GreenFly - A 'flylady style' gardening thread with weekly tasks to tame your garden

greenbee

Basil germinated fine in the greenhouse, but stopped in it's tracks not long after going outside - much like everything else. Hopefully the warmer weather will get everything moving (I'm sure the weeds will get going!). 

EssexHebridean

Thanks for the herb input all - yep, sounds like I'm not alone here then. My coriander germinated fine, but something must have eaten a fair bit of it while we were away, sadly. I've a pot of parsley being very slow, the basil I've mentioned. Thyme I know is a slow grower to start with anyway so that's not doing too badly. Chives in a pot are doing better than the little patch I sowed direct. I sowed an entire small trough of coriander yesterday anyway so fingers crossed that will improve matters! 

redofromstart

Parsley and oregano germinated ok but not doing much now. I bought supermarket basil and split to pot on so that is doing ok.

last time I looked I had one broad bean out of 12 plants and the runners seem to have stopped growing. Clearly not a good bean year here

Slinky

Doing battle with the blessed slugs here, discovered a load of them under my pots, in particular the trough with the lettuce in. No wonder I'm struggling to get anything worth picking.  Success though with the strawberries. It's strawberries with everything at the moment, and the neighbours and friends are doing quite well out of us too.

I planted out a bush rose yesterday that I received as a present for my big birthday recently.  It's gone into a new bed that we've left bare and been weeding regularly. I do hope that I've not planted it right where some bindweed roots are. We've dug and dug most carefully, but it's a crafty beggar as you know.  I've got lots of other plants to put in, mostly bought as bare root perenials which I've potted up. Not sure about layout, will just have to hope it looks OK when I've put stuff in. I'm sure some of it will be in the wrong place, I guess it can be moved if needs be.

Another unwelcome visitor to the garden is a young squirrell which I've twice chased away from the bird feeders today. Hope it gets the message. The birds are eating us out of house and home, two feeders full of sunflower hearts aren't lasting much longer than a day at the moment, we can't afford to be feeding the squirrell as well.

I made a decision to get rid of a clematis which seems to suffer from vertigo. Didn't grow more than 18 inches up the trellis this year. The flowers look OK for a couple of days, but perish when the rain gets on them and the seed heads are very scruffy.  Alba.  Wouldn't have it again.  I was astonished at the size of the rootball when I pulled it up, massive, by comparison with what was going on up top. There was an ants nest under the big stone I was using to shade the roots, I wonder if they were causing an issue.  Anyway, it's gone to the compost bin and something else will be found. Maybe another honeysuckle. We've planted a new one up the otherside of the trellis arch and that's doing pretty well.

redofromstart

We get through a lot of sunflower hearts as well Slinky. A lot of pleasure out of watching the feeders though. The finches go through a lot of nijer seed too.

im not at home today but I have cleared half a green waste bin of ivy for my absent host. There's an amazing mint patch, two good hostas in her garden and a glorious honeysuckle in the hedgerow and I am guilty gardener eyeing them up for splitting. 

Cherryfudge

Farway said:

For a quick fix, pop into Asda and buy a growing pot one for a quid, in the fresh herb grocery section, not garden.

It'll soon grow outside, just give it a bit of TLC for a week or so

That's a good price! I'll have a look: we only have a small Asda but we go there quite often for the cheap tinned foods.

This year I am really struggling to keep the ones from the supermarket going: I have two pots with a couple of leaves each! One was reduced to about 35p so perhaps I can excuse it dying on me. L!dl seems to have stopped doing potted coriander altogether round here so it was home grown or pay T or S prices. Hoping Asda comes up trumps for me!

Cherryfudge

It's been a busy day and I didn't get out in the garden but I've at least fed and watered the houseplants.

Slinky

Coriander. Evil stuff, wouldn't want it as a gift

Sun_Addict

Garden task today was repot some seedlings too big for current pots. Realised I’ve forgotten what some of the seedlings are so that could be interesting 😆 Also fed and watered all greenhouse plants. Picked a huge amount of sugar snaps and mangetout that are growing faster than I can pick them. 

EssexHebridean

Haha Slinky - are you a "tastes of soap!" person?!

Courgettes fed last night - now I know that tomato food is the way forward - hopefully a few doses of that will cure the yellow leaves. Also removed flowers that were hanging on to the end of well formed fruits. 

More slug pellets ordered - the wool ones again. we're only half way through the original tub but found a good deal on a 10l tub of them so decided to go for it. 

MrEH salvaged some lolly sticks and stashed in the shed ready for using as plant labels. 

Tonight's jobs:
Spray broad beans
Get spinach trough replanted (something dug up the last sowing, and there's not enough left to make it worthwhile. Will do half with more spinach and half with (probably) more carrots I think. 
Check on toms needing sideshooting/staking.