What jobs are we doing in the Garden today 2015

You keep those in your garden?

 

Thankfully,no. Lol

I've just had to redo the anchoring of my plastic greenhouse. We have strong winds here and it was threatening to take off despite being weighed down with various full bags of compost :O

 

Sorry, I missed that bit

What have you planted in the super new crescent border?

 

They earned their nickname as Blow-Away for this very reason - I lost two (and quite large ones too ) in my previous garden ... and that is despite them being weighed down with compost bags, bark bags, bags of flint and on the shelving: books, plants, tools, seed box. I was gutted!

I think they should be treated a bit like some seasonal plants: put it up once all the freak strong winds have gone and then take it down before they start up again (so, put it up in June and take it down in July ).

 

Haven't done much today apart from moving some pots into a more sunny position. I also filled the bird feeders and put some more food on the bird table. The robin has been around all day although he's been getting buffeted about by the wind. The tits have been clinging to the feeders which are now swinging around in the wind, as they're hanging from the whitebeam branches....nothing seems to put them off their grub though!

 

I root-pruned two pampas grass, two kerrias, the variegated privet-y thing and my fav pittosporum "Tom Thumb" and replanted them back in their big pots with nice fresh compost theyre the first of many but Im so glad Ive made a start on sorting the pots out feeling a bit achy now from carting pots around so going to plonk myself on the couch, kick off my shoes and recuperate with a nice hot cup of coffee and a biscuit or two...or three

 

I have been playing with the new hose. It's very clever, stretches out like a huge snake to 75 feet when you turn on the tap, then when you turn the tap off, continue to spray the water left in the hose and it wrinkles itself back up to a size you can hold in one hand and is as light as a feather. I LOVE my new blue hose

 

The garden is slowly emerging from under the snow, so yesterday it was time for a bit of damage assessment. The kale is prostrate but alive and producing, the purple sprouting broccoli has been completely flattened, half of the broad beans seem to have disappeared and the leeks are still under the snow. Another bit of cutting back broken or top heavy shrubs, mainly ivy to add to the photinia which the snow has reduced by two thirds. Managed to dig through the two feet of snow which fell off the roof (there was about 5 feet of it a week ago) to uncover the irises to let some light get to them. Intended to prune the apple tree, now that I can finally get to it, but it was raining too hard. Decided not to sow any more seeds in the glass porch until the temperatures improve. It's a good job there is some more horrendous weather forecast for this week...

 

The weather has been atrocious here today with high winds and bucketing rain. I've mainly had other things I had to do, but managed to pot on 14 cuttings of Physocarpus opulifolius 'Diable d'Or' which were rooted last year. The shrub was already in the garden when I arrived and is a real beauty with purple leaves that colour well in autumn, new shoots tinged with gold and oodles of foamy white flowers followed by bright red berries which turn to black. Here's a pic I took two springs ago

 

Sounds about right, M! My little one last year made it right through to the season to the bad winter storms we had and this year the bigger 'walk in' one was the same price, so I figured I had nothing to lose

 

A very productive evening! Have spent it making chicken run fence posts.

Needless to say this is why I'm generally banned from being around sharp things.