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The gardening thread

First thing after breakfast when I was feeling fairly calm, I set about untangling my hops and introducing the shoots to my string fan ...
I found a convenient offset to the right and I think I managed to make four decent new plants without destroying the main one - it was all rather brutal - it's the wrong time to be doing it. There were two other likely candidates, but I left them for insurance ..
Inevitably there are quite a few unintended cuttings in with the watercress in the bubbler... such an annoying plant. It's my observation that stems usually stiffen up when plants go into flower - not when they're shooting skywards in the spring, but with this hop it seems to be the opposite.

A good handful of chicken shit and a good watering ...

hoptraining.jpg
 
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I just leave my hops they grow huge, up and into the greenhouse. Not sure why but the only hops I've had are from shoots inside the greenhouse. String fan sounds good though.
 
two sheds said:
I just leave my hops they grow huge, up and into the greenhouse. Not sure why but the only hops I've had are from shoots inside the greenhouse. String fan sounds good though.
Click to expand...
In a good year it starts out geometrical, but then it turns into a big mass - then along come the comma caterpillars and fungus.
Being a golden hop it isn't doing its sub-tropical best on a north-facing wall so I hope the transplants will eat the neighbour's ugly concrete shed with the aid of morning sun :) (Though I still hold out the hope I will have escaped this house by then.)
 
Traditional hop gardens use twine to train hops up about 3m high. The twine wouldn't hold up if the plants weren't so strong. As an aside, a happy hop in full sun will climb it's trellis in 10 days so a sunny spell should see your concrete shed disappear pretty quickly.
 
A lovely, idle gardening day today. Bit of gentle sowing (purple broccoli, black eyed susan (thunbergia alata), courgettes), took cuttings of my sphaeralcea (after knocking a branch off), fiddled about a bit more with the new pond, transplanted stuff here and there, chopped back the ferns and hellebores, ready for adenophoras and kirengeshoma to expand, tying in clematis, fixed a couple of the greenhouse windows...and so on - all mimsy, effortless fluff but enormously satisfying. Primping at close quarters instead of the usual manic hoeing or sketchy spadework is much more my thing.
 
Had some more gentle gardening today.
Apart from the incremental side of the jungle-bashing, de-twigging and generally sorting out. I've a HUGE patch, which is fine, when it is all tidy, but the strong winds battered things rather a lot this past winter. It has taken ages - as I do still WFH / admin my business - to get this far, and still a lot to do. I did do some, but it was just a little too breezy to finish off the loganberries bondage, I was getting scratched ... hopefully tomorrow, if it is calm enough !
What I did do was sort out the mess the mice left - nibbling the runners & buds off - in my strawberry pots [tower] and set up ready to transplant some runners in a few weeks. I also planted a few more seeds.
 
yep nice day for me too, I always seem to do well when I've had some commestibles. Planted out some yellow archangel and ox-eye daisies and raspberries and things that I'd recovered from other bits of the garden, watered the seeds I've put in. Put some hazel cuttings in the hedge to try to build it up so the dog doesn't do a runner - doubt whether they'll take but I'll do some more in the winter. Scuffed some more nasty spanish bluebells, potted on some herbs I bought from a neighbour (plus got a nice red leaved pelargonium from them and a pineapple scented salvia). Nice couple of walks with Frankie. Watching a bit of snooker as an encore :)
 
My OCD is complicating my fencing. It doesn't help that the board edges aren't flat ...
I'm pretty sure it's the photo that isn't horizontal ..

newfence.jpg

I have the beginnings of sciatica so I paused half way ...
It's been a bit chilly so far today so I did my first pricking out - once again I struggled to leave aside any potentially live plants - hopefully I will give some away - especially things like tomatoes.
From here, thence to my bathroom window shelves - and on to my new mini greenhouse once the fence is finished ...


firstprickingout.jpg

The watercress loves the carelessly mixed hydro nutes ... two weeks since I added them and I am likely to end up eating some and by the time I'm ready to deploy hydro outdoors, it's likely to be cuttings from these plants that I use ...


sproutingarea.jpg
 
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The security camera froze while I was half way through sieving and sorting a large pile of rakings that needed shifting if I am to get this seating and container planting area sorted ...
I managed to make 105 litres of something slightly resembling compost and which will certainly combine well with container-emptyings and whatever else I can acquire locally - including the bag of Wilko MP that is currently out of the bag and being allowed to breathe ...

This was worth the effort as compost is desperately short around here and it makes more sense to put the dried veggie material on the squash and crucifer beds as mulch - and the really coarse stuff will serve as a path.

Leaving me mostly with virginia creeper to go in the green bin once I have that organised.

Once the heap has gone, I should be able to lose a fair bit of rubble there and still have clearance to build a deck where my disastrous shed-greenhouse thing once stood ...



sifting.jpg

compostystuff.jpgremainingheap.jpg
 
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Not massively impressed by the Westlands.
Seeds germinate well enough, but for MP compost where you might expect it's a bit too hot for seedlings, it runs out of steam rather quickly.

I sowed the tomatoes on 8th April. By the time I came to prick them out two weeks later they were looking hungry - OK I sowed a few too many and maybe I could have done it sooner... maybe I misjudged the watering, but it can be a bit like concrete.

They're greening-up a bit after a couple of days, but they're a bit of an embarrassment ... I may sow a few more just for me - fewer to a pot - and hope these perk up well enough to give away ...


tomatoes2weekssad.jpg
 
The final part of that fence did my head in - trying to get it level with non-square ends...
I have some feather-edge left over - so I will definitely be using some as gravel boards... I'm tempted to trim the top too ...
I have now officially exchanged foxes for birds - only pigeons and magpies so far but it's a start ...

fencefinished.jpg
 
Next comes the "adult Lego" - assemble some sort of pergola over the "seating area" to give a bit of structure and with the aid of climbing plants a bit of a screen to add perspective so I'm not simply sitting on an allotment. ...

Then I have to get the heat gun out and see if sewer pipe can be flattened so my NFT channel isn't a stupidly long way from the seedlings I need to plant in it.

And it's a good job I hung onto the tallest canes - so I have plenty to cut down for runner and climbing French beans ... it would have been frustrating to have supplied the neighbourhood with home-grown bamboo and then have to buy some for myself !

materials.jpg
 
two sheds said:
:eek:
Click to expand...
It's one not in use.:)

I think I may have had to buy a whole section 30 years ago just for the short bit I needed to replace a trap I accidentally filled with cement when building my folly shed-greenhouse .. :oops:

I have lots of squareish-section gutter which is fine for NFT, but it needs to be covered to keep the light and weather out.

I have a 35mm hole-cutter and the plants are inserted cushioned with split, short sections of pipe insulation.

flatten.png
 
The available timber and space have determined the dimensions of my pergola.
I've ordered yet more climber seeds - though they're getting sown rather late - especially the sweet peas - but worst case I'll have them for next year ... two kinds of morning glory - the fragrant "alba" and a dark purple one called "grandpa" :hmm: - and cobea scandens because my old seeds didn't germinate ...

One way or another I'm doomed to be still here next year ... an I suppose I can take seeds with me though who knows when they would get planted ...

First lot of nasturtiums are out in my mini greenhouse along with the giant tagetes ...

The miscanthus and Joe Pye in the front garden are almost certainly rather potbound, but it probably can't be helped - not least because of the lack of compost - hopefully my planned drippers will help ensure I don't let them go thirsty ...




pergoladesign.png


earlyshoots.jpg
 
Pak choi hasn't failed yet:
IMG_20220426_164120218_HDR.jpg

Onions and garlic over wintered very nicely. Which means they will all start bolting no doubt:
IMG_20220426_164105548_HDR.jpg
Carrots coming up nicely:
IMG_20220426_164047988_HDR.jpg
Peas already being nibbled by the weevils. Hopefully they can put on a bit of growth quickly and get out of danger:
IMG_20220426_164031273_HDR.jpg

Rhubarb cropping weekly:
IMG_20220426_164021689_HDR.jpg
Currants... Ms Idaho is delighted... Not! :DIMG_20220426_164001473_HDR.jpg
 
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