WHAT ARE WE DOING IN THE GARDEN TODAY - 2021

From the 31st December "Then start work on extending bed at top of garden. This is a raised bed which gets plenty of sun and has good drainage, so dig out soil to about a foot down then add stones, carefully collected over the past 12months and refill with soil and smaller stones. Edge with bigger flatter rocks."
First foot or so was ok, then discovered a couple of lazy builders had emptied a load of concrete left over from putting in fence posts into a hole and covered with 6in of soil. Broke off some of the edges; but left with mass about 2ft*3ft*1ft thick that is not moving. Cleared all round this so will start to create bed this afternoon, one section will be a lot shallower than the rest.

 

Weekly check on all the overwintering plants and the numerous cuttings that I took from my parent's garden last year that are housed in our big coldframe. Added yet another layer of fleece to them.
Gave the Lemon tree a quick once over in search for a scale insects...once again no lurkers spotted. Gave it a winter feed before wrapping it in a new roll of fleece.
Also checked on the orchid cuttings....still alive and green after 6mths. It was a bit of a hit and miss experiment as I hadn't a clue about orchid propagation....I just knew i had to try as the parent plant ( my Dad's) looked and to be utterly honest...still looks very poorly.

 

Lovely photos, Armandii.

Looking around my garden, I fear so many of my plants may already be lost, as we've had a very sharp, prolonged frost these past few days. Yours look ok! We've had quite a heavy fall of snow today. Maybe it will insulate the survivors?

I cleaned and filled the birdfeeders too. A flock of starlings appreciated the fresh fatballs and seeds. I watched them, admiring their lovely plumage against the glowing white snow in the background.
There were plenty of smaller birds flying about, but I didn't do too much observing them, because the warmth of the fire was too tempting for most of today.

 

That is a remarkable likeness

 

Yes I feel a bit of fear too @pattie as this winter has had more prolonged spells of cold weather than last. My Dahlias survived so well being left in situ that I did the same this year too. Getting extremely anxious now


You have reminded me ....I also refilled the bird feeders too today.

 

Oh I know how annoying that can be, Nigel. My garden is full of concrete, broken bricks etc.

Took my built up polytunnel thingies up to the lotty today.

 

Very nice @Snorky85

 

Turned the compost into another bay. I can’t believe the amount of worms in there. Rusty

 

When I was digging over a make-over patch and now going to be hopefully grass the amount of worms in there was vast..Yet the veggie bed that had Pots and Toms only this year(weeds in humongous amounts as a non bonus ) there were few worms, so growing different crops plants must cause this....

 

A lot of 'tender' perennials will survive -8C if they've got a thick layer of compost, manure, dry leaves or straw over them...anything that prevents the frost from reaching the tubers/rhizomes/roots. Hope they'll be OK, Upsy!

 

Yes thanks @noisette47 , I have actually piled a mound of compost over them all and then placed large flower pots over the compost, last year I only applied the compost and they were all OK... So going by last year they 'should' be Ok as they now have an extra layer of protection... but they are my babies that I grew from seed 3 years ago...and I worry!!