A much needed tidy of the Auricular theatre plants

In 2020, during lockdown, I made an auricular theatre for my small collection of those sweet plants.

We used materials we had & a piece of reclaimed wood we were gifted. 

It was painted in our shed paint because that was all we had & everything was shut in lockdown. 

It is against the house on the patio where they can be enjoyed for their tiny flowers in summer. 

However, they do not like to be too wet in winter & I cover the whole theatre with a sheet of horticulture fleece to keep off too much rain. They do not mind the cold, just not being too wet. 

This works well & is an easy solution.

In summer, they do not like scorching heat directly on their leaves so I pop a small garden umbrella over them to keep off the midday heat. 

They do like their specific growing conditions - not too hot, not too wet, just right, like goldilocks.

After a very hot summer, they were not looking their best so I bought some new terracotta pots to repot them ahead of winter. 

The soil needs to be gritty / light to stop waterlogged roots so I mixed in some perlite. I always use some of our leaf mould in the bottom of the pots to cover the drainage 

After clearing the theatre, the plants were re potted, some split & then a light covering of gritty soil on top because they don't like their leaves to sit on wet soil. I will have to buy a bag of small stones for the surface when I pass the garden centre. 

However, it is much improved & they are looking neat & tidy again ahead of winter. 

I look forward to their tiny flowers next year. Once they flower, I will know which I have & will buy in a few more. 

This was their flowers the past summer - delicate, tiny, little pops of perfect colour. 

Does anyone else grow them & what advice would you give? Thank you for stopping by, it is always appreciated.

Dee