the daydream fund challenge thread

ukmaggie45

Took some more photos yesterday, but to begin with here's a before (in April) of the bush by the archway that I just pruned very heavily.


Archway and bush by ukmaggie45, on Flickr

And here's yesterday's photo.


apple tree arch pruned bush by ukmaggie45, on Flickr

OH planted up the rest of the main crop spuds yesterday, it took ages finishing digging a trench and holes for them.


Digging to plant potatoes by ukmaggie45, on Flickr

I watered the first lot of spuds to go in, had just poked through so we earthed them up - don't want to rely on lack of frost just yet. Did a little bit of weeding and not much else. Even so have been fair worn out today so not been to house. OH went to get some mint to go with roast lamb this evening, and to top up the bird feeders. Hopefully will feel fitter tomorrow, plan is to get the garlic in the front garden by the new roses... OH couldn't find the garlic today, or only part of it, so I told him to leave it till I was there.

The alliums in the front are flowering beautifully. Last year there were 3 in a potato bag with a load more bulbs (tulips and mini daffs), this year we've got 6, though slightly smaller. I'm hoping to get them in the ground for next year. We'll see!


allium bloom by ukmaggie45, on Flickr

Here's my pitiful selection of plantlets - onions, lobelia and lavender. All need moving on really, maybe next week as OH is on earlies so home at 1pm, can take me to the house and then nap there for a bit while I garden.


blowaway with young plants by ukmaggie45, on Flickr

We're going to plant a couple of currants (black and red) along the side of the shed... May do them parallel with the back path though, not sure yet. Will have to have a good think tomorrow if I get there!


side of shed by ukmaggie45, on Flickr

We've got lots of odd bits of wood behind the shed, from stuff we've pruned etc that I'm hoping we can find enough big enough to do this year's bean frame. Last year we used plastic coated but it was a bit slippy and blew down at one point and despite repair was never quite the same again! :rotfl: You can just about make out a few sticks behind the shed in this photo, as well as the 2 compost bins that now need duct-taping together (the 2 in the far distance in the brick enclosure are not quite so badly failing).


behind the shed by ukmaggie45, on Flickr

I think the brick enclosure was probably built to take compost, there's a couple of concrete posts lying along the front of it. Not had time to think about it properly yet, or even examine it fully. But I think it's supposed to be in 2 halfs and have wood planks across to retain the compost in it. Must take detailed photos at some time and try and work it out! The plastic compost bins are pretty useless for us - we have so much stuff that needs to go in them I think we just overfilled.

While we may be useless at using composters the shallots OH planted are doing really well, tempted to nick a couple soon!


Shallots by ukmaggie45, on Flickr

Must get to the seeds tomorrow though, this is becoming a matter of urgency! :eek:

lostinrates

I had a great day. I went to one of the most perfect homes I've ever been in. The very essence of vintage, eclectic chic. And the garden...everywhere you look something to see, and a critter to talk to and smooch! I'm considering starting a campaign to get Alfie to get her home in a magazine. Its just idyllic....a little clearing in the trees (chicken heaven...they must feel like true heirs of their jungle fowl ancestors) so green and so charming. I loved the house so much, not over restored and so interesting, so personal. To me its exactly what a hoe should be. And so perfectly located: it doesn't suffer the proximity of squeezed Forest and forest surrounds development so many places round here do...and even though we drove through roads packed with people near Alfie it was quiet as any village outside of one of the major UK tourist destinations.

Mable is HUGE. Truely huge, and so talkative: all pigs love a scratch but not many tell you about it as much as Mable! It really is blissful with the chooks roaming around with the dogs and everyone getting on well. It really is paradise and when any other Daydreamers go near the New Forest you should definitely try and wrangle an invitation

alfie_1

LIR.... aaaaaahhhhhhh! the pleasure was all mine and you are way too kind with your comments....but thankyou....:) even if i had to count my 3 "babies" to check one hadnt gone awol with a certain person !!:D

lostinrates

alfie_1 wrote: »

LIR.... aaaaaahhhhhhh! the pleasure was all mine and you are way too kind with your comments....but thankyou....:) even if i had to count my 3 "babies" to check one hadnt gone awol with a certain person !!:D

well, you know, two are easier to carry than three....so I HAD to offer to help

Not too kind at all. I wonder if perhaps you don't realise how special you've made the place? It has real identity..nothing bland, its obviously a home a working but beautiful HOME not just somewhere to live. DH and I were talking on the way back and agreed that while where your friend lives is gorgeous hands down we'd both choose yours over it.

BTW, I hope you put Mable away tonight....you never know about the fox risk ;)


I'm throwing the rest of our chicks out with the biggies tonight too, so they'll all be in ''adult''flocks tomorrow.

Then I'm going to choose my ebay eggs for a next batch.:)


After the next batch of chooks I'm thinking about some guinea eggs. I should have had a another batch of our chicks cooked by now, but time is just racing this year.

lostinrates

Maggie, DH got mightily confused when I just told him to look a the photos of another ''daydreamer'''s garden. He saw the digging picture and said ''doesn't look much like a ''Maggie''!''. To which I'm left to wonder what a ''lostinrates'' is meant to look like.

alfie_1

lostinrates wrote: »

well, you know, two are easier to carry than three....so I HAD to offer to help

Not too kind at all. I wonder if perhaps you don't realise how special you've made the place? It has real identity..nothing bland, its obviously a home a working but beautiful HOME not just somewhere to live. DH and I were talking on the way back and agreed that while where your friend lives is gorgeous hands down we'd both choose yours over it.

BTW, I hope you put Mable away tonight....you never know about the fox risk ;)


I'm throwing the rest of our chicks out with the biggies tonight too, so they'll all be in ''adult''flocks tomorrow.

Then I'm going to choose my ebay eggs for a next batch.:)


After the next batch of chooks I'm thinking about some guinea eggs. I should have had a another batch of our chicks cooked by now, but time is just racing this year.

:o:o:o:o:o:o

Davesnave

COOLTRIKERCHICK wrote: »

Davesnave....

It seems there is a huge demand for fruit and veg plants at the mo...

when you go to your sales, is it worth buying seeds in bulk, and then re- packaging them with your nursery details on...and selling them?

Pick your own area? with runner beans, broad beans, etc? and you could also try selling them to local hotels etc... or what ever dont sell, blanch and freeze to eat over the winter,

Those are all possibilities for someone, CTC, and the seed one is certainly novel, but doing veg is not us, except as overspill from what we are doing already. To be honest, I think we are already spread too thinly here, so we're even re-considering our original plan of using egg sales as a draw for our plants.

If we took on another 50 hens, we'd have to spend £££ on their facilities with no guarantee that the plant sales would benefit, and of course 50 more hens would take up serious time that could be better spent on plants. It's a bit like lotus implied, you can start making a rod for your own back.....:(

I know we love our chooks, but we love our plants too and that's what we do best, so the garden/nursery comes first. I can honestly say that if we don't have a real ornamental garden here inside 5 years, then there will be a For Sale notice out at the front! :rotfl:

Davesnave

Guinea eggs, eh, lir? I still like the idea of them, even though Mr Dog is behaving himself exceptionally well recently.

Maggie, is that bush you pruned Winter Jasmine?

http://apps.rhs.org.uk/AdviceSearch/Profile.aspx?pid=291

ukmaggie45

Davesnave wrote: »

Maggie, is that bush you pruned Winter Jasmine?

Hi Dave, no, it's a viburnum - pink flowers in winter. It was just going berserk and overshading a load of other stuff.

I think I must try and get up the stairs (it's going to be great when we get the new bannisters!) to get some photos of the back garden from above. Might be better able to choose where to put the rest of the veg then. We really should try and draw a scale plan of the garden and plan what we're doing. Because we're not living there yet we're rather just plonking stuff in where it's easiest.

Also I want to split the 2 huge beds at the end of the garden into several smaller ones with at least some of them raised. It's very difficult getting into the middle of them without trampling down the soil, there's just a few "stepping stones" to use, but my balance isn't good enough to keep to them.

lostinrates

Looks like we're going to get MORE RAIN!

Hurrah!

Only thing is, and this shows how long its been dry for, we have a pile of stones here left over from when the sewage system went in, and its been put over a surace water drain in the yard and is stopping it draining.....next job f the day is to try and move the pile of stone over a few feet.