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The gardening thread

A bit of a "hungry gap", colour-wise - but the geraniums and verbena bonariensis are getting going and the pink filipendula will be showing soon and is much bigger this year.
Lavender was all the florist had for me - otherwise just indoor plants.
In the old days I would have cycled to "Gardiner Haskins" in town and found a few pretty things ...
I'm too knackered at the moment to cycle 8 miles to Bitton and the nearest big garden centre ...
Perhaps I'll take the bus into town to the dreaded Wilkos - I can buy coffee beans opposite ...

subtlebeginnings.jpg
 
A key excuse for having a back garden this year was to get a maybe quantifiable handle on the natural levels prior to sowing a wretched lawn ...
And it's all over the place - which is actually endearing for my current purpose.
I've had to prop up my ricinuses so they don't end up bent ...
When I come to level it, I will ask my BIL for guidance - though sadly he won't be able to deploy the machinery he normally uses ...

upthehill.jpg

The cucurbits outside getting some decent sunshine after three weeks indoors...

cucurbits.jpg


And this poor old fuchsia is coming back to life.
It was one of my hanging basket "Voodos" remaining from 2020 and I killed last year's with hideous Aldi compost and lack of love before they even got going - and this poor old thing limped along and only made a few flowers ...
It was riddled with vine weevil larvae when I repotted it several weeks back - and it now has a new lease of life as a shrub.
It may find itself out the front to inject a little colour while the new fuchsias and begonias get going.

fuchsiarevived.jpg
 
It's a moving target this gardening lark.
So I had this bonkers plan to start my climbers in the ground in front of my window boxes and precariously train them all around and up the wall - with the sweet peas taking a more direct route .. It was never going to work ...

So I have old floorboards and power tools so I'm going to custom-make planters ... and I needed to do something about those concrete blocks and the planters themselves aren't very pretty ....

Thus confirming my trip into town to painfully haul back 100 litres of compost on the bus among other things :facepalm: otherwise it's twice the price locally ...

100 litres of compost locally - £17.50
100 litres in town £10
Bus fares £4

:hmm: and the local compost is better too ...
I don't actually know how much compost it will take ...
The compost will be beefed-up with some more solid stuff that came out of other planters - once I've been through it for nasties...

It will give me more "display space" to slot-in things as they come into their own ...

planB.jpg
 
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I desperately need to get these climbers in the ground ... and not just in the front garden.
I'd better get the pergola built - though I haven't thought through where to plant .. thinking about it I have lots of vigorous "pearly Gates" that I won't be using any of out the front and I suppose I'd better plant some of them elsewhere in the back garden ...

sprouts.jpg
 
Also Arse ...
Blasted mice have eaten or disturbed most of my early broad, french & runner beans seeds even before germination as well as the sugar snap. Both the outside as well as in the greenhouse.
[Coming in via the ventilation gaps. So, they'll need blocking up]

And Double Arse - just seen a bloody grey squirrel, again.
Have emptied the special feeders and other discouragement methods in progress.
I live in an area that does have a few red squirrels, which I was encouraging.
 
Having apparently blocked the fox access at the end of the garden with garotte wire, net, stinging nettles etc ...
This morning I decided the Ipomoea "Pearly Gates" I ordered by mistake, but sowed anyway, might be a bit too vigorous for my pergola - it is after all more or less "posh bindweed" - so I've planted all 7 plants at the end of the garden with the hope that it add to the barrier and maybe even eat the neighbour's nasty concrete block shed ...

------------------------

I thought for completeness - and also because the foliage is pretty, I ought to grow some carrots in my "potager" ...
Only a small space available. Initially I was just going to clean up the first few inches, but I decided if I was going to grow carrots, they would have to be nice ones - so I dug out a spade's depth and sieved the lot onto a tarp and forked the next spit down.
It must have been 150 litres or so - I rehoused loads of rose chafer grubs and worms .. I must be mad - according to my sciatica .. though I definitely need the exercise ..

Probably just as well I did given the crazy amount of crud I pulled out of it...
I mixed 20 litres of compost into the top and trod it down, but there's still a dip and it's likely to settle even more...

I of course ignored the spacing instructions as I had 3 kinds to fit in - some pelleted Autumn King, plus Nantes and Amsterdam earlies ...


sundaymorningcarrothole.png


hole.jpg


holestuff.jpg
 
And I have absolutely bought my last lot of stuff for the year ... :facepalm:

Amaranthus seed, plus some different thunbergia seed since the ones I've sown aren't doing amazingly well anyway and these are reddish ...
Also lobelia cardinalis and angelica gigas if only for next year - and Bishop of Llandaff dahlias ...

I have a potager to look pretty this year as well as the front garden.

newreds.jpg

And Parkers are insisting on giving me free dianthus which hopefully I'll find a slot for ...



Dianthus_Deltoides_Collection_B_1022216__71766.1645781201.1280.1280__30782.1653380533.jpg
 
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Cold wind today ...

Managed to re-set-up a small strawberry tower in a more sheltered spot, as I've "nicked" the tall mini-greenhouse, relocated it and I'm planning cucumbers ... It is getting a new cover next week, one of the ones with reinforcing netting included.
A few other jobs, in between cups of warming coffee ...
 
I just googled Bishop of Llandaff and those are actually what I wanted to grow. I knocked on the door of a house that had one growing last year to ask what variety it was but the fella didn't know. I asked a lady at the allotment who suggested Bishop's Children.

At least I know for next year. Thanks
 
contadino said:
I just googled Bishop of Llandaff and those are actually what I wanted to grow. I knocked on the door of a house that had one growing last year to ask what variety it was but the fella didn't know. I asked a lady at the allotment who suggested Bishop's Children.

At least I know for next year. Thanks
Click to expand...
Not too late if you coddle them - given the late winters we have now - I've just ordered 3 tubers.
I would have had some earlier if Wilkos had had any ...

But those randoms look fun though and one may come up like the Bishop :)

the other red foliage plant I used to get was Fuchsia "Thalia" - and I would have it this year if they hadn't closed the garden centre in town...

Darn I've just found some ... :facepalm:
Damn and I accidentally some lavender Hidcotes :facepalm::facepalm:

B8100661-Fuchsia_Thalia.jpg lavandula-angustifolia-hidcote.jpeg
 
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Apols in advance as I try to avoid being too opinionated about our gardening choices but every so often, I feel compelled to issue a wee warning.I read the words 'houttuynia cordata, StoneRoad and raced to the end of the thread to send you a heartfelt warning - this apparently innocuous plant is a monster of the very worst type. A rhizomatous thug which will be a running nightmare unless contained in a sturdy container. I have had the vast misfortune of dealing with several of these - they are even worse than campanula rapunculoides. Don't let it run about in any beds with perennials...but you could, concievably, plant it as a groundcover in some sort of enclosed situation.

Ah, I am also growing Bishop's Children, contadino. Keep the best ones this year, as they will make a tuber which you can either leave in the ground or dig up for next year. All the Bishop's offspring are quite good, but some tend to have darker foliage than others. I grow all my dahlias from seed or rooted cuttings and leave the tubers in the ground all year...but I do have very free-draining soil so tubers such as dahlias and cannas don't get affected by winter rains
 
I have the luxury of a red hot sunny border this year so various things will be slotted-in around the tomatoes and peppers - and I'm planning to see how big some of my vast hoard of spider babies can get in a month or two used as bedding ...

spiderbabies3.jpg
 
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campanula said:
Apols in advance as I try to avoid being too opinionated about our gardening choices but every so often, I feel compelled to issue a wee warning.I read the words 'houttuynia cordata, StoneRoad and raced to the end of the thread to send you a heartfelt warning - this apparently innocuous plant is a monster of the very worst type. A rhizomatous thug which will be a running nightmare unless contained in a sturdy container. I have had the vast misfortune of dealing with several of these - they are even worse than campanula rapunculoides. Don't let it run about in any beds with perennials...but you could, concievably, plant it as a groundcover in some sort of enclosed situation.
Click to expand...
 
campanula said:
Apols in advance as I try to avoid being too opinionated about our gardening choices but every so often, I feel compelled to issue a wee warning.I read the words 'houttuynia cordata, StoneRoad and raced to the end of the thread to send you a heartfelt warning - this apparently innocuous plant is a monster of the very worst type. A rhizomatous thug which will be a running nightmare unless contained in a sturdy container. I have had the vast misfortune of dealing with several of these - they are even worse than campanula rapunculoides. Don't let it run about in any beds with perennials...but you could, concievably, plant it as a groundcover in some sort of enclosed situation.
Click to expand...
Yeah, I have it and it's a pain to stop it growing through the helebores. Even if it looks good.
 
Definitely at that cusp now where my indoor lighting can't compete with the sunshine so I'm moving things on out as fast as I can.
In the mean time a 9 watt boost for the most sluggish customers that aren't ready ...
Weirdly, the old-fashioned country garden snapdragons are quite slow - as well as variable in rate of growth.

Deformed thunbergia on the left, datura, cleome and the heliotropes.
the biggest one is definitely going outside ASAP.



morelight.jpg
 
campanula said:
Apols in advance as I try to avoid being too opinionated about our gardening choices but every so often, I feel compelled to issue a wee warning.I read the words 'houttuynia cordata, StoneRoad and raced to the end of the thread to send you a heartfelt warning - this apparently innocuous plant is a monster of the very worst type. A rhizomatous thug which will be a running nightmare unless contained in a sturdy container. I have had the vast misfortune of dealing with several of these - they are even worse than campanula rapunculoides. Don't let it run about in any beds with perennials...but you could, concievably, plant it as a groundcover in some sort of enclosed situation.

Ah, I am also growing Bishop's Children, contadino. Keep the best ones this year, as they will make a tuber which you can either leave in the ground or dig up for next year. All the Bishop's offspring are quite good, but some tend to have darker foliage than others. I grow all my dahlias from seed or rooted cuttings and leave the tubers in the ground all year...but I do have very free-draining soil so tubers such as dahlias and cannas don't get affected by winter rains
Click to expand...

It's in an isolated pot, and staying there !

I do have a couple of places where it wouldn't matter if it did get a bit into spreading all over the ground - where I need something colourful as ground cover, but isolated from other plants. But under trees is probably a bit too shaded for it ?
 
Um, it doesn't seem to be very demanding of sun, to be honest. The last removal was through a shrub border, where it was very shady, StoneRoad. If anything, the dry soil under trees might prevent its enthudiastic nature from taking over. I think it is one of those plants which can be a menace in a mixed border, but kept in it's own constrained space, it is OK.
 
Damn. I was looking at past urban posts and I accidentally some seeds of this.
I wasn't going to pay extra for a ready-grown plant of a crucifer with "rocket" in the country name.
I will scatter it about as well as sowing some seeds indoors ...

Hopefully a better bet than mignonette which had no detectable scent to my nose ...

This one might stand in for my nicotianas if the lurgy gets them ...

I hope my local florist gets something colourful in while I'm waiting for things to happen ...

Hesperis matronalis

EDIT :-

so strictly biennial ?
I was going to sow wallflowers in any case for next year.
That pink one I had years ago sounds a lot like this plant - or perhaps it was a specially good one of "giant pink" and I was sold rooted cuttings ...

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