Hi Flowery Gang,
I am sheepishly returning to my poor, neglected blog... My last post was sitting unpublished (I have posted it now - an April post published in December). That pretty much sums up my 2023 - I transformed into a Tasmanian devil version of myself as soon as the flowers ramped up and it was game over for the updates. I was out at dawn picking in the coolest part of the day and out and about with a head torch on after the sun set. I lived and breathed the flowers and it was AMAZING.
I've learned so, so much about growing, harvesting, different varieties and about myself. How much I can manage as one person and how can I make it better next year... This coming season, 2024, I'll be more organised (she announces confidently) and I have made a promise to myself to keep up with the blog, I was looking forward to doing it. I had so many moments of complete joy this year, but I work solo and although my three year old twins are good listeners, they didn't share my delight of a newly bloomed cherry caramel phlox or understand my outrage when my pale, nurtured from seed, zinnias bloomed a crass shade of purple. So this shall be a place to share those highs and lows in a bit more detail than I do over on the glossy social media posts. I thought I'd do a brief (cough) month by month overview in this blog just to catch myself up. It might be a bit of a Behemoth....
May
A month of ranunculus (outdoors planted following on from undercover), the last of the tulips and towards the end of the month, the first hardy annuals - orlaya, cornflowers, poppies all bursting into life. Bearded Iris, aquilegia and lupins joined the party too. Let's not forget the armfuls of beautiful, frothy, cow parsley. A month of planting out too - 200 new, pre-sprouted dahlias went in the ground plus the more tender annual seedlings. I also started supplying Green Hoos, a gorgeous horti and home boutique in Glasgow's West End, delivering blooms every Friday. We did have three weeks of unusually high temps, I spent most of my day/the month watering.
A mixed bunch showcasing some of the best May blooms
Stocks growing in the tunnel 
Italian Ranunculus, marshmallows 
Planting out seedlings
clouds
June
In June I was still cutting a lot of ranuncs, poppies, orlaya and stocks. The perennial plants really kicked off this month - Roses, Peonies, Iris, Alliums, aquilegia, delphinium, achillea (plus lots more) all came into their own - my favourite frilly delights. In the tunnel daucus, sweet peas, Canterbury bells and snaps bloomed, the colibri poppies got into their stride and I planted out didiscus. Agrostemma was ready to cut outdoors by mid month with lots more right behind. I was so pleased to find a (much needed) ladybird larva in the poly, on a zinnia leaf (zinnias which I'm afraid to say, succumbed terribly to botrytis and I think will now be off my growing list) also, leaf cutter bees on the roses outdoors.
Mixed buckets 
A view of the farm in June
Roses, roses, roses
Roses and sweetpeas enjoying the heat
Fruit salad
Me, watering
July
The romance of summer. I was completely blown away by early July blooms, I was looking forward to Spring with the tulips and ranunculus, then in June the peonies, roses and iris would be a hit but then my focus was on the dahlias going full swing next month. The colours were heartbreakingly beautiful, soft blue delphinium spikes and blousy creamy roses, pastel sweet peas and glaucous fat poppy seed heads... Acid yellow clouds of achemilla mollis and bupleurum punctuated with spiky purple and blue alliums. Glorious... I really wish I could have paused it. I managed to fit in a trip with my husband to London to see Billy Joel and popped in to Covent Garden flower market. Interesting to see how the imports compare to my own blooms. Back home, ants had started to farm aphids on my dahlias. I just left them to it and nature seemed to take care of it, there were quite a lot of wasps which I think did the job. But not so much with the earwigs which are my arch nemesis. I felt quite light of focal blooms this month, relying on mainly roses and delphinium.
Outside the daucus and Larkspur burst open, Jasmin blooms scented the air and choc cosmos made me hungry every time I wet into the tunnel. Roses enjoyed a second flush mid month and towards the end of the month rudbeckia, helichrysum and the first dahlias made their grand entrance.
Acid green and pink posy
Ants farming aphids on dahlia new growth
A sleepy bee enjoying the world's most beautiful bedding
Bouquets for sale at Ardardan Farm shop
Freshly cut roses with a random chrysanthemum 
Resting cut blooms in the shade
Romantic posy
Choc dahlias - a new one for me. 
The first of the dahlias stealing the show in this arrangement August
The month of all the flowers but mainly... My Dahlias. They were slow this year and not as productive as normal, it's been wet and grey and quite unseasonable. But, I had soo many new varieties it was great to see them come through and be able to still fill bucket after bucket of orders. Rudbeckia were amazing this year too, tricky to get the stem length on them but they seemed to enjoy the wet which is the opposite of my experience with them...
Car boot full of wholesale orders
Untying the sweetpeas
Gorgeous rudbeckia
A stuffed full bucket
Freshly cut blooms waiting to be sorted
Pumpkin spice dahlias
That's the sweetpeas out!
I started supplying our local florist too which has been a fantastic opportunity, running weekly orders lets me plan more accordingly when sowing seeds and planning my space. It also lets me know I need more retail blooms (not too fleeting like sweet peas) for this type of customer, unless specifically asked. I was going to focus on wedding or occasion blooms only but I have had quite a few retail requests so I decided to change my plans for next year.
September
Another month of Autumnal tones coming through from dahlias, rudbeckia, helichrysum and snaps with didiscus coming into its own (completely giant and sprawling) with amaranthus mid to the end of the month. I planted out Hesperis and digitalis for next year this month too. The start of really clearing, I decided to cut the tunnel grown sweet peas completely, putting roses in their place, the outdoors sweet peas bloomed maybe a week, not even after the indoors and I cut from them so much more. The roses produced another very welcome flush and chrysanths ended the month with their weird and wonderful coppery blooms. Oh, surprise ranunculus bloomed this month too - I must have missed some corms when lifting, a treat.
Beautiful mix of tonal colour, roses, dahlias, cosmos, snaps and phlox
Didiscus (lace flower)
Posies on their way to the farm shop at Ardardan
Dahlias basking in the sun
Wholesale order of warm dahlias
My own bunches ready to go along to Ardardan farm shop
October
I cut it fine in September, now in October I was fully booked out with wholesale orders. Some late planted dahlias in the tunnel produced some super long stems towards the end of the month. I started to slowly clear beds and start to weed and mulch. Ranunculus and anemone corms were started and some hardy annuals planted out. Cornflower and agrostemma were promptly eaten by something along at the farm, I think maybe rabbits so I'll need to fence in along there.
Right - that's all I can manage (fit inside one blog)
Jenn x