No ordinary Bastard Balm

Much of this unremittingly rainy day was spent at the Ship Inn, Pinchbeck, helping Molly celebrate her 92nd birthday with a slap-up lunch (which was truly delicious, but left me feeling exhausted for much of the afternoon!) The staff were excellent and gave her extra cushions for her chair to make sure she was comfortable.

The rest of the day was largely spent doing paperwork, though the rain stopped for about half-an-hour which enabled me to do a circuit of the garden with my camera. My featured flower is a newly acquired  cultivated form of Bastard Balm, probably 'Royal Velvet Distinction'. I spotted it when we went to the garden centre  to buy a non-flowering shrub for Molly. She's recently developed a pollen allergy and they're replacing their annual flower bed with a variety of coloured-leaved shrubs - less maintenance too.

Bastard Balm is a very local native British species that grows in south-western hedgerows. I remember being very excited to find it in a leafy Devon lane nearly forty years ago! The native species is less brightly coloured than this cultivar, but both are equally valuable for pollinators. The rain should help the soil soften, so that it can be planted in a shaded bed in our front garden, where woodland and hedgerow species thrive.