What Jobs Are We Doing In The Garden Today 2019

Someone is going to busy.

 

I didn’t do much today, apart from pick fallen leaves out of the pond, and pull out dying-back water lily leaves. Boy! Is that water cold?!!

 

and more . In between the the garden has been to wet and muddy to do much. I think all the jobs I had hoped to catch up with and a few new ones will have to wait until next year.

Last week I did cut back a Scabious in a pot and pull a rather astonishing amount of blanket weed out of the pond. I started mulching a few of the pots but only did one before . Mr Woos beautiful patio Rose has decided that later November is a good time to have a repeat flowering . Should I mulch it now or wait until it's finished flowering?

 

I use the small bubble kind. It's wide enough to cover two widths of glass. My GH is made of cedarwood so fixing is fairly easy. I measure and cut the plastic from just above the side window line, then I take the plastic to the ridge and down the other side. I use an electric staple gun. Having completed the roof span, I then do the sides. As the GH is T&G boarded base to bench height I cut lengths so as to overlap the ends of the roof span and fix the lower end to the framework at the bench. Originally I had fixed the sheeting down to base level, thus covering the inside of the boarding. This sheeting is still good. Always make certain that overlaps will allow any rain etc that does get in, will be able to drain between sheet and frame. I leave my insulation in situ all the time. Good luck.

 

Just an extra tip. When I was using two 75foot GH's I would divide the run off by using broom handles and making roller blinds. These I fixed across the house. Very handy for mixed collections.

 

Hi @Mike Allen - wow those were BIG greenhouses! Unfortunately the roll of bubble plastic I had was just a bit too small to cover 2 panels - also the extra supports my greenhouse has between the uprights and the roof get in the way. I have an aluminium greenhouse - so no staple gun! Yes, separating sections for a mixed collection is worth doing - I used to rig up curtains between them. But with my new greenhouse I ordered it with a glass partition to save the effort. Thanks for suggestions - I will just have to be thankful that I do not have 150 foot of greenhouse to insulate like you did!

 

Yes Caroline, fair size. They were in the grounds of a military hospital. I'd been headhunted to take on the post of head gardener. Sadly previous gardeners were nowt but labourers and merely kept the paths swept and the grass cut. The GH's had been donated by the Nuffield Foundation. One had cold frames the full length. Both houses had hot water pipes from a small gas boiler. Realising that the powers to be, (MOD) were as tight a the proverbial gnats ****. It was agreed that, provided the hospital was cared for, then everything else was mine.

Silly me. As perhaps some kind of surity. I suggested that I'd have the GH's full within a month. I could have bitten myown tongue. Nevertheless, by a bit of scrounging. Both houses were full by the end of August that year. Close to where I had just moved to was Eltham Palace, and the grounds there were used/maintaned by a section of the Royal Parks, here they trained their gardeners. I soon had loads of geranium cuttings etc.

Time passed and I had quite a following of outside customers, especially for roses.
The chap who delivered the medical gases asked one day if I could get rose bushes. This became a good earner for that time. He would turn up with a clip board and lists of his workmates requests. I had at that time a good friendship with a market stall holder in Woolwich market. Strange but true. Alf, the gas man, said. That the chap on the market sold a load of rubbish. Strange. This is the man I dealt with. I'd give him a list. He would deliver the roses to me at the hospital. He'd give me a receipt including VAT. Honestly. I made one old shilling profit per rose bush, plus the return of the VAT that I'd never paid.

Poor old Alf passed away about a year ago, sometimes we met in the supermarket. Topic of conversation. Hey Mick, those roses are still growing well. Little did he know. Alf old friend. RIP.
At that time the IRA were very active. Woolwich had been victime to some of their bomb blasts. A pal, a sgt in the RA, his wife had an early morning job, cleaning some offices. She, on route to the front door noticed a toy gun on the ground, she picked it up and woke up in hospital having had her hand blown off. This was the era.

OK. Taking all things in all. Those days wages were small, thankfully I was a civil servant, job for life etc etc. I have to honestly say. Although I started out helping/hindering dad to harvest the spuds 1945. My life has been dominated by horticulture. Leaving the police servic and joining the GLC parks. For some unknown reason. I passed my 1st class gardeners and groundsmanships. Then truly my gardening life and experience has been learned by practical experience, self taught. Fair do's, I have survived on the compost for several years. I have utilized that time and got me a few credits, including becoming a plant pathologist and plant scientist. Mere titles, but so what? I love watching that series. The Victorian Garden
but although my old dad wasn't a professional gardener. I feel that in the series. I am retracing some of my footsteps..

 

Goodness those were scary times re IRA. I remember how your bag was searched as you went into every department store. Your problem with financing the greenhouses is a common one. People buy some big resource, then conveniently forget that it now costs money every year to service it, maintain it etc. I call it 'Brass Plaque Syndrome'. Someone gets their name on a brass plaque for donating/opening a resource, then it goes downhill because annual funding doesn't get a brass plaque and publicity.

 

its a bit chilly today. but intentions of getting out there and raking some leaves. they are dry, and I am home today from work.