Doing a bit of voluntary work sometimes brings the most surprising rewards.  I was assisting one of the ladies at the IT group where I teach a few weeks ago and happened to ask what her password was for something. ‘Hellebore****’ she said. Now, Hellebores happen to be amongst my favourite plants, and when we had the garden landscaped in 2013 I insisted on a bed planted only with them, so of course we got talking, and to my delight she told me that she was a Hellebore ‘breeder’ and had lots of unusual types in her garden.

This week, she invited me to go and see them and take a few ‘babies’.  Her garden is quite magical and bursting with Hellebores of all types and colours – spotty ones, double ones, ruffed ones, a quite gorgeous and rare bright yellow one… all currently in their full glory. She generously dug up seedlings and small plants and I came home with a car full!  They’ll take a couple of years to grow, but in the meantime I thought I’d share with you a few photos of those that I do have that are already in a profusion bloom!