MULTIPLICATION

That's the name of the game. (I find it hard nowadays to remember that the BBC banned Bobby Darin's record.)

Whilst we wait for Storm Katie (Monday) it is Saturday and rain. So out with the old house plants - one Canna lily becomes four, one streptocarpus becomes three and the poinsettia is cut back so it will resprout (and it is repotted).

One of the old amaryllis is in bud, the other following. I had forgotten how fast they grow. Half of the lawns have had a light mow and look a lot better.

Two very different gardening images, the first from my daughter and son-in-law's place on top of Orlop Hill looking south, the second in the gardens at Worcester College, Oxford.

 Up in the wood the primroses are in full flower and I do not remember so many wild daffodils.
Lesser celandines - R regards these as a weed but I rather like them as long as they do not get out of hand.
The flowering currant is heavy with flowers by the path as well as behind the house.
The snakes head fritillaries on the banking are in bus but as they arte favoured by rabbits and squirrels I wonder if they will survive to flower.

It is Monday, Easter Monday and I am struggling with a bad back so I cannot wheel muck around etc - whoopee! It is hard enough bending down to pick daffodils for the house. And I have this sense that the garden is ready to explode with new growth, buds fattening, weeds spreading, grass growing.

So April is almost upon us - what else is in the garden - fruit? veg? Ah! flowers and a duck let lone a fine fat female pheasant patrolling by the pond.

So two types of euphorbia, Madame Lefevre tulips in all their brilliant red glory, flowering currant and anemones, let alone the rhubarb - at last - are thriving. Everything is multiplying - the daffodils, the anemones and by the look of her the hen pheasant (Not to mention the rabbits in the field.)

Then up on my Facebook pops the information that Easter is named after Ishtar, goddess of fertility and sex - hence eggs and especially bunnies! Thanks Becky.