The compost heap - off topic thread

fryup wrote: »

well in a raised bed amongst the veg i suppose vinegar with salt and washing up liquid?



yes, vinegar wouldn't be in the stratosphere as roundup...(or would it?)

Are you serious? A raised bed of veg and you'll spray salt, soap and vinegar?

Just weed the damned thing!

fryup wrote: »

i'm too lazy

Then veg growing is not for you.

fryup wrote: »

where can i get mexican feather grass? (i'm in the mid-west near Limerick)

Future forests do them.

WRONG!

Agri seed is for feeding stock its the wrong type of rye grass!

Get a lawn seed mix for a hard wearing lawn that will have dwarf rye grass in it.

That or the Multipurpose would be the sort of thing to use.

Did it by hand for years but its a bit of a knack. Have to admit there were always a few spots with too much and too little but all worked out in the end.

Eventually got a cyclone spreader and that was much better.

Best thing I can say is try and sow from as many directions as you can and try and ignore previous passes. Divide seed up into two lots (can be more) and sow each lot at right angles to the other. If you have a lot of seed you can sometimes do 4 passes.

That said some people can get it just right in one pass - not me.

Then I used to brush the seed in with a broom. Just gently moving the broom enough to cover the seed, you may need to hold some of the weight of the broom, the main action is pulling the broom towards you a bit like raking out, while doing that you can flick thick clumps of seed into areas where there is too little.

looksee wrote: »

Here's an odd thing, I wonder if anyone else has seen this happen. I planted a couple of slips from a spindle tree last August, and in due course this spring they produced buds then leaves and even a few flowers. They were pushed in the end of the raised veg bed and I wanted to pot them on out of the way, but when I carefully dug them up, expecting a little root ball there was nothing, not a single sign of anything resembling a root. I had taken them with a heel and planted them quite deep, but nothing at all suggesting a root. I know willow can do it up to a point, but I always regard willow as an exception.

I have put them into a pot and will leave them to see what happens.

I haven't done Spindle but I've had that with viburnum. Buds and leaves with no root. Ultimately they failed though.

I've had it happen with roses - often the bits that I've pruned in the autumn and thrown in a heap somewhere with no intention of growing them on.

Reckon I've earned at least two slices of that, this weekend.

TMV? Looks a little like Tomato Mosaic Virus to me? Now while there are specific symptoms the plants are often so weak they succumb to something else so you see more than one disease.

Not strictly gardening, but it is about grass, for which the number and length of threads about lawns and mowers on boards.ie suggests there's more than a passing obsession with that particular weed! :pac:

‘The Silicon Valley of turf’

Warning: contains references to soccer and other sports!

Went on a farm walk to day of a local organic farm.

Came back and prepped a bed for sowing some seeds over the weekend.

New Home wrote: »

It could be useful if someone wanted to grow a certain type of crop... for glaucoma, like.

It very much looks to me like the kind of setup that's destined for the not-a-gardener market - places like schools, where one enthusiastic teacher can have a great raised-bed programme, but it collapses as soon as they leave because no-one can be bothered to do the tedious stuff.

And I can see how it would be useful for growing masses and masses of bedding plants for later transplanting, something bordering on the "industrial" scale which I need to do but still haven't got organised (came close last year with marigolds, and this year with Swiss Giant pansies, but it's all very hit and miss)

But 6000€ for 18m² max? Ah, here ... :pac:

Got to see most of the program and there was some very good photography in it alright. Nice idea as well to turn an area like that over to supporting wildlife.

Think its only a 2 parter program 🤔

Something else to keep us entertained over the next few weeks Monty has announced a few winter special episodes of Gardener’s World starting next Friday.

I’ve really enjoyed the Wildlife Gardener on BBC so far, thanks for the heads up! another 2 episodes left. There’s something very endearing about Colin Stafford Johnson, what a magical oasis he’s creating……!

I was checking the info on bbc and it said episode 2 of 4? He’s only gone as far as the end of year 1 yet I think it was meant to be a two year project. Hopefully we don’t have to wait till this time next year to see ‘year 2’! I’m looking forward to seeing how he manages his meadow after year 1 once the annuals have done their thing.