WHAT ARE WE DOING IN THE GARDEN TODAY - 2021

I've sown 3000 Aubrieta seeds in trays today. It took a couple of hours working in the utility room and trying to keep the mess to a minimum. I miss having a greenhouse.

Can someone tell me please how long Lupins take to germinate? It's a long while since I've grown them.

 

@Sheal
They can take more than 2 weeks or more, I've been getting the odd one coming up and it must be over a month now.

 

After shifting 4 tons of gravel to finish off the bottom of the garden yesterday I was hoping for an easier time today. It's looking better than I envisaged and with the new high wire fence I have a borrowed landscape interrupted only by dog walkers and horse riders. We get plenty of comments at our progress. Mostly positive

Emptied our raised pond and as suspected all the little fishes had been eaten. It is going to be upcycled as a raised bed. A lot of soil and compost to be barrowed today so I should have a good workout in the glorious sunshine.

Any ideas for a small, above ground water feature for outside our summer house? Not another pond though.

 

What else do you have outside the summer house? If you have a selection of pots, maybe a ceramic pot, with a cork blocking the drainage hole, filled with water? Some of the bowl-shaped ones would look really nice... (we keep a selection of old whisky corks, of different sizes, for sealing bottles - you could even take them to the shop to try for size!) An obvious tip - put the cork in the inside of the pot, so the water is pushing it into the hole, rather than trying to push it out...

 

Planted out hardened off spinach seedlings. Did them quite close together but hoping for baby leaf crop so should be fine. Would love to get more stuff in the ground but just not enough space.

Moved a few more Red Cross onions over to make space for some quick-grow salad onions but I could probably just use the Red Cross as salad onions as that's about how bulbed they are haha. Realllly hoping they start to form bulbs soon. I'm still getting new leaves.

Also sowed some borage, and salad onions straight into the soil outside. Pricked out a bunch of marigolds (I sold loads, I had hoped to have more but someone wanted to buy 25 so I sold them!), and some additional cucumbers as I've only got 8 going and think people might want to buy them too (and why not sow more if people are willing to buy). Should be done with my seedling setup indoors in about a month when things can go back outside so that will be quite nice.

 

I potted up a couple of young citrus trees (grew the lemon from a seed I got from tesco last year, but had to cheat and buy an orange seedling as the ones from tesco are all seedless lol) - they look a bit daft at the moment but hopefully they'll grow into their new pots. They spent most of the day outside enjoying the sun but are now back in the warm. Watered everything then nearly threw myself off the balcony while climbing the bench to check my strawberries (in a hanging basket) for weeds - no weeds, and I survived, so a good result overall

 

Thanks @Logan. My lupins have still got a chance then. They've been in a fortnight but there's nothing showing yet and being old seed germination will be hit and miss.

 

Only did some watering and re-covered lots outside to be ready for tonight's snowfall. And yes, I put domes over the foxgloves I trimmed a bit too early.

Amazingly a couple of my 4 o'clock seeds germinated. So I made sure their water supply if full too.

 

Congrats! None of mine have yet so I've started off a couple more - I'm determined to get one lol

 

I followed @pete advice and put the container with the soil blocks on a warm surface. I think it was that and my stubbornness. He had 100% germination and it got my goat that I was a flop so grim determination along with his advice certainly changed things.

So, it started with one finger pointing at him and then two thumbs up!!!

 

Lol who says gardening can't be a competitive sport Well done with the determination - I'll look into finding a warm surface to try too if my second lot refuse to cooperate, thank you for the tip

 

Before I made a propagator I always used the airing cupboard.
Checking twice a day.

 

ooh you've just reminded me-my mum had given me some 4 o,clock corms(?!) she had got from "Farmer Gracy" and they're still in my car door....must plant them today.

 

Good point, you can dig them up and treat the roots like dahlias during the winter.

 

Not much because..this greeted me this morning.