Awful weather - typical Brits talk

twopenny

Thanks for reminding me about Cosmos. I intended to grow some this year and I was thinking I need some movement in plants as it's a bit static. So two birds, one stone

Same cold wind and wet with unexpected sideways showers  so the charm of the sun was observed largely from inside.

I'm collecting and saving gardening jobs for the Easter hols as I expect my location to be overrun by tourists not distancing. It's already started. Tons of stuff to do. The place should look magnificient by the time I've finished........

Gardeners eternal optimism!

[Deleted User]

Morning All 🖐
Hope everyone's enjoying the sunshine we've had the past week or so, it provides the impetus to get out there and get stuck in !
Not much more than tittivating here but that's okay, low-maintenance is a joy after a hard weeks work, i'll be brushing and tidying gravelled and patio areas and generally pottering - with a few coffees inbetween  🙂🌱🌺

[Deleted User]

Davesnave said:

Daughter bought Mum a lemon tree for Mothering Sunday. It arrived Monday, unsecured,  in a long package via Yodel. Compost was everywhere, 2 main stems were broken and the old leaves had scale insect + whitefly.

All this has been photographed and a claim for refund has been lodged. Whether it appears on the Forum depends on  the response, but needless to say it was from one of those firms with garish photos throughout the catalogue.

Daughter should have known better, especially as Mum killed the last one!

Ugh, these places, why oh why use Yodel ??🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️ 
You'll get reimbursed D, shame for your daughter though because she wouldn't have known the outcome 😕 

[Deleted User]

goldfinches said:

I spent a long time mooching around the Botanic Garden here on Monday afternoon admiring everything that's suddenly come out and took this picture of the magnolia by the main entrance. Last year I was watching this one and just as the first few flowers opened the Garden closed and it bloomed unseen so I was so glad to be able to catch it before any rain spoiled the flowers this year.

I also took this picture of some of the hellebores one of which is wrapped up as part of a project by one of the staff.

If I ever hear the results I'll pass them on.

Gorgeous pictures, i love seeing the first spring scenes - gladdens your heart !

[Deleted User]

Farway said:

Another dull day outside, brightened by the ornamental cherry now being in full blossom, if sun peeks out I'll try for a photo, standard cherry blossom against blue sky shot

All my tomato seeds have germinated, just poking up now, I'll move to window sill later on today,

Spotted on FB,seems the multi coloured tomato seed scam is going round, along with blue strawberries & black rose seeds. Easy to smile but such a shame for newbies who fall for it, it's not like being harmlessly sent for a tin of tartan paint & a Long Wayt [sic] this one costs money

I've sown some mixed colours beetroot [not from internet & Photoshop ] over my no show ones, if they all come up there'll still be space

I checked my sweetcorn, only been two weeks now, seems longer with the other items germinating quickly but it's not rotted so I'm hanging on a bit

No postie in shorts here yet, but birds are gathering nesting material from next doors dead hanging baskets

Nor here, indeed the service has had quite a hiatus as 13 of the local Sorting Office's staff were off work 😬😯
Between illness and annual leave the numbers were so depleted that a non working day and skeleton hours were normal here for a couple of weeks, it's slowly picking up but nowhere near the usual order of things (apparently changing holiday dates and staff cover from elsewhere wasn't an option 🤨 )
Hey ho, it'll sort itself out soon enough !

[Deleted User]

Farway said:

Dull start to the day but nothing planned for the garden today except add a light dusting of slug pellets to protect a newly emerging tree lily at the front, may as well get growing to provide a landing area for the Lily Beetles which are no doubt sharpening their mandibles and putting on beetle lipstick for mating ritual somewhere

Ugh, those red horrors were the bane of my plants' life in my last  garden - a cottage garden with a lot of lillies !!!
Good luck with the fight, F !

[Deleted User]

Farway said:

Sun's out and more Spring.

A few doors down has magnolia buds bursting, and over the road is a pink cherry also in blossom, a couple more days like today should do it properly

Your garden sounds nice now 2P, lol at "lock down green", suits it I'm sure.

Local traders can be a curse at times, in these times you'd think they would be doing everything possible to retain custom instead of driving folks to the internet never to return

Quick check shows some nasturtiums have germinated, just poking up now, plus I watched more You Tube on fig cuttings, seems they root readily in water, so I've now got some on the window sill in a jar, not that I need more figs but I'm sure if they root I'll find takers for them

And Gardeners' World is back tonight

What do you make of Carol Klein's new programme, have you seen it ??
I watched the first episode ...... didn't look for the second though ....

[Deleted User]

Davesnave said:

Lost my post! Grr!  Basically, yesterday's essential mission was a damp squib, due to the essential bit taking up all but  45 minutes, which wasn't long enough at the nursery. All the things I wanted were sold out or not stocked, but Dearly B managed to find a few plants on her list. The place was rammed due to the fine weather there and the low prices, so I resolved to return on another day with a longer list of options. I did pick up a pink perennial pea in Morrisons on the return journey which looked good value at £2. Small consolation.

Today began drizzly and brightened-up after lunch, so with clear skies tonight there may be a slight frost. I hope so, as I found red spider mites on an Agastache I overwintered in the poly, so I've stuck it outdoors where the sun don't shine until late!

Still collecting dumpy bags of the pruned and cut back trees too small for logs. Another 3 bags placed in the bonfire queue.

Love them, amazing value for money plants, aren't they 👍

Farway

Catsacor said:

Farway said:

Sun's out and more Spring.

A few doors down has magnolia buds bursting, and over the road is a pink cherry also in blossom, a couple more days like today should do it properly

Your garden sounds nice now 2P, lol at "lock down green", suits it I'm sure.

Local traders can be a curse at times, in these times you'd think they would be doing everything possible to retain custom instead of driving folks to the internet never to return

Quick check shows some nasturtiums have germinated, just poking up now, plus I watched more You Tube on fig cuttings, seems they root readily in water, so I've now got some on the window sill in a jar, not that I need more figs but I'm sure if they root I'll find takers for them

And Gardeners' World is back tonight

What do you make of Carol Klein's new programme, have you seen it ??
I watched the first episode ...... didn't look for the second though ....

I'm not a big fan of Carol's but I enjoyed both programmes, what I liked [pun] she was down to earth & explained the hows as well as why, aimed at just right level I thought, from  beginner who has never opened a packet of seeds to those among us who just wanted an easy watch without too much arty farty designing going on

Sun's out, looks like a slight breeze but all being well I'll be out there doing "bits", main one is cut back a buddlia now the wheelie bin is empty

And probably sow another batch of Cosmos, like 2P, decided can never have too many Cosmos

I was thinking how garden fashions come & go, decades back, in the 60s, I sowed mixed cosmos in a border at front of my house, looked very cottage garden like and some asked what they were. Never saw cosmos again until a few years back, but fashion is now the white ones

That's me, a trend setter , I was tie less at work for years and needed to have one in my desk just in case of a "posh" meeting

Davesnave

Catsacor said:

Farway said:

Sun's out and more Spring.

A few doors down has magnolia buds bursting, and over the road is a pink cherry also in blossom, a couple more days like today should do it properly

Your garden sounds nice now 2P, lol at "lock down green", suits it I'm sure.

Local traders can be a curse at times, in these times you'd think they would be doing everything possible to retain custom instead of driving folks to the internet never to return

Quick check shows some nasturtiums have germinated, just poking up now, plus I watched more You Tube on fig cuttings, seems they root readily in water, so I've now got some on the window sill in a jar, not that I need more figs but I'm sure if they root I'll find takers for them

And Gardeners' World is back tonight

What do you make of Carol Klein's new programme, have you seen it ??
I watched the first episode ...... didn't look for the second though ....

She's not breaking any new ground, but I liked what I saw and I'll go back to see the rest. 

https://www.channel5.com/show/gardening-with-carol-klein/

I'm biased; Carol is an ex-teacher like me, (see the cursive handwriting a few minutes in!) lives very close to where we are on a plot like ours and she gardens in a similar style to us. I think we may have better soil than her though, as I remember the clay there when we visited her back in the '90s. Carol seems to have reduced the frenetic enthusiasm in her presentation, which probably put many people off her in the past. It's very hard to stop being a teacher when you've done decades in front of classes that often need a bit of geeing-up!

Here, I have finally burned just about everything from the winter hedgerow and stream bank maintenance, though many big trunks remain to be turned into firewood before they harden-up too much. The transplanted primroses don't appear to have noticed, which is hopeful. Today I'm trying to transplant two yews that have been in a nursery bed too long.... Forecast says cloud moving in, but looks lovely just now.