A Keen Naturalist’s Dreamy Spring Garden

Dr Sarala Waghray, originally a fisheries biologist and educator for long in India during her prime age, is an accomplished naturalist with immense zeal, commitment and dedication towards the ornamental plants and flowers. A naturalist, to my mind, is a person with immense zeal and commitment for the plant and animal life, and who spends reasonably good time outdoors, takes keen interest in observing and acquiring knowledge of nature, and may preserve and/or even record it for the posterity. Dr Sarala is settled in the United Kingdom for the last many years and maintains a variety of plants and trees with a mesmerising landscape particularly during the spring and early summer season, thanks to her motherly care of all plants and flowers in her huge and exceptionally beautiful garden.

One could find a wide variety of plants and flowers in her garden. She keeps experimenting with newer species but her favourite one is Candelabra primula. Origin of this plant is said to be Far East but it grows and prospers well in many parts of the world including the northern region of England. The plant is characterized by whorls of flowers arranged in circles at regular intervals around a strong vertical stem, looking almost like a wedding cake as she once described it to me once in her own words. On an average, tiny flowers are arranged in seven rings growing from the bottom upwards in a rather long flowering season. The plant can grow in a damp, neutral or acidic soil and flowers appear in a hue of bright colours.