Awful weather - typical Brits talk

liberty_lily

Lovely lily, Farway 😄 Our (day) lilies turned out to be rather disappointing (again), giving DH ammunition for his argument to replace with something else next year....
There's a huge clump (some 4m in length), so will have to find something that will spread quickly to fill the gap if we do lose them 🙄
The Japanese anemone (Pink Saucer) in the foreground is - unsurprisingly - doing really well.....The weather has been dry and dull but humid here, breezy with some sunshine today. Not much gardening achieved - except the predictable dead-heading/strimming/tidying - as we've loads to get on with inside!

Hope you get your digger on site Friday as promised, Woolsery 😉 I know we're getting fed up with unfulfilled promises of (paid, obviously) help with our building work and I'm getting sick of the sight of acrows (in place between two reception rooms for almost ten months now!) and the huge timbers preventing me from landscaping the 'front' garden....

goldfinches

I spent a lovely afternoon admiring Corpus Christi college gardens especially their lovely hollyhocks in the front quad, very difficult to decide which colour was nicest.
Then on the way home I spotted this marvellously vigorous squash (I think) plant which has sprung up in the corner of the County Court and a Student Accommodation Block, I'm sure it wasn't there last week. I shall keep an eye on it to see what happens next.


Then, rather meanly, I was pleased to notice that my neighbour has a poinsettia in her window which isn't looking nearly as happy and healthy as mine. So nice to be able to feel that one has superior skills occasionally. 

Woolsery

goldfinches said:

I spent a lovely afternoon admiring Corpus Christi college gardens especially their lovely hollyhocks in the front quad, very difficult to decide which colour was nicest.
Then on the way home I spotted this marvellously vigorous squash (I think) plant which has sprung up in the corner of the County Court and a Student Accommodation Block, I'm sure it wasn't there last week. I shall keep an eye on it to see what happens next.

)

Your 'squash' looks  remarkably like a very healthy Foxglove Tree (Paulownia tomentosa) seedling to me!

Farway

Dull, bit windy but humid if that makes sense

LL replace day lilies with perhaps Crocosmia Lucifer or similar? Once settled in they go forever, like day lilies in that respect, and the seed pods are quite attractive in a way

Good spot on the Foxglove tree, Woolsery, looked it up & and have added it to my “If I had the space” list

Talking of foxgloves, seed was collected yesterday as hoped; loads more left to ripen of course so may get collecting more next week

Grrrr, the whitefly has arrived for the summer hols on my tomatoes in the conservatory, spotted last night. This year I have some magic eco-friendly spray stuff, which I suspect is soft soap based. I would use noxious chemicals given the chance but these days nothing available to amateur touches greenhouse whitefly and I’m not paying a fortune for white fly chomping wasps for my few toms

I’ll have a spray very soon before they really get going. Last year I tried the yellow sticky fly papers which caught a lot but didn’t prevent them swamping the leaves

And I have another lily opened, this one is pretty red but unscented which I wasn’t aware of when I bought them or I’d have left them on the shelf

liberty_lily

Hot and sunny here, although the breeze lingers which gives a bit of respite 😎

I'd also like a Foxglove tree...hopefully if we ever get the area around the fallen beech tree cleared we'll be putting a few 'specimen' trees there. We have a Gingko in a pot waiting to go in and like you, Farway, this one is also on my list 😉

We do have some crocosmia (a couple of bog standard types, not Lucifer) in that bed. I'd like to get Lucifer but it's probably too red (we have a pink, orange, blue/mauve and white theme going on) so would be better suited to the ever expanding 'hot beds' 😁

Once Wimbledon is over next week I plan to get on with clearing the remains of the rockery (mostly weeds and a couple of alpines now) - just need to work out where to put (another) mountain of soil......

Woolsery

Pete says our hay is the best he's cut this year. He's a traditionalist and likes to see the wild flowers, so not part of the relentless movement towards maximum production at any price.

Speaking of traditionalists, it's great to see all these politicos standing up for good old family values all of a sudden, though what the difference is between groping a man's thigh and Gillian Keegan's still isn't entirely clear to me. I have the video if anyone cares to help me there, mods included!

I'm finally planting up the second deep bed. It started grey today, but I was indoors slapping on the sun cream by midday. Not a lot popped-in yet, apart from chard and a couple of allegedly mini squash, so here's a double geranium that does well for us here. I  don't normally like double things, but along with chocolate ice cream, this is an exception.

goldfinches

@Woolsery - thankyou for the paulownia spot, I knew I recognised the leaves and can only say that yesterday was both hot and trying.
@liberty_lily - I had some very robust crocosmia in a previous life that were a lovely coralish orange (if there is such a colour) and flowered for at least three months and sometimes lasted for five at the gravelly base of a knee high wall in a sheltered south facing garden. Definitely worth considering as I never gave them any attention at all, they just were. Goggling around suggests it might have been these or a very similar looking one Crocosmia 'Orange River' - Beth Chatto's Plants & Gardens.

Farway

Up very early with my mind on my duff car and not gardening. My intention was getting out there for an early start at Friday feed & water the front pots, but instead I was looking up used cars on PC, and now I'm here browsing

Looking sunny with heat on the way, this afternoon I'm off to the volunteer border to water, cadging a lift with another garden volunteer, needs to be done because it's six days since the pots were last watered and been dry ever since

Nice pic of double geranium Woolsery, like you, I prefer more open flowers and my single geraniums would make a great picture in the hands of an artist

Sprayed my toms in the conservatory with magic eco-friendly whitefly prevent, so I'll see how that goes

Woolsery said:

Speaking of traditionalists, it's great to see all these politicos standing up for good old family values all of a sudden, though what the difference is between groping a man's thigh and Gillian Keegan's still isn't entirely clear to me. I have the video if anyone cares to help me there, mods included!

You're not supposed to question this, however I also wondered where the angry parades and demonstrations were,after all when Mr Trump mentioned grabbing "cats" all hell broke loose

And back to gardening

Woolsery

Farway said:

My intention was getting out there for an early start at Friday feed & water the front pots, but instead I was looking up used cars on PC, and now I'm here browsing

....And back to gardening

I was doing the same as you! Nothing wrong with our car at present, but Dearly Beloved is finding the clutch a pain with her poorly knee, so I'm on the trail of an automatic with a few other essential qualities. I can't see her getting an op any time soon.  I've found one theoretically  'nearby,' but  the Bristol Channel doesn't feature in the distance analysis. Odd, when Goggle has been calculating routes in milliseconds for years now.

Gardening gives plenty of time for contemplation. When I see a black swan event, I don't waste too much time on who's virtue-signalling about the latest thing, but try to imagine what's prompted it. I think something large is about to drop and I might have an inkling of what it is thanks to taking my news from a range of independent sources. If it persists, even the press and the BBC may find out, but there are no appropriate smilies....

RAS

On a different note; if you are after a clematis just a a filler, Aldi have some in stock, in flower so at least you know what you are buying. At £7. Two pink, crimson, dark purple and "blue". Only name I recognise is Hagley Hybrid. The blue/mauve and purple seem to be most popular.