Evening all,


It's hard to believe that 6 months has passed by and I haven't done a single gardening job. Moving house is a right old pain in the neck, but I'm happy to be where I am now. 2010 is the start date, must iniatially do some outdoor buildings but hope to start on the garden as well.

A few pic's of my new garden taken in sept

Haven't been doing much around my daughters garden for the past month or so, too busy getting things organised for my new house and I suppose that will be the way it will be for the next couple of months anyway. Last saturday I rescued this green house from ending up in the builders skip. It will take pride of place in my new garden, did I mention my new house is in 0.8 of an acre, so plenty of room for anything I want to do. Would hope to start on the gardening side of things in sept as I'm sure my better half has plenty of plans for me to do work, work that is, not gardening.

2 of the apple tree's which were planted last september seem to have little apple's appearing, hopefully they'll grow on into something nice and juicy.

Have been late planting out to the 3 raised beds, it's been a bit of a struggle to keep the plants in the greenhouse alive for the past month or so as the day's have been ultra hot, the spuds seem to be growing away, bushy but no great height, don't know why this is but I'm sure time will tell.

Have been missing for a while, between work and other problems just keeping up with things has been a struggle. Things are flying ahead, this year won't be a showy year as I just don't seem to be able to find the time to get on top of things. I recon 2010 will be my year.




Marigold 'durango' grown from seed this year again are doing well, nice big flowers and plenty of blooms per flower.

Gillardia's grown from seed last year, did well but are even better this year.

Lupins 'tutti fruiti' again grown from seed last year but are much stronger this year.

Evening all,

Just to let u know I'm still here, but have been up to alot of things, unfortunately most of them nothing to do with gardening. things are good on the gardening front at the moment and will post again to let u know how I'm getting on.

Growth over the past week has been very obvious, flowers, grass, strawberries, raspberries, potatoes and many more things but also weeds as per usual. Saturday could be best described as wet so I spent most of the day in the greenhouses potting up and tidying up. Dismantled the heated propagator as I need the space it's taking up, and really don't have further use for it this season.





Dropped by the hydro allotments this morning and met Peggy, it's a fabulous place with plenty of things going on. It great to see at first hand the interest that is really there in allotments.

My lilies are getting bigger by the day, great really, considering they were left to die down at the end of last season and just stuck at the bottom of the garden since then and left to their own devices. Will probably make 4 or 5 pots out of them at the end of this season and give them some fresh compost at the start of next season.

As you can see, plenty of green developed on my veg shelf since last week, everything has germinated so hopefully we will get them all to the planting out stage.

Things are beginning to hot up now in the garden, plenty of maintainance i.e. grass cutting weeding and edgeing. Colurs are beginning to creep in also, nice to see it at last.

Apple, plum and pear trees all in blossom, they look really colourful and healthy.

Gave the strawberries a feeding over week end, they also seem to be doing well

Little flowers on most of them.

The first potatoes I've ever grow have sprouted, hopefully they will continue on

Most of the veg seeds I sowed a week ago or so both in the cold and heated greenhouses have germinated, will let you know exactly what is up next week end.

Been having a problem with my potatoe peelings in the compost heap this year, a problem in that they keep sprouting.

Hopefully have sorted the problem now by lining the bin with some bubble wrap I had lying around and then some black polythene. Had a look at it this eve and the heat was good, so maybe this will speed things up as I have noticed it seems to be taking forever and a day to get compost.

Also planted up some comfrey cuttings I got last year that have been sitting in pots at the bottom of the garden, must say they are lovely and colourful.

Things are coming along nicely in the heated greenhouse, moved out some more seedlings today to the cold greenhouse to make some more room. Still have about 180 or so seedlings to pot up over the next week or so. The fuchsia standards are coming on well and the crysants are beginning to flower.





Sowed some veg seeds today in the propagator at about 18 degrees, which really means nothing as the daytime temps soar to about 30 degrees in the greenhouse. Doesn't seem to cause any problems. Have reduced the heater to run at about 12 degrees overnight.


SOW DATE 13/4/09 IN HEATED GREENHOUSE

VEG VARIETY
TOMATO MONEYMAKER
TOMATO LEGEND
TOMATO RED ALERT
TOMATO 4796 TRIAL SEED

Did some veg and flower seed sowing today in the cold greenhouse, more of a test for myself to find out what can be grown in trays and pots and then transplanted out as opposed to just sowing outside simply because my soil really needs allot of work which is going to take some years to accomplish. Hopefully will do some outdoor sowing next week end . Some of the seeds are trial seeds, something which I volunteered for and was hoping they would send flower seeds, but as my luck would have , I got all veg seeds, ah well nothing like been thrown in at the deep end.

SOW DATE 29/3/09 IN COLD GREENHOUSE

HERB COMFREY



SOW DATE 13/4/09 IN COLD GREENHOUSE

VEG VARIETY
BRUSSEL SPROUTS TRAFALGAR F1
CABBAGE SURPISE F1
CABBAGE TUNDRA FI
CABBAGE AUTUMN QUEEN F1
CALEBRESE BELSTAR F1
CLIMBING BEAN 4773 TRIAL
CORIANDER 4784 TRIAL
KALE 4792 TRIAL
LEEK OARSMAN F1
ONION HI KEEPER F1
PEA TWINKLE
PEA OASIS
PEA BALMORAL
PEA JAGUAR SECOND EARLY
SALAD LEAVES 4790 TRIAL
SWEETCORN 4703 TRIAL

Did all the usual maintenance work over the weekend, grass cutting, weeding and cleaning. My early potatoes have pushed some leaves through the soil so I hope that's a good sign. The second early's are chitting well and will be planted out at the end of this month. All the flowers in the cold greenhouse are really filling out so hopefully they'll be in bloom in a months time for planting out. Generally the garden is really coming to life now, some nice colours and plently of leaf growth which promises some colourful flower's in the next couple of weeks all going well.

Spent Sunday moving some of my seedlings to the cold greenhouse. Some might say a little early but need the space in the heated one as I have many more seedlings to prick out this week. Only moved the strongest seedlings so hopefully they'll acclimatise to cooler conditions without any bothers. I know I seem to be a major advertiser for the soft drink companies, but I must say these tray are so handy, just bung a cork into the hole at the centre of the tray, fill with a little water every other day or so, weather dependent, and no problems with compost drying out. If the water hasn't been soaked up after a day, remove the cork and drain off the water and the compost is moist for another couple of days, again weather dependent. And to think these trays were heading to a landfill site.

Also decided to put up shading this weekend as some of the days we are getting at the moment are almost summer like. Great to see such good weather and hopefully we will see much more of it over the coming months.

I know I've been saying I've been trying to get round to starting off my veg seeds, well this eve filled some trays with compost and put them in the propagator to get the temp up to around 15 degree's, so tomorrow evening will be starting in earnest.

These are some fuchsia cuttings that I'm going to try and grow as a fan shape and as standards after reading an article in garden news recently. Seems to be a simple enough affair, but as usual time will tell. Over the weekend spent most of my time trying to organise more space in my heated greenhouse, transferred some plants to the cold greenhouse as they were ready for 5'' pots, so hopefully the climate change won't be too much for them. As the weather was good this weekend did some grass cutting and general tidying around the garden. For some strange reason just can't seem to get round to starting off my veg seeds, but no more excuses, this is going to be the week it begins.

2008 MORE FLOWERS

2008 FLOWERS

This is one of the cuttings I took from a fuchsia 'Dollar Princess' in February. read a interesting article in last weeks Garden News about growing fuchsia fans and fuschia standards. Going to give it a try and will keep you updated.



Bought this crysant in one of the DIY stores in an almost but dead state. Wasn't hard to revive it and I now have 3 well rooted cutting to boot. I don't think crysants are too popular in this country as garden flowers but in the UK many different varieties are easily available as cuttings. Must have a closer look at this next year as I think they are fabulous.

Haven't been getting as much done around the garden for the past 2 weekends as I should have. Between one thing and another, time has been limited. Have sown directly into a border the following seeds, not a great border as the wind is rampant there and I'm still waiting for some griselenia hedging to fill out which I planted there around 18 months ago. So we'll wait and see what happens there.

SOW DIRECT DATE 21/03/09
FLOWER VARIETY
CANDYTUFT FAIRY MIX
LAVATERA MONT BLANC
NEMOPHELA BABY BLUE EYES
NIGELLA LOVE IN A MIST
SUNFLOWER DWARF YELLOW SPRAY

The heated greenhouse is a bit of a challenge at the moment, morning and evening temperatures still low, but during the day temperatures inside are soaring to 35 degrees even with ventilation. Don't need to have bubble wrap for daytime but certainly do for night time. I suppose my biggest problem is that I leave for work around 7 in the morning when it's still quite cool and don't get home til around 6.30. Having said that the seedlings are doing very well.

In total I have about 300 seedlings pricked out now with a tray of antirrhinums and some delphiniums to prick out from the first lot of sowings.

Went on another seed sowing frenzy today and sowed the following

SOW DATE 22/3/09
FLOWER VARIETY
BLACK EYED SUSAN SALMON SHADES
GAZANIA KISS ROSE F1
GAZANIA KISS GOLD F1
GAZANIA KISS WHITE FI
GAZANIA KISS BRONZE F1
MARIGOLD DURANGO BOLERO F1
MARIGOLD PATULA DURANGO BEE F1
MARIGOLD DURANGO RED
MORNING GLORY CARNEVALE DI VENEZIA
MORNING GLORY HEAVENLY BLUE
PETUNIA SALMON VELVET FI
ZINNIA ELEGANS SWIZZLE SCARLET AND YELLOW
ZINNIA ELEGANS SWIZZLE CHERRY AND IVORY

All the seeds sown today were sown in trays as normal but for the 'Zinnia' as they don't like root disturbance, I sowed them in toilet roll cores cut in half, put them into the seed trays and covered the seed tray as usual with glass to speed up germination, hopefully this will work and I'll be able to plant them out without root disturbance.