden Centre is a Polyanthus called Showstopper Cream, it looks like the 'Primevere' of my childhood and my Man's childhood, so we just went for it straight away. It did give us a smile straight away.

To go back on the tree front, the Hazelnut small tree acquired last year is giving us some buds this Spring which we are very happy about.

Hazelnut Tree starting to bud.