Awful weather - typical Brits talk

Farway

Blue sky & sunshine, nice Spring like day, supposed to be the hottest since the dinosaurs died out, or something like that.

Dustyevsky said:

Yes, they're celandines. Though we have them as 'weeds,' if they were hard to grow, we'd marvel at the marblingof the leaves and the glossy petals!

I have them and plenty on the verge opposite my house, where they mix with the wild violets. I sometimes wonder if I'm the only one around who marvels at these little gems, so often dismissed as weeds.

The same has been said about dandelions, too easy to grow, otherwise everyone would be in rapture about the yellowness, seed head “clocks”, edible leaves, medicinal uses, etc

I was only thinking about apricots last night, more of a nightmare in my case, leaf curl carted it off, very annoying 'cos it was posh & expensive one, Tomcot https://www.blackmoor.co.uk/apricot-tomcot-p15263

Checking the garden for progress yesterday, I have loads of fruit buds just waiting for the sunshine.

My pears are at last looking like they may, at last, have plenty of flowers.

No flower signs yet on my snakeshead, PP, 

Once my hard red pear flowers I'll try for a photo, if my cunning plan has worked I should have a curly branch with pears dripping from it

Some may recall a programme showing how someone had trained & pruned fruit trees into fancy shapes?

I tried to copy and some have worked, others the branches broke as I tried to bend them

The only tree short of fruit buds is my plum, and I blame Mr Bullfinch for that !

I suppose he's welcome though, never had much in the way of  plums from it anyway

The fuchsias from cuttings have survived the winter, new leaves are just starting to show, which is handy because I may now poke one in the new space at the front

What is it about a vacuum? I'm already mentally filling it, poppies, everlasting sweet pea, clematis, fuchsia.

Tempted to try beetroot in modules, watched YT on same, seems to work, and I had poor results directly sown last year. Job for the weekend?

Volunteer meeting this afternoon, give me a chance to check progress on the border, and see what's what. Hoping the forsythia & Tete daffs are out, should be.

-taff

Well PP< you know what I'll say about concrete...gabions! I swear one day I'll get some and hang to the OH...[he hates them and has put his foot down with a firm hand about it] I feel your pain though, we excavated a sloping area and found car exhausts, rebar, concrete, blocks, bricks, you name it. Who knew such an innocuous looking area could hide so much lumpage and carp.

Dusty, that is a good idea! Love the celandines...I do find I appreciate weeds [?] more as I age, except ragwort that is.

2p, wow, an apricot? fabulous!

My gardening yesterday was burning flowers into wood for brithdays, so today I may venture to the allotment for a general look [ not doing much] and potentially get some cheapo arches on the way for my beans and stuff...I have some lengths of wire mesh I coudl attach which would save me buying loads of sticks. dunno, I'll have a think. No rush just yet. And its sunny and in decent temperatures I'd say..i.e. not perishing...

-taff

Did not refresh..oops...

Your vacuum Farway...this I do want to ask about in general anyway...

How did you all design your gardens? Did you read books, decide on conditions, favourite plants, how often do you chop and change etc?

wort

rhododendron and kojo no mai not the best pics look much better in the RL .
Dusty I have some muscari like those, I tend to plant out after they flower and they are doing well outside.Your Dd must work in a big store ,we got moved to a retail park now its just food. After 20yrs on GM had worked in every dept. Food is a very different beast,I also do the Admin.
I have just bought a small version of the kojo no mai home which I may pass  on to dd1, I'm sure not the 1st I don't know if she still has the other.

Farway hope you have better luck than me my perennial sweet peas decided Norway was a better place to be.

wort

Not sure where this pic disappeared to !

Farway

-taff said:

Did not refresh..oops...

Your vacuum Farway...this I do want to ask about in general anyway...

How did you all design your gardens? Did you read books, decide on conditions, favourite plants, how often do you chop and change etc?

Design, not really. All my gardens were established by previous owners, so I was mainly altering, not starting over.

That said, books for ideas, now replaced by TV & YT, always something new to learn or try.

Conditions dictate a lot of things, slopes, wet, shade etc. I learnt years ago not to fight losing battles, but then someone breeds a different plant, and it's worth trying again.

Chop & change as life changes, young children, swing & football area, kids getting older, pond. 

Away working, more easy care perennials.

Getting older and creaky, hardy shrubs & trees, no digging or summer bedding plants

And of course, somehow arriving home with a bit of plant that fell into pocket or the basket while walking around somewhere

wort

Taff we moved here as a new build, I had pots from the last house with a few established plants in. I tried to plan but other than the beds and lawn shape I rather rushed in without a lot of knowledge. I started with a beach feel with gravel and sleeper path, phormiums of all colours ,a palm,and paid quite a bit for pebbles like PP has 😜 it has evolved the phormiums got big and taken out. 

I just go for stuff I like stick it in and hope it works. 

wort

Beautiful day here , unlike the past 3 days where the wind was chilly even though it was sunny,its much warmer.
Running out of things to wash ! Still wary of doing to much in the garden as it's still frosty in the morning. Also if we believe the forcast of snow on the way !! 

pink_poppy

Sorry for the early morning garden rant   I'd been awake since 3.30am and was feeling a bit grumpy   

Beautiful photos, wort, especially the Kojo No Mai (had to google that).

taff, I like gabions too, there's a house in the village with them and they look amazing.

Farway, if you don't fill that vacuum, you know nature will.

Dusty, I know there are worse things than stones and concrete in a garden - I was just having a whinge  

I was sat on the back step earlier and I suddenly realised where the concrete might have come from. The pic shows the path in front of the garage - to the left is (and I quote the previous owners here) "a fairly large hole used as temporary stone store"... also known by me as "somewhere you can break your bl00dy ankle if you don't look where you're going!!"... it would be a lot safer if the path was the same width as the garage door (I'm sure it must have been at some point) - that's another thing we'll have to tackle at some point - I dread to think how many stones are in there.


Oops, I thought I'd taken a wider pic than that. Anyway, the concrete above looks suspiciously like the stuff I've been digging up.

Hazy sunshine here and 9 degrees.

wort

18 degrees here, only mowed the back lawn , and done some washing, then spent the afternoon in the sun with a book. Lots of bees and a white butterfly. Plus the bird song, Bliss