This is a funny time of year in the garden with many plants dying back and everything tending to look rather messy and damp.

Days and time are short and the weather is often off-putting so things are left to sleep until Christmas is over and we feel the need to get busy outside again.

It is also a time for reflection, looking back on the year we have just had and forward to what will be.

As I think about my own garden and the summer that has just passed, penstemons come immediately to mind.

One had been lost in the cold wet of last autumn, which was disappointing, as it had been bought several years earlier from Howick Hall in Northumberland. Here we walked through a large lawn of uncut grasses dotted with early-summer bulbs and flowers following a winding, mowed path leading into shrubbery and woodland.

Seeing the lavender-blue penstemon always triggered this memory.

The lost plant was replaced by two new ones Penstemon Schoenholzeri' or 'Firebird' and Penstemon 'Hidcote Pink' both of which are vigorous growers with semi-evergreen foliage.

'Schoenholzeri' has brilliant scarlet flowers and grows about 90cm tall while 'Hidcote Pink' has pale-pink blooms lined with crimson inside and will reach around 75cm in height.

The buds and upper stems of the latter plant are covered in a subtle, frosty-silver sheen that catches the sunlight.

Like most penstemons they need a well-drained, fertile soil in full sun away from cold winds.

Although quite hardy, it is best to give penstemons winter protection with thick mulch and as extra insurance, to take a few summer cuttings.

The clematis have also been good this year with flowers from April until late October. Most of them are unnamed having been bought from a Sunday supplement two or three years ago and arriving unlabelled. After pointing this out to the company concerned they kindly sent another batch which also arrived unlabelled so we ended up with ten mystery clematis to fit into our very small garden.

The year starts with a pink-flowered species, I think a montana, with beautiful dark leaves growing against a blue fence, and a similar white flowered specimen trained into the holly tree. It continues with several summer species in various shades of blue and purple, some very vigorous, other yet to get to reach their best.

'Star of India', a resident for some years, takes centre stage in mid summer while 'Etoile de Violette' waits until most plants are fading before blooming at the end of the summer and into autumn.

Updated: 15:57 Monday, January 21, 2002