Awful weather - typical Brits talk

Dustyevsky

Farway said:

Dustyevsky said:

goldfinches said:

The weather here is mystifyingly peculiar, I was woken by the chill around 3am and had to resort to more bed covers and a hot water bottle then this afternoon it was so muggy that digging made me feel quite exhausted. Whatever is causing this had better stop it soon or we'll all need a spell in an expensive hospital.

I think I may need a psychiatric hospital stay after reading the Exeter crowd's latest summing-up!

"The UK had its warmest May and meteorological spring on record according to provisional Met Office figures in what was also a wet and dull season for many."

Roughly translated, this means, "Little frost, and those guys north of Doncaster had somewhat better than usual weather"

I heard that, warmest May etc. I think Winston Smith is working there, turning history into Newspeak.

Furthermore, I have Veranda Red envy, not even a flower on mine :'(

Either that, or there's a remake of 'Gaslight' going on.

wort said:

Dusty that’s a bummer about the neighbour 😩 You’d think they’d give up now. Just awkward bar stewards.

 We get on fine with most of our neighbours, day to day, but the large complex of properties nearby won't spend money on professional management, so a few numpties volunteers attempt this. They're clueless and morally confused as well, so it doesn't serve anyone's best interests. One reason property's difficult to shift there is a reputation for infighting. Most of that has no effect on us, fortunately.

Hope your convalescence goes well, wort, and you're soon back in action with the secateurs.

ArbitraryRandom said:

Had fun with the kitten yesterday. A whole bunch of crows being angry in the morning. I thought they didn't like my putting the wash out, but then I noticed they were focused on a spot at the end of the garden. Headed over to take a look and found the cat looking nice as you please with a juvenile (I think) sat quietly between her front paws. Cat was looking a little wild eyed at the noise/attention and thankfully the bird seemed okay. Picked the cat up and brought her inside, juvenile flew away as soon as it was clear... but since then whenever she goes outside they send up the alarm and are hopping around on the fence keeping an eye on her. At least I won't lose her anytime soon  

You may be in for some tough surveillance. 'Our' crow was back yesterday, this time attacking the car!   That's virtually 2 weeks of daily visits. They don't forget easily!

Sudden prediction of all day sunshine here, and it's started well. I had some good photos in the early morning light. Here's one, the Japanese Water Iris by the wash copper pond:

YoungBlueEyes

Hurray for survivalist apricots and millionbells, and enticing girlfriends, and funny mugs I hope your dentist is alright - other than the obvious reason, it’s not normally A Good Thing when the weight piles itself on quickly… 

I was gonna take a picture of me irises but not now I won’t, yours are beautiful Dusty Another page in the calendar done It’s taking me a while but I’m closing in on the answer to your crow issue. The Gerry Anderson radio prog I listen to had a fellah called Geordie Tuft ring in occasionally to deal with country matters and they did crows a few times. Proper Old School Irish wisdom at its finest. They’re both dead now god love them. Real losses, the pair of them  

On a more cheerful note - here’s a Bee Bum and a very pleasing rose just opening. In real life the colours graduate through deep reddish pink to creamy

Colour changing seems to be a thing this year - here’s me Hot Lips 🤔

Edit - new non-blurry pic - 

The purple wosname in the background is one of the things that slumped to the ground for no goddam reason, so being sans clips I stabbed 4 canes in at the corners and strung them up by their erses. Gardening gets a lot easier when you stop looking up the real methods and just go “sure I’ll just do it like this, it’ll be fine  

Farway

Late on parade today, all was a going well then had an offer I couldn't refuse, trip out to local posh garden, plus café & Olde Farm Shoppe.

Nice sunny day and thankfully a tad cooler

Resisted the attached GC items, so came home with just photos and some local Blue cheeses.

Blooming emergency mobile battery is snookered, won't hold a charge and I can't find a replacement, so flash the credit card and cheapskates refurb one on the way. It's my emergency, always in my pocket if I tumble into the flower border one, so can't really spend time faffing about looking. Under £20 so not a bank buster.

Some nice photos as usual, are those purple one Canterbury Bells YBE? I've always liked them but never found a space.

No camera handy, but two low flying Chinooks just went over, presumably on way to D Day down Portsmouth. It's Red arrow demo day on Saturday, so I may see them go over. 

No Lancaster etc this year, grounded them all with the Spitfire crash.

At least the weather is nice for them, but with the breeze I bet there will be a lot of sunburns

twopenny said:

Which gave me the Wort idea = search the net on Images for garden ponds/raised bed gardens, paths etc.to save in your Wish folder

Great fun to plan and will give you ideas above your station.

For above your station, try this from my outing this morning, Toot Toot !

Can we have a railway running round our Lottery winning acres?

wort

Washing was dried quick, sun and massively windy, huge gusts keep thinking the house will take off and I’ll end up in Oz.

Dustyevsky

YoungBlueEyes said:

Hurray for survivalist apricots and millionbells, and enticing girlfriends, and funny mugs I hope your dentist is alright - other than the obvious reason, it’s not normally A Good Thing when the weight piles itself on quickly… 

I was gonna take a picture of me irises but not now I won’t, yours are beautiful Dusty

Colour changing seems to be a thing this year - here’s me Hot Lips 🤔

Sorry, I can't find the enticing girlfriend. :'( I know 'Million Bells' is a petunia relative, and I used to take easy cuttings of Surfinias years ago, when we weren't varmers and did stuff with hanging baskets etc.   Our dentist, who's very petite, also piled the weight on, but for a good reason - she was pregnant!

Now don't let my irises put you off, Bluey. They aren't even mine, but a pressie from a nice lady in the village. She was moving and wanted to spread them around, just in case.....but then she ended up buying in the village anyway!

I see your 'Hot Lips' are doing what my 'Cherry Lips' are doing; pretending they're not bicoloured. It will happen.

Walked off site this afternoon. Mrs Dusty is trying to make me build a dry stone wall with the wrong sort of stones. I want to use mortar. It's stalemate. I was going to surprise her with a countermove and buy some gabions. Then I saw the price!

Farway, I saw a Hurricane briefly this afternoon. It was low and heading NW, presumably going home.

Taff, that's some catalogue! The first couple of pages alone could get someone arrested!   To be continued, but I'll pass now on the docks and willowherb!

goldfinches

Waves to all and admires gorgeous photos. 

My walking group went round a local tree trail this afternoon and I was so busy making sure no-one got left behind or too far ahead and so on that I forgot to take any photos at all. We saw some lovely trees too, I particularly admired a Kashmir sorbus which the notes said had pink flowers and white berries with pink stalks and a Cut Leaf Beech was intriguing.

I don't like the sound of your dentist 2p sounds as though something drastic is wrong, could it have any relationship to those appalling figures for male violence that Sir Mark Rowley was trying to prod politicians into doing something about yesterday? As a side note I think he looks distinctly worn these days, perhaps he should join us in the hospital.

Ybe - those campanulas look lovely don't they but I always found they had a tendency to slump rather untidily and they were terribly difficult to prop up neatly as well. I used to grow them through things which were a bit tougher and that sort of worked but not always.

Farway - yes to the trains as long as we can have steam ones and not electric and can we have tunnels made of trained over things with trailing flowers like laburnum and wisteria please? The bill calculator is whizzing round and emitting sparks I'm sure but pie in the sky is free for all isn't it.

Dusty that iris is lovely, you do take wonderful photographs. 

-taff

Arb I'm thinking they were just friends the cat and the crow that is

2p I had to deliberately never use pinterest otherwise I'd spend all day oooing and ahhhing over things and the size of the estate I'd need gets bigger with every look...I did like the steam train idea though...and the easiest way of making lots more plants. I'll pinch that for next year now. I need that mug too please.

dusty, what a beautiful iris photo and I dont even like them. I dunno, what kind of attitude is that? You'll be driving a train next in inclement weather...:) In all seriousness though, that website has me rethinking my entire plan for the garden once the builders are done. I was aiming for mediterranean ish but now I might just do wild weeds instead. If I can come up with some sort of plan so it doesn't look like a haphazard mess that is. I'll be the Beth Chatto of weeds. I saw this one and I want..

https://waterwisegardenplanner.org/plants/sphaeralcea-ambigua/

YBE you win the internet for today with the bee bum, that;s just splendid. I saw a hot lips for sale on sunday in the gc 

and it was all red too.

Farway, best kind of offer really..

I received some strulch today so I've scattered it judiciously and am waiting to see if anything has been munched in the morning. Followed up with planting the cat mint out covered with an ex hanging basket, tomato sort out of what is actually going into the big pots, some watering, pulled out the Israeli Sage and repotted it, it wasn't happy where it was, make of that what you will politically...consolidated the give aways and made a date for a plant swap on Monday. I'm getting hollyhocks, woop, because all mine out the front died. And planted some beans direct, covered in strulch though. And sowed some parsely ...again...thank you foxes for digging the last lot up. In weather news, it was sunny most of the day but veered off into bloody cold after 4, so I'm actually sitting here in my floor length thick hoodie and sheepskin slippers. This is the first time in my life I have come home from somewhere and immediately got into the equivalent of something more comfortable  much warmer...what is going on?

ArbitraryRandom

-taff said:

Arb I'm thinking they were just friends the cat and the crow that is

That reminded me of a decidedly-not-a-lap-dog I had growing up - he thought he was a friend to everyone and was very confused when the thing he had just steamrolled reacted badly to said steamrolling  

Up early this morning. Dawn was apparently about an hour and a half ago - the sky is doing a very good early evening impression, but I've doubled up on my antihistamines already, made a cup of tea, and am just heading out for my bindweed patrol. It rained fairly heavily overnight, and the forecast is just the odd shower until a deluge on Sunday. 

My pattypan squash are starting to form flowers. I've not tried this type before, so I'm keeping a close eye as apparently you're supposed to harvest them before they get too big and use immediately. I also have a growing suspicion that two unknown squash or courgette plants managed to sneak into the middle of my herb bed (it was where I dumped the soil from the seeds that failed to germinate inside) so I will need to transplant those somewhere before they get too big... 

And my brassica collection from T&M is due to be delivered today... I still can't find space in the beds, so I think I'm going to try growing them in pots. I'm thinking a 30L pot (~35 h x 40cm d) each should be enough? 

Edit... T&M have done a sneaky bait and switch. I bought 20 mixed brassica plugs - they've since updated the listing to 4 for the same price and sent me 4. Nothing obvious to indicate the change in the packaging etc so I had to double check my original order confirmation as I thought I'd just made a silly mistake misreading. Polite email with screenshots sent asking when I can expect the remainder of my order (or if they want to claim it was a genuine mistake they're not going to honour, they can just refund me, and I'll keep the four - which would be easier to find places for in the garden )  

YoungBlueEyes

The label says it's a "Campanula Persicifolia Caerulea" Farway, I only bought it cos it promised to be pretty blue and white flowers. So they've all come out purple, naturally. While we're on colours, my delphinium that I wanted to be blue (which I really thought it would be as the label says it will be purple and white) has come out purple and white! Maybe next year it'll be blue. My Hot Lips were two tone last year but aren't this year so you don't know.... 
I vote yes to the railway, wants to be a bit bigger than that though, and steam powered. And yes to tunnels too, as long as they're built from lovely old properly patina'd (sp?) stones:) Could I request that round the outside of the estate is all woodland, like that pic but thicker and deeper, and carpeted in snowdrops and bluebells in the springtime thankyouplease I'd love a stream running through it too, with a few drops so there are waterfalls, and benches/picnic areas placed for the views. 

I was quietly impressed with my Bee Bum pic, for one thing it might be the only Bee Bum pic I've taken that is actually a bee's bum I shoulda made better use of the internet yesterday while I'd won it (thanks very much taff ) cos I'm having endless trouble today. I'm having a pig of a job finding Geordie's crow cure Dusty - and the bbc have decided I need to keep signing in to view pages - and even though I'm saving my drafts on here as I go along it sometimes refreshes and sucks it into the ether (Your sage comment made me smile wryly.)

It was properly breezy here too yesterday wort, grand drying day though eh  

So who's gonna win the battle of the dry stone wall then Dusty....? I wonder if it'll be the same person who'll win the plum tree battle.... 

I'll save your idea of propping up my slothful campanulas for next year gf, cos that's a good idea. Hopefully next year something will be big enough to support it. Canes and strings has kinda worked but it's not really a permanent or pretty solution.

Is the bind weed patrol making a difference then Arb? Could kitten be trained to pull them up...? 

Same forecast as yesterday here but a little less breeze. Possibly. Sunny enough but the wind will whip the heat off it, and it'll stay dry. They say. While I was tidying some nonsense from the conservatory into the bin I found a bag of dahlia tubers that are desperate to be planted, a couple of them have green leafy bits showing 

YoungBlueEyes

Ooh that’s naughty of them Arb. I’m normally a cynical one but I reckon they’ll see you right, T+M are highly spoken of