Sibylle's Blog @mohn-images.com: The Photographic Garden Diary: The May Garden

The best time for our garden is May, when most flowers reappear from their underground dormancy and trees and shrubs unfold their leaves. It is a time of awakening and pleasant surprises: which plants will have gained in strength and increased in number ? Which colour combinations will they present, new and surprising ? No matter how much planning goes into the planting - there will always be unplanned vistas which make gardening so delightful.

Choisya ternata, Syringa persica, Tiarella cordifolia, Choisya "Aztec Pearl" ..

For most of the year rather nondescript and unsightly, in May Viburnum rhytidophyllum makes a show in splendour and full white bloom next to the red maple.

Paeonia mlokosewitschii

We had three flowers this year on this fickle plant which lasted a few days only. When shedding her petals - as if to mock me - she stretched out her horns, teeth and tongue:

Among the fading trilliums in white, I found a red version with hanging flowers, easily overlooked and more of a plant collector's specimen as it can only be appraised in a frog position lying flat on the ground .. not even the camera (except a phone) fits underneath...

It is probably Trillium vaseyi, sweet wake-robin. I don't remember ever having bought this, so it is probably one of those pleasant surprises and came as a stowaway with the batch of white Trillium grandiflorum, that we planted a few years ago.

We have been trying to naturalize the fine Gladiolus communis; a few are coming up every year, but on rather weak stems. The bulb may still have to adjust its depth in the ground before it can make larger groups.

Aquilegia growing through pretty Syringa persica. This small pleasant lilac grew neglected in a dry rather shady spot where it was not too happy. Paul salvaged it last year and put it in "conversation" between Choisya ternata and Choisya "Azted Pearl" which flower at the same time. Now it thrives as if it had never moved.