Awful weather - typical Brits talk

Dustyevsky

Windier than a bag of farts today 😯, but sunny. 😎 However, the current 5c does indeed feel like zero.😬 I'll probably go shopping. Don't know about you folk, but I'm building certain stocks up, as our present direction of travel looks uncomfortably in line with the desires expressed in Agenda 2030. 😕 As usual, happy to be laughed-at, and even happier to be proved wrong. Anyway, nothing will go to waste. I ate some noodles last night… 'Best before October '22.' I'm still here. 😜 That was Convid of course. For us, that was no big deal. This time, staying home might not be a lifestyle choice! 🤐

DD isn't going to a new facility in Bristle, Farway. The establishment has been around as long as I can recall, but she'll no doubt end up living in a modern, satellite area, or even as far out as Sodding Chipbury. Speaking of chips, I read the demise of many fish & chip shops, could actually be down to the new weight loss jabs, and not the cost of fish. Yup, bound to be that….. Law of unintended consequences. 😉

We can't quite run to a heat pump here. I checked for help with that or solar panels, and sadly, people vote the wrong way here we're in the 'wrong' postcode. If April's cold we'll get more logs. Again, they'll not be wasted.😇

Lovely, blossoms Bluey, but cat wee tree is in May. Here are the few flowers on our newly-planted damson (with a few naughty sheep trashing my bonfire in the background!) Can't light it anyway, because of the hogs.

More news on them later….

Dustyevsky

2p said: I've got some of my favourite yellow wallflowers come through and this purple is new. All self sown so it's a surprise each year.

They are amazing value, aren't they? Stupidly, I only cottoned-on a few years ago.☹️

Like -taff, I hope your 'hardening-off' the seedlings went OK last night. The tiles didn't move, but it was not a night to be outdoors. 😲

-taff said: March is a busy month. Got some respite for the next few days then sister is coming the weekend after next with another three birthdays to go yet…[ 11 total in March , peeps were obviously busy in Junes of previous years…]

With us it's April & May. Obviously slower to come out of winter hibernation! 😂

wort

well, the weather here this morning is everything at once !!! Sun ,hail and 50 mile an hour wind gusts from mixed directions. it started yesterday around school time. I had been to dd1 s primarily to plant a few bulbs and primroses from my garden. But ended up weeding and clearing the detritus from the greenhouse. She’s not keeping it which is shame and I have no room for it ,so it may have to go on the family group see if there’s any takers.

2p the path has been in since we moved here as a new build, so the sleepers are starting to rot, as they are 25 years old. But I always fancied that style so we curved the path up to the patio. My forsythia on the pic is getting a radical chop this year, they grow like wildfire don’t they. I am trying to keep shrubs to a manageable height now.

My jasmine is in jeopardy , as the post it is climbing up has rotted at the bottom and it’s tipped to one side. I’ve ordered another metal arch and hoping I can persuade someone to help me , the stems are twisted around the post and woody like a tree !!

Farway I was hoping to get honesty from BIL but he dug it up and got rid of it 🥹 I’ve been eating tasty toms from M n S piccolini, was tempted to smear a seed or two to try and grow.

Dusty the yellow primroses are the ones I have they spread everywhere hence my passing on to family. Don’t envy the septic tank emptying.

Might have to check if my double daffs smell now 😂

LessImpecunious

Similarly apocalyptic weather here last night, and this morning, hail showers; everything went dark c.20 mins ago, then sun reappeared dramatically (excuse smeary photo due to failed double glazing!...And not wishing to go outside to take pics!)

Before that, I had popped on to read, and to post the following, as I'd noticed something odd about the Without Coat figures....

twopenny

Wort it's worth a go with the tomato seed. I ended up with some small plum tomatoes last year, no idea where they came from but probably something I'd taken the seed from or the compost heap and were shop bought tomatoes.

Trying again this year.

Still blowing madly out there, sun shine and blue skies earlier but come over black this morning. I've been out to empty water from the seed trays and whatever is in the compost drains out brown 😐 but I've got leaves coming on purple sprouting and kale.

Glad I pruned my blossom tree yesterday what with it being in full leaf and this wind. Oh got some garden waste to the tip yesterday.

Dusty I briefly had a damson delivered wrong and the blossoms are always spectacular.

Greenbee you sound very organised. Hope your energy plans come to pass quickly. I'll be interested to know how you find the installation and take performance.

Taff no wonder you do so much alotmenteering. You have to squeeze it in between all the socialising 🙂

Less that's some amazing view you have from your window. I'd be sat there with a book most days just watching 😍

Bluey that is a beautiful walk to work. You seem to have a bit of everything to bring joy to a chore.🌻

Wort the jasmine should be ok being taken out and replanted if you cut it back first and speak nicely to the fencing guy. They are fairly indestructible.

Reminds me I found two Morrisons £2 Clematis still growing. Their only problem is they are brown bare stems from my height so in danger of being cut out by mistake.

Yes, wallflowers are brilliant I've found, think they come from giant ones £1.50 for 10. They grow with no help, look after themselves whatever the weather, self seed, flower most of the year and a wonderful perfume.

Perhaps they aren't enough of a challenge for folk 😉

Farway

'Twas a wild & stormy evening yesterday, sunny & blumming cold wind this morning

YBE, Starmergrad and angievostok Farway <snigger> Corbyn Garden City? Double uptick for Corbyn Garden City, even more apt because I think he likes gardening, something with marrows and newts?

That cherry blossom, the one opposite me looked like yours yesterday, but looking battered this morning, as is the magnolia. Such fleeting blossom but worth while every Spring

Local Cat Wee tree is not due until May [it's a hawthorn]

Time for tin foil hats everyone. My mentioning Paul Robeson tomato the other day, doing well BTW. The algorithm decreed I was fed the real Paul Robeson singing to some miners 😁. No conspiracy at all

Greenbee, heat pumps and solar panels, quite exciting, hope it works out, there are so many mixed messages about them, and so may sharks as well

Wort, I’ve been eating tasty toms from M n S piccolini, was tempted to smear a seed or two to try and grow. Worth a go, just pot luck on the fruit as they are F1, sometimes works well, I had a rambling small cherry plum type last year from some saved seed but also had tall with pea sized fruit, so it's pot luck.

The tom seeds sown weekend ago are mainly up, MIA is Gardeners Delight, but it's old 2021 seed so maybe that's why. I've plenty to get on with though

I was up Morries this morning, groceries but hoping for some eye opening plants. Nah, they have fruit trees now, large, in pots, £20, given price of fruit & what's going on around us they could be a good buy right now. Didn't spend too long looking, the wind was Polar and as I'm still post Lurgy thought it wiser to go & lurk near the cheese counter

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81936121#Comment_81936121

I like that Less, both are doing well, but now one has got a deformed leaf 😕. Why don't seeds ever just get on with it

I've just realised it's Easter next week 😮I remember it snowing at Easter so not yet in the clear. My rhubarb is not quite ready, but by Easter I think I can have a taster.

No gardening planned, except looking at my seedlings and urging them on

greenbee

Solar has been in for a while Farway - I've actually had two separate lots installed as the first one was clearly a success so it made sense to do the second (different scaffolding, which is what makes separate installations expensive, so the reduction in price of the parts offset the difference between doing it together or separately, which meant I didn't have to commit quite so much first time without knowing whether it would be worth it). Electrician who did it has been a great find and has done all the other electrical work since.

One heat pump engineer was recommended by the electrician, the other by a neighbour. I'll probably go with the latter as long as the initial estimate isn't wildly higher than the one I've already had. Both (and the electrician) are local independents, but not just solar/heatpump installers - proper electrician, proper heating engineers, so not just jumping on the bandwagon to trouser the grant.

Dustyevsky

Farway said: Time for tin foil hats everyone. My mentioning Paul Robeson tomato the other day, doing well BTW. The algorithm decreed I was fed the real Paul Robeson singing to some miners 😁. No conspiracy at all

Err… I didn't mention said Mr Robeson, but there he was in my YooToob feed today crooning to the same miners! 😧 Being a far right extremist, I noticed him immediately, fomenting unrest among the working classes.😉 I mentioned this serendipitous relationship with your choice of tomato to Mrs Dusty, who shrugged and said, “It's just AI, dear! “

So there you have it. They know who we are, where we are, and even what varieties we're growing. 😨 And don't forget, by your own admission they think you watch Huw Edwards' gardening channel too! 🤣

twopenny

Been watching My Garden of 1000 Bees by wildlife film maker. Absolutely extraordinary. Both the camera and the filming.

https://www.mygardenofathousandbees.com/

I remember being amazed at how many different species of bee were on my lavender back in the day when I had a big garden. Now I've got to get started on a different sort of planting and woodwork I think.

For those of you more interested in more than photos of bee bums this is for you. Or cameras 😉

There was also a short programme on today about 4 young city girls trying out gardening with mixed results.

Blowing a hoolie all day, rained then dried in the wind. I contemplated mowing the lawn but couldn't find the space between wet and dry!

LessImpecunious

2P - Blowing a hoolie all day, rained then dried in the wind. I contemplated mowing the lawn but couldn't find the space between wet and dry!

I thought the hail had been all over the country, but all you folks seem to have got off lightly - our lawn either covered in a layer of the stuff, or a layer of melted hail pretty much all day, so definitely no contemplation of mowing here! There was though a longish sunny spell in the afternoon, enough for me to prune a biggish buddleia in a spot completely sheltered from the NW wind, not unpleasant for 3/4 of an hour or so… Maybe that was what was meant by the feels like minus zero temps which the drunkards forecast for us today…😉