Veg and Flower Time

2011-03-28T13:23:00.001+01:00

Well, have been on the missing list for a while now, have started again and will be updating as I go along.

Spring and all is going well, let's hope it continues.

2010-03-31T22:06:00.003+01:00

Been meaning for all of last week to get in and add some words to the pictures posted last week, where has the time gone . The weeks are flying by and finding time to get everything in seems to be impossible.

Hydrangaes are coming back nicely, gave then a little clip and tidying up a fornight ago.

My lupins are really beginning to fill out, hopefully a sign of things to come.

The lilly's are coming on strong, suppose I should have thinned them out this year but now it will have to wait till next year. Have got nice displays over the past 2 years from these.

All is going well in the greenhouse, not as many seeds as I have done for the past 2 years as I'm oly doing my daughters garden this year, my own will follow next year.

Marigolds are so easy.

Red cabbage plants no bother again this year and they were absolutely lovely last year.

Peas not a bother either, so hopefully we'll have a good crop again.

Today I planted the spuds in a raised bed. Tightened up the recomended spacings to get more in, so we'll have to see what happens.

2010-03-16T20:00:00.004Z

Below is a list of the seeds I sowed in February this year. Although all my seeds were last years or the year before, germination was good. Going to sow another batch over the week end and also do some more work on my daughters garden.

Flower seeds sown in February 2010
Rudbeckia Cherry Brandy
Rudbeckia Becky Mixed
Rudbeckia Hirta Toto
Petunia Salmon Velvet F1
Marigold Durango Tangerine F1
Gaillardia Goblin
Sweet Pea Early Fragrance Mixed

Veg seeds Sown in February 2010
Cabbage Red Jewel F1
Pea Twinkle

2010-02-15T19:58:00.005Z

Sunday was like a summers day, bright and warm, spent the afternoon in my daughters garden in short sleeves. Well the greenhouse is finished, that 3rd bed is done too, dug 2 trenches across the bed 18'' apart and put in some newspapers and well rotted manure for my pea's. That now is covered as well for the next couple of weeks. Bought some carrots on seed tape for a trial this year, seems to be the thing to do. Spent a couple of hours cutting back and weeding some flower beds as well as cutting a small patch of grass just to tidy it up. I also turned over the compost heap.

I started these 2 beds last year for raspberries and blackberries, they really haven't done much but then I suppose, hand on heart they were slightly neglected, gave them a good old weeding and a good covering of home made compost. Fingers crossed we'll have something good from them this year.

Seeing as my greenhouse is now nice and clean an organised I put my 'rocket' early spuds on the bench for chitting. Will be planting these on Paddy's day.

My seeds in the propogator are germinating well and all but one tray has shown signs of new life, still plenty of time for this tray to come good yet. Also sowed some 'red jewel' cabbage seeds on Sunday as I have the propogator on a fairly high setting which this seed requires.

Frustration

2010-02-10T20:26:00.003Z

Was delighted to get a packet of bubble wrap clips with the roll of bubble wrap I bought last week.
This was most useful as for some strange reason one never seems to have enough of them or indeed one can sometimes forget where they were put for safe keeping. The problem I have found in the past is that different manifactures use slightly different profiles which in reality means that they sometimes are not a snug fit, ie they tend to fall out as your trying to hang the bubble wrap.

Solution: position a match stick in the profile and gently force the clip into place. The match stick is made of soft wood so it will slightly squash as you force the clip over it.

Signs of new life 2010

2010-02-10T20:14:00.003Z

Popped into my daughters shed this eve to find the marigold durango seeds have begun to germinate on day 3. Hopefully this is a good omen for things to come rather than me counting my chickens before they have hatched. I normally cover my seed trays with a sheet of glass as I have found by experimentation that this can cause faster germination by up to 50%. The other thing that I am happy about is that I now know for sure that my flouresent tubes work, this is the only light source as I have blanked out the windows in the shed. So much for fancy expensive gismo's, these were a fraction of the cost and give a larger area of cover. Hope I haven't jinxed thing for myself now :-)

2010-02-08T19:11:00.007Z

My lupins were looking pretty miserable so I cut back all the dead wood, some more to do next weekend. Can't remember where I read the type of feed to use for these flowers, know I saved the article somewhere.

Weeded, dugover, added a barrow load of homemade compost to each of 2 raised beds, then I covered them with polythene so that they'll be weed free when I need them in the next couple of months. One more bed to do next weekend.

Dug up some strawberry plants 11 in all and put these in tubs at the back door. They may be seen by my daughter there and maybe she'll water, feed and pick them now that they are under her nose. Poted up 5 runners from last year. Must do some more runners this year as this crop of strawberry's are in their last year.

Nearly got the greenhouse bubble wrapped, but forgot to bring some corner clips with me this morning. Another job to be finished off next week end.

Started my seed sowing today.

Rudbeckia: becky mixed, hirta toto and cherry brandy.

Petunia: salmon velvet F1.

Marigold: durango tangerine F1.

Gaillardia: goblin.

Fingers crossed.

2010-02-01T19:13:00.003Z

Got my propogator and lights set up in a tempory place for this year. I was never quite sure whether the lights had any effect or not as I usually set this up in a heated greenhouse, but this year it's set up in my daughters shed as I haven't a garage or greenhouse up yet. Going to sow next weekend so I'll keep u posted as to the outcome.

Today also tidied out my daughters greenhouse, it was a job long overdue. Everything has now being removed ready for a good old washdown and bubble wrap next week end.

What I did today

2010-01-25T20:34:00.004Z

Managed to pick up some used carpet and underlay today, so this afternoon laid it out to make a bed of 40' X 6' . Hopefully this will kill off everything underneath and leave me with some good soil. Won't probably do anything with it until much later in the year when I'll be preparing it for 2011. The other good bit of news is that I'll be doing some seed sowing and gardening for my daughter this year, she has run some power into her shed so I'll be able to set up my propogator in there for flowers for her garden and will also do some veg as well in her greenhouse for planting out later on. Once I get the building work done in my own garden which will probably take me most of this year, it will be full steam ahead in 2011 all going well.

2009-12-21T21:51:00.004Z

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

2009-06-20T20:25:00.003+01:00

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.

2009-06-08T20:06:00.003+01:00

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.

2009-06-08T19:54:00.002+01:00

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.

2009-05-25T22:03:00.002+01:00

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.

2009-04-27T20:02:00.003+01:00

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.

2009-04-21T21:11:00.005+01:00

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.

2009-04-13T21:01:00.005+01:00

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

2009-04-13T20:39:00.004+01:00

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.

2009-04-06T21:02:00.003+01:00

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.

2009-03-30T16:58:00.003+01:00

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

2009-03-23T20:06:00.001Z

2008 FLOWERS

2009-03-23T19:51:00.001Z

2009-03-23T19:14:00.002Z

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.

2009-03-22T21:44:00.011Z

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.

2009-03-17T17:53:00.003Z

Did a little bit of flower picking today, don't have a whole pile of tulips or hyacinths, must do more for next year.

Signs of growth with pear, apple and plum trees also some raspberries I planted a couple of months ago coming on nicely

This was one of the tulips before I cut it for the vase above, amazing how quickly they close when out of direct sunlight

A hydrangea which literally was only twigs, 2 weeks ago and now has sprung into action

Wall flowers (I think) nearly there now, should add some nice colour well before the bedding plants are put in at the beginning of June.

Got those spuds planted, Arron Pilot, put some British Queens on the bench for chitting, Did a little bit of tidying up around the garden and some more pricking out of seedlings.

2009-03-17T10:55:00.002Z

Happy St Patricks day everyone , haven't done much since my last post, had great intentions but between work last week, a meeting re allotments on Saturday afternoon, then the rugby match on Saturday eve, and then the celebrations that night, left me in no fit state to do much on Sunday. So it was a total disaster. Started again this morning by pricking out more seedlings, tidying up the greenhouse, going to do a bit of planning for my next round of seed sowing for the coming week end, and going to plant a few spuds today.

The garden

2009-03-08T16:46:00.002Z

Didn't do much work today, added some spent compost from my seed trays to one of the borders, had a quick look in the cold greenhouse, everything fine there. Had a quick look around the garden, things appear grand. Watered and fed some other plants, that was as much as could be done.

Green house work

2009-03-08T16:29:00.004Z

Spent the morning pricking out another 80 or so seedlings. Have about 150 now in total. Last year I used liquid copper fungicide which was watered in at the initial stage of watering the compost. This year I'm just misting the seedlings when there pricked out to pots. Seems to be working fine with only 5 out of 150 going down.

One side of my 6'x6' green house is now full and I still have another 150 or so seedlings to be pricked out over the coming week. God but I'd love to have a huge green house. I also watered the seed trays and newly potted up seedlings and also the seedlings that have been potted up for a month with a little feed to keep them going.

So, half the greenhouse is taken up with half of the first sowings, going to sow as much again around Paddy's day so it's going to be very tight in there in another couple of weeks.

Colour in the garden

2009-03-08T16:23:00.003Z

A few flowers brightening things up, plenty of daffodils some hyacinths, pansy's and viola's. Tulips will be here soon. Can't wait for the annuals to start flowering.

Snow

2009-03-08T16:10:00.003Z

Well we've had different types of weather since my last post. This photo was taken near Charlville Co Cork early last Wednesday morning, It snowed for much of the early morning and everywhere was covered in a white blanket, luckily enough it wasn't cold enough to freeze the snow so driving conditions weren't too bad. We have had rain, wind and some good sunshine as well this week, hopefully the appearance of snow which is something I haven't seen down this end of the country for years is a good omen for what's to come for the rest of the year.

Weekend work

2009-03-01T20:51:00.002Z

Saturday is my day off from work and gardening, in fact everything, so got nothing done. Reconed I deserved a second feebie as well today seeing as how I got so much during the week and needed a good old rest as I'm back to work tomorrow. Did however start working out how many plants for each area of the veg garden and will finish that off over the coming week and a few other jobs to be done during the evenings this week. Will keep you posted

2009-02-27T12:46:00.004Z

Had a think about this no dig gardening and searched around on the net last night. Some good sites out there, but because of the fact that the area I was considering for this, is a sloping bank, more consideration and thought is required.

Got a nice surprise this morning in the post. T&M replaced a packet of seeds which I had a problem with. Great customer service there, I sent off an E, had a automated response within 10 minutes telling me someone would contact me as soon as possible and that's what happened. It's nice to see some company's out there offer a high level of customer service, no matter how small the problem. Also this is a copy of the only gardening mag I buy, Garden News, its a weekly one. More free seeds again this week, they're going to have to stop these free seeds, I'm running out of space, just can't help myself. Gotta stop sowing. :-).

Watered my seed trays this morning as the weather was dampish and have had enough of digging for the time being. I normally put a cork in one tray and stand the seed trays in there for about 15 minutes or so.

With the potted up seedlings I just stick a cork in each tray as its too fiddly transferring one pot at a time to another tray. I just add a small quantity of water to each tray and its usually soaked up that day. If there's still water in the tray that evening, I remove the cork and let the excess water drain away rather than letting the pots sit in water day after day.

2009-02-26T17:35:00.004Z

Continued with my digging today and as I dug the afternoon away 3 works kept popping into my mind, 'no dig gardening'. Certainly going to check it out.

Plenty signs of life in the garden.

Beds are done

2009-02-25T20:49:00.006Z

Finished off digging over the last 2 beds, so a bit of fertilizer next week, a bit of luck after that and I'll just have to wait and see what happens. The beds are 9'x6' approx so I'm not going to be exactly feeding the extended family for the year as I have just discovered cabbage need 2'x2', cauliflowers need 2'x2' brussel sprouts 2'x2' and so on but it should be a good introduction for me. Also got the rest of the grass cut, just a light topping, its hard to beat the smell of newly mown grass.

This is tomorrows project, weather permitting. Going to try to turn this into more veg ground. I can feel the pain already.

A beautiful morning

2009-02-25T14:13:00.005Z

A beautiful morning this morning and I decided to do a litte work in the heated greenhouse. Generally just organised things a bit better as I have alot of seedlings which will need to be pricked out over the next week or two.
Things are going to be pretty tight in there and also will have maybe another 20 tray to sow come the middle of March.

Pricked out some marigolds this morning, the ones on the left, fuschia next to them.

This is my one and only fuschia which is about 10years old. Based on advice given to me by one of my forum buddies, I started it into growth about 5 weeks ago by putting it into the heated greenhouse. This is how it looks today. Took some cuttings from the new growth about 2 weeks ago, put them in the propagator at 20 degrees and they were ready for potting on this morning.

Also did a bit of seed sowing, 2 trays and a couple of pots of sweet pea

SOW DATE 25/2/09
FLOWER VARIETY
ANTIRRHINUM TOM THUMB MIXED
DELPHINIUM DELIGHT MIXED
SWEET PEA EARLY FRAGRANCE MIXED .

Turned off the heater in the greenhouse this morning as the days seem to be fine now, but will turn it on each evening for a while yet.

Ok, the weather seems fine again after the shower we had at lunch time, so I'm off out now to cut more grass and dig over those 2 other raised beds.

Other jobs I did today

2009-02-24T18:56:00.004Z

Just in case anybody gets the wrong idea, I'm on holidays for a week, I have loads of jobs to get done, so every day I'll be doing something in the garden. Unfortunately back next Monday morning, but then I suppose the way things are, those of us that have jobs are lucky, no doubt about it.

Tidied up the cold green house, cleaned up the geraniums and others, gave them a liquid feed and put a bit of order into the place.

Also checked how the chitting process was coming along, seems to be ok, don't really know as I have never grown spuds before, things seem to be growing out of them so I assume that's fine.

Planted 20 sweet pea plants which I grew from seed last October. Going to grow cordons this year as last year they just ran riot, and the quantities of flower were good but the quality not so good, so this year I'm going to try quality instead of quantity. The bed for these I dug about a month ago, put well rotten manure at the bottom of the trench and added compost to the soil. Hopefully they will do fine .

Also did a bit of tidying up around the garden, some grass cutting, border tidying etc. Place looks nice and neat now, but there's a distinct lack of colour, plenty of green as in the above, other than that some daf's .

Allotment work today

2009-02-24T18:29:00.005Z

This is my mini allotment area, here I intend to grow the usual veggies and some fruit. This is one of the 3 raised beds I made late last year and I gave it a bit of a dig over today, simply to get rid of stones and get a better tilt. The soil itself is clay, and I haven't time this year to remedy that, neither have I had time to adjust PH and nutrient values, just going to go with the flow this year and hope for the best. I'm going to use another area to grow spuds and in line with what Derek Brooks says, I'm going to use a 4 year rotation. The only thing I'm going to do this year is to add some fertilizer a month or so before sowing or planting.

I also planted some strawberry plants today, 18 in all. These I grew from seed around this time last year and kept them in 3'' pots at the bottom of the garden since last summer. Again the soil is clay and I have dug in some compost to try and remedy this. All I need now are some nice tasty strawberries. They are either Sarian or Florian or maybe a bit of both, don't know, had a bit of an identity crisis last year.

These are some cyclamen grown from seed last year, very slow progress, hopefully I'll be using come October. Had them in 2'' pots and again left them at the bottom of the garden since late last summer. Today I potted them on into 3'' pots, so hopefully the bit of new compost will give them a bit of a boost.

Seed sowing 2009

2009-02-23T19:26:00.003Z

Started my seed sowing with some strawberries on January 1st. These have done very well and are currently in 3'' pots in the heated greenhouse. Any seeds that require 15 degrees or less to germinate are sown on the bench and others that require 18 degrees plus are sown in the propogator. Germination thus far has been very good this year and hopefully all my little seedlings will go on to be strong longlived beauties.

SOW DATE 12/2/09
FLOWER VARIETY
CHRYSANTHEMUM EARLY DWARF CHARMFASHION MIXED F1
CINERARIA SILVER DUST
DIANTHUS PLUMARIUS SONATA
GAILLARDIA T&M RESELECTED HYBRIDS
GAILLARDIA GOBLIN
LOBELIA TRAILING SAPHIRE
LOBELIA UPRIGHT CRYSTAL PALACE
MARIGOLD DURANGO TANGERINE F1
OSTEOSPERMUM TETRA SUNSHINE GIANTS
OSTEOSPERMUM PASSION MIXED
PANSY WITTROCKIANA PETITE MIXED F1
PETUNIA CONFETTI MIXED F2
PETUNIA SALMON VELVET FI
PETUNIA PURPLE VELVET F1
RUDBECKIA CHERRY BRANDY
RUDBECKIA BECKY MIXED
RUDBECKIA RUSTIC DWARF MIXED
RUDBECKIA HIRTA TOTO
TAGETTS STARFIRE
THUNBERGIA SUPERSTAR ORANGE
THUNBERGIA ALTA BLUSHING SUSIE
VERBENA COMPACT MIXED
VERONICA MIXED COLOURS
VIOLA ENDURO MIXED F1

SOW DATE 12/2/09
VEG VARIETY
BRUSSEL SPROUT MAXIMUS F1
CABBAGE TARVOY F1
CABBAGE RED JEWEL F1

Will be sowing more varieties of flowers and veg mid March, will let u know how the current batch are doing as well as other varieties sown.

Greenhouse staging

2009-02-22T22:24:00.003Z

Again on another trip to the shops saw these drinks stands heading for the dump. Thought to myself definately have a use for them. They are light weight but very strong, easily cleaned and will outlast me. It amazes me the amount of stuff that is produced, used once and then dumped. Well maybe the recession will stop alot of this carry on, shameful waste.

The heated bench

2009-02-22T22:20:00.002Z

Hasn't been commissioned yet but hopefull next season will be the time. Just using the top as a work bench at the moment and the bottom being used as a place to put the propogator.

My seed trays

2009-02-22T22:08:00.002Z

These are what I use for seed trays. Was in a shop one day at a deli counter and spotted a load of these ready to be dumped. I heated a 6 inch nail with a blowtorch and put in the drainage holes. All the seeds I sow in these trays are covered with glass which was waste and I cut to size. I find by covering with glass 2 things happen, 1. germination is much quicker and 2. the compost doesn't dry out as quick in the propogator. Normally I dry off the glass first thing each morning and around teatime each evening

My equiptment part 2

2009-02-22T21:40:00.005Z

My little greenhouse in its tempory home

My pride and joy is my little 6x6 greenhouse, at the moment it is bubble wrapped as I'm sowing seeds. I have a heater, a propogator, a heating bench which I made myself, have the cables and thermostat but haven't used it as I moved house a couple of weeks ago and will be moving again in the near future, so next season hopefully it will be up and running. I also have flouresent lights which seem to be working well and all the other bits and bobs that one needs. I always try to find something that I can recycle or make myself rather than just going out and buying it. It's not about the money, for me it's about saying 'well done kid' you made something that is as good or better than a shop bought article or ' glad i didn't throw that out, knew it would come in handy some day :-) .

My equiptment

2009-02-19T19:35:00.002Z

Right so, courtesty of my daughter I have a shed full of the usual stuff, a wheel barrow, fork, spade etc etc, also on her garden I put up a green house which I got free from a relation , but needed to do some work on, ie had to make a door as it was missing. I use it as a cold frame, but you could say it ended up as a dumping ground last summer, have made a promise to myself that this year, neat and tidy is the only way to go.

From the start

2009-02-15T18:11:00.002Z

So to start from the beginning, have only been interested in gardening form the past 18 months, was asked by my daughter to look after her garden which is about 1/4 acre mostly sloping. Currently have no garden myself due to selling own house and waiting for builder to finish new house, and as everybody knows things in the building industry are very slow at the moment and that includes finishing off developments. I'm hoping for june, but we'll have to wait and see. My new garden will be a normal semi d garden whatever that size is, so that will be a new project. Back to my daughters garden, well that certainly has been moving forward well and last summer looked great, even if i do say so myself. Not alot has happened over the past couple of months due to work commitments, bad weather and laziness as well as having to move to tempory accomadation. Hopefully by the end of this year we will have most of the work completed and will be a case of annual planting as well as ongoing maintainance rather than project after project.

2009-02-14T22:46:00.000Z

Hi,

Just setting up this eve, so going to take some time to get things right.