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The gardening thread

The cleomes I sowed on 8th May are a decent size now - and the heat has made them start flowering - thankfully I potted them up reasonably generously .. so fingers crossed
Fortuitously they've sorted themselves into three groups - one very tall white, a bunch of small ones of indterminate colour - I will make up a container with that lot - and five medium size pink ones which I am about to plant beside the front gate -
I've managed to clear a decent spot for them and opened up the light to the white brugmansia at the same time - but it's very dry and I'm going to need to terrace the steep bank using old floorboards - which at least leaves a space for something else along the edge - though I'm not sure what yet...
This is the location of the largest number of harvestmen in my gardens so I hope they survive ...

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I came across a YouTube channel yesterday I can see myself learning a lot from :-


"John Lord’s Secret Garden"

John Lord, owner of Ratoath Garden Centre in county Meath with over 40 years of gardening experience. Gardening Expert specialising in perennial plants. With 2 acres of show gardens planted by John himself he knows what are the plants that will shine in your garden. Mad About Plants.
 
So I did it.
I cut back the sloping bed to path level and found a patchy pre-existing courtyard surface.
I have some slabs out the back I could cut, but I'm struggling to get enthusiastic - though I have an angle grinder... maybe later.
Tomorrow I will cut up a floorboard to box-in the raised bed that will hold the cleomes - hopefully also holding in moisture for the brugmansias ...

cutback2.jpg
 
All three species of ipomoea are still moderately cautious with Grandpa Ott in the lead - (well it is Bavarian :D )followed now by lobata ("Spanish Flag") which also has interesting leaves ... quite delicate little racemes of flowers - I don't know if they expand ...

Alba ("moonflower") is a lot slower - all seven plants (east, south and north) tentatively easing their way towards the light and with the leaves looking a bit anaemic ...

I'll give both planters in the front garden a decent feed and water tomorrow ... it could be the cobea scandens is taking a lot of the resources as a much more vigorous plant ...Ott has already doing what I'm used to with other species - notably brugmansia and drawing nutrients from lower leaves ...

This weeks's modest temperature and muted sunshine ought to be ideal for them ...

I will also have to decide how I'm going to give them all a share of the light by steering them over the wall .. as at the moment it's a bit of a scrap ...


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Cleomes planted.
There are elements of ginger and citrus in the sticky-hairy-prickly stem / flower combo, but the overwhelming smell is weed :D
I will make sure I put a prominent label there ...
They weren't noticeably pot-bound and that's a decent spot for sunshine. I once had an enormous rosemary that thrived there ...
I'm going to edge the bed with some spider plants I've been fattening up, and I will see if I can fit in some bronze fennel.

Then I have to get into the middle of the garden and straighten up the verbenas and nicotianas with posts and string, and dig up the fully-pollinated sunflower - and I may swap in a containerised multiple header that has a bit of life left in it.
I will try to keep the ripening one vaguely alive for the birds ...
It's actually probably at the point where you could cook and eat the whole head - I had a taste of one of he immature seeds - but I'm not short of food and there will be lots more opportunities later ......

I'm a teeny bit nervous about putting nice things in pots right next to the gate ... I could add a board and make it a plunge bed - but will likely just anchor the containers ..


pinkcleomesplanted.jpg
 
I managed to squeeze in four bronze fennels and ten spiders :D
I'll sort out that messy right hand end at some point. I'm not at all certain where the mains cable runs so I will carefully excavate a decent hole and set a post in with some concrete mix I have left over ...

newbedwideshot.jpg
 
I keep planting tall things that flop over and I keep having to do surgical forays with stakes and string - and every time I tell myself that the next time I will have the support structure in place in advance...

Oh well, It wasn't quite as demanding as I expected - in the end just a horizontal run of hop cordage and then reaching forward and gently teasing the sticky plants apart and tying them back to the cord ... the only snag is they're now six feet tall and not quite the "voile effect" I intended - in the way of the verbenas ...though you do get tantalising glimpses of what lies behind and it makes it a treat for those who come to my door .. and of course this year the visual attraction continues 3 metres up the wall ...

Someone stopped to take a photo just now :)

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gentlegreen said:
I keep planting tall things that flop over and I keep having to do surgical forays with stakes and string - and every time I tell myself that the next time I will have the support structure in place in advance...

Oh well, It wasn't quite as demanding as I expected - in the end just a horizontal run of hop cordage and then reaching forward and gently teasing the sticky plants apart and tying them back to the cord ... the only snag is they're six feet tall and not quite the "voile effect" I intended - in the way of the verbenas ...though you do get tantalising glimpses of what lies behind and it makes it a treat for those who come to my door .. and of course this year the visual attraction continues 3 metres up the wall ...

Someone stopped to take a photo just now :)

View attachment 334054
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View attachment 334059
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The last few years I've been using the Chelsea Chop. Things like firecracker which would normally flop fill out at a lower height and stay upright.
 
contadino said:
The last few years I've been using the Chelsea Chop. Things like firecracker which would normally flop fill out at a lower height and stay upright.
Click to expand...
Yes I ought to have the courage - maybe in my next garden.
For some reason I keep forgetting how bloody tall nicotiana alata gets ...

I'm basically trying to stuff far too much in.
Just as well I chose my seeds mostly from Premier seeds and not Chiltern - that way leads to proper madness ...
 
Call me a snob, but impressive though teasels are, I'm definitely all about the spiky asteraceae - plus eryngium of course ...
I think teasels are best for a genuine wild garden ...
 
contadino said:
They're a tricky one because there are short-arsed bedding varieties now. I chopped mine last year and they still got to 1.5m tall. They then went diagonal anyway because they were in a bed next to a hedge.
Click to expand...
The ones I planted a fair bit later in a tub are a lot shorter - and the ones I've been torturing in 7cm pots are flowering at a small size ...
 
5.5 kilos of "courgettes" - which I will take to my sister's shortly ....
And the first 1.3 kilos of paty pan squashes - thankfully even the best plant is producing quite a few of them, but fairly slowly.
I have no oven so I may have to rig up something in the garden using charcoal ...

squashes.jpg
 
I re-evaluated the garden earlier and, inspired by the airy little bed I opened up yesterday by the gate, have started arranging a second vista that you have to walk up the path to fully appreciate - with the ricinuses following down from the Joe Pye in the corner ...
I can see myself regularly sitting out there to appreciate it ...
newvista.jpg

View attachment VID_20220724_125541448.mp4
 
I hope my sister's Ukranian guest wasn't too upset I didn't stay for the courgette fritters ...
I imagine they must have a fair few vegans in Ukraine these days.
It seems my sister is up against it food-wise, so will take all the courgettes and squashes and runner beans I have spare and the cycle ride is good for me - even though they live outside the city limit in SUV-land...
 
The first of about 10 individual mirabilis plants has produced a white flower .. by all accounts even this plant might produce other colours too ...

The perfume close-up is pungent - in the jasmine / nicotiana / lily area, but mostly bass notes ...
It shares its taxonomic heritage with carnations, pinks and beets ... - oh and bougainvillea ...

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gentlegreen said:
I hope my sister's Ukranian guest wasn't too upset I didn't stay for the courgette fritters ...
I imagine they must have a fair few vegans in Ukraine these days.
It seems my sister is up against it food-wise, so will take all the courgettes and squashes and runner beans I have spare and the cycle ride is good for me - even though they live outside the city limit in SUV-land...
Click to expand...
If you have the space, you could probably get a crop of beetroot before the frost, and cicoria rosso di Verona are sown about now for winter. I think I have some seeds for the latter if you want some.
 
contadino said:
If you have the space, you could probably get a crop of beetroot before the frost, and cicoria rosso di Verona are sown about now for winter.
Click to expand...
Yes beetroot are for deffo now - I have some viable seed - just have to fence it well enough to keep the bloody fox from lying on it... :)
And I was about to order some hearting lettuce and chicories.
I still hope to get my outside NFT system expanded and running as it gets cooler ...
 
TopCat said:
I put a hot bbq tray on my lawn and have killed some grass. Suggestions to fix it? View attachment 334400
Click to expand...
You can put some seed down, probably not too late in the year and the birds are spoiled for choice for food with so many insects atm, so probably won’t even snack on them.

However grass is amazingly fast at self healing and new shoots will pop up even if you do nothing. If the grass in the square patch is truly dead, the shoots will come from lateral spread from the surrounding live grass.
 
I posted this in the local park forum ...
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I once made the mistake of burning the grass at a camp site by putting my portable BBQ on a slab ...

Someone suggested they put a concrete slab "every 50 feet or so" - which I calculated as 17.4 per acre = 661 slabs in the whole park ...
 
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