Today I did something in my Garden

Its a bit early for seeds, and late for spring bulbs, coming up to time for summer bulbs but I would give it a little while yet, we are due some cold weather. You don't need to completely change the soil in the pots or bunker, take off about 4 - 8 inches and throw in a couple of bags of compost with John Innes, or a bag of compost and a bag of soil (into the bunker, equivalent for the pots) and mix them well.

Then when you see some primulas or the small pansies, probably in the supermarket or diy, but check that they have not been left to dry out, put in a pack or two of them. Later in the year - May at the earliest - you can replace them with summer flowering plants. You can buy a tray of young plants for the same price as a packet of seeds, and much more reliable.

Look out for easy shrubs in the likes of Lidl, things like Pieris, check back here if you see some on offer and wonder are they suitable, and put them in. They will become a permanent item, you can put some spring bulbs in next autumn. You will have to water them in the summer or anytime there is a few days of little or no rain.

Edit - you would be better to start a new thread then it can continue on and you will be able to find your questions and answers.

Going back to things I did today in the garden - I finally got around to giving my new little trees a wire netting collar, just to keep the bunnies off. I planted some on a nearly naked ditch (after we had removed all the briars) that the said bunnies had dug an entire city in, hopefully stripping it will encourage them to go elsewhere, but I am half afraid I will see one of my Rowans disappearing root first into the ground!

Skill Magill

looksee wrote: »

Edit - you would be better to start a new thread then it can continue on and you will be able to find your questions and answers.

Thanks a mill, I'll do that, you've given me plenty to go on though

ellee

I finally got round to pruning the late clematis plants . They were starting to bud already!

I can see some daffodils and crocuses popping up but no sign of any tulips? Is that normal? I don't normally plant a lot of bulbs but had a go this year.... bit worried they won't like my cold clay soil....

macraignil

ellee wrote: »

I finally got round to pruning the late clematis plants . They were starting to bud already!

I can see some daffodils and crocuses popping up but no sign of any tulips? Is that normal? I don't normally plant a lot of bulbs but had a go this year.... bit worried they won't like my cold clay soil....

Bulbs here are bit slower popping up this year. I think tulips are usually a bit later than crocuses anyway. If your ground is cold clay it would probably make them slower to shoot up. I only have a small number of tulips in a couple of big pots in a spring bulb selection and there are only shoots a few centimeters tall showing currently. This is with a free draining potting mix and the pots in a relatively sheltered south facing spot. The year has been cold so far so your tulips might just be slow to pop up because of that.

ellee

Yeah and I chose fairly late flowering tulips also. Won't give up on them just yet! Plants tend to flower late for me. I've delphiniums that don't ever flower until Sep!

scarepanda

In the absence of being able to do much in the garden for the last few weeks because of the weather, we concentrated on getting the shed and garage organised and sorted out. All gardening tools have a proper home now and we got an old bench moved and put up in front of the South facing window for potting etc.

The lawn seems to have dried out a fair bit the last few days so I'm hoping to get back out tomorrow and work on tidying up the ditch and dog proofing it before the end of the month.

I have just been doing winter gardening in front of the fire, sorting out the seeds I have purchased/been given/collected etc since before Christmas. I have something like 30 packets of seeds plus several packs from last year. I don't have a greenhouse or even, yet, a cold frame, so there is going to be masses of clutter of seed trays around the house if I even get a fraction of them sown!

Today I did something in my garden: I looked at it.

Been away for two weeks, so it was my customary back-home-tour. All the tulips planted in pots are poking leaves above the surface; none of the tulips planted in the ground are. Daffs are just about to flower, but the crocuses are only barely showing signs of growth. Fritillaries are obviously enjoying the swamp-like conditions; maybe a bit too much - could be a bad omen for the crocuses and tulips nearby. A drain dug just before I left is full to overflowing (as is every other hole around the garden).

I thought I was going to have fritillaries until I realised they need damp ground. Maybe eventually my bog garden will happen!

scarepanda

I managed to get a couple hours work done in the garden today. It's cold out but perfect weather when your pulling at a hedge!

I got about 3/4 of the hedge trimmed back and old shrubs from the rockery pulled out. The aim of the job to get in close the hedge to put up wire to create a better barrier to keep the dogs in the garden. But I also want to clear out any scrub while I'm at it to hopefully rejuvenate the hedge. And then replant the rockery. But I have to dig out old rotten weed membrane first. One part I tried to clear out today has about 6 inches of a 50/50 mix of gravel and organic matter. So that's going to be a fun job!

piwyudo0fhn57b

Well done!

Not quiet as far as the garden but I sorted through my oca and mashua from last year. Got rid of the rotten ones and boxed up the rest in sand to keep the air off them.

Need to open my seed potatoes at the weekend for chitting

Currently building a small greenhouse. Image attached.
Got a bit more done today until the rain came.
Sorted out my earlies for chitting.

Charlotte, sarpo Una and fir Apples.

SouthWesterly wrote: »

Got a bit more done today until the rain came.

Coldest night of the year/winter here last night (-6.5°C) ... which meant SUUUUUNNNNNNY MORNING!!! :cool: And afternoon. Did a bit of log-splitting to warm me up, then uprooted my most vigorous rose bush to split it for re-planting in a new location. En route to the project site, I spotted half a dozen rose prunings, thrown in my "must move that later" pile that were sprouting lots of new growth, despite not being heeled in in any sense of the word ... so I heeled them in where I'd taken the big bush from. Of course, I can't remember what exact rose they came from originally - I'm hoping it's the yellow one! And as a "might as well, sure let's see what happens" bonus, I decided to jam about twenty post-transplant cuttings/prunings into my sort-of-nursery corner beside the septic tank too.

After that, it was back to standing around, trying to figure out how to reorganise veg patches, fruit garden, water storage and vehicle access ... but I think I've finally got it straight in my head (and putting it down on paper this evening). If we get another few of these cold and frosty days this week, the digger will be working hard.

Well whatever’s left of my frost fleece that tore in half last night and left my tender plants under a foot of snow this morning will be well and truly blown half way across the country tonight with this howling gale! Fat lot of good that was :eek: :rolleyes: you live you learn :pac:

nigeldaniel

My rose garden is in a mess after the winter. Yet somehow wild grass and a few weeds managed to grow up around them! I might as well dig the lot up and start again.

Igotadose

Local farmer neighbor offered me a digger's load of cow manure 'in a week or so.' Never used it directly myself. Should I put it on the beds and cover over, and let it sit till I put seedlings out in May? Do I need to let it rot first? Can it be mixed in immediately and then sit for a couple months?

Suggestions welcome, thanks

Igotadose wrote: »

Should I put it on the beds and cover over, and let it sit till I put seedlings out in May? Do I need to let it rot first? Can it be mixed in immediately and then sit for a couple months?

It mostly depends on what you're going to do with the beds afterwards - so plants will be quite happy to grow in it "undiluted" whereas others would really need it to be well rotted.

I'd spread it thickly in one part of the bed - a section that you won't need to plant until much later in the season - and leave it exposed to the elements. The rain will wash some of the soluble nutrients down into the soil below, while worms and bettles will get to work on the insoluble stuff.

Later on, you can move it in stages, either digging it into another part of the bed, or using it as a top dressing on a bed that you've cleared.

Am now two days into some serious ground clearance work, one more to go. I'm aiming to create two linked ponds with combined capacity of about 50000m³ - that should get me through the summer! :cool:

This week's objective is/was to get all the thorny shrubs, gorse, brambles, etc dug out and moved to a holding zone (they're destined for one or more hugelkultur beds). The digging out is done; will shift them all tomorrow; then start marking out the area to be excavated.

My leeks are up

More at my desk than in the garden.
I set up a planting calendar for this year.
Hopefully it will save having gluts.

Skipduke

have an old bath, planning to put it in the greenhouse and fill it with soil in the hopes of growing carrots. Good or bad idea?

magicbastarder

Drainage?

Skipduke

magicbastarder wrote: »

Drainage?

decent size crack in the center of the bathtub, no problems with drainage

SouthWesterly wrote: »

I set up a planting calendar for this year.
Hopefully it will save having gluts.

Great minds ...

... although I did my version last week.

This week's project is get the beds ready for this year's veg, starting with those clearing a space for those irrigation ponds. Job done by lunchtime today.

The site in question:
BEFORE (well before - did some preliminary clearning back in October)

AFTER (the barrels are for reference!)

Next stage is to move several trailer-loads of topsoil to the new beds higher up the garden, as soon as possible now so that I can start planting/transplanting by the end of the month. Temperature today 16°C

but very strong wind. The cranes loved it though - saw about dozen groups fly over during the afternoon, probably about 2-3000 birds in total. Magnificent sight. :cool:

New Home

That many cranes?!? Wow, I'd have loved to see them, it must've been a sight to behold.

Would you take a picture, next time, please, Celtic Rambler?

New Home wrote: »

Would you take a picture, next time, please, Celtic Rambler?

I would ... if I could get the right combination of early warning, limited cloud cover and the right camera to hand! I've been trying for over a year to get a good photo of their passage overhead, even to the point of having a drone charged up and ready for take-off for more than a week back in the autumn! So far, though, no success.

Just checked my crane migration site, and seemingly I'm in the ha'penny place are regards sightings yesterday - some people saw tens of thousands! :eek:

From that site, this is the migration pattern yesterday (SW to NE) and an "I am here" for completenes.

I am amused that your garden in many respects looks uncannily like mine CelticRambler! Appears to be much the same size (though I think from what you have said, yours is bigger), uphill slope, (superficially) similar trees, I don't have the same extent of digging work at the moment but it comes and goes!

Much work going on at the moment thinning out a wildly overgrown hedge on a bank to let more light into the house, its working great!