WHAT ARE WE DOING IN THE GARDEN TODAY - 2022

Well, why not just edit your post?

 

There was much excitement in my garden today, and great entertainment for any of my neighbours that happened to catch my comedy of errors. While I was watering everything with my brand new stretchy hosepipe-with-trigger-nozzle, I found a mouse in one of the tubs. I don't remember planting that. For anyone interested, this particular cultivar is highly adverse to over-watering. Between me leaping back in suprise and dropping the hosepipe (thus releasing the trigger), and the idiot rodent going mental in a bid to escape, the dogs noticed... as the barking started to die down, I released the deathgrip I'd inflicted on the tub to prevent it overturning when two furballs each over 45kg had tried to jump in it at once, and thought to turn off the tap. This proved to be a mistake as the hose connector decided it'd had more water pressure building up than it could take and blasted off from the tap the moment I was in range. As my dogs and I stood there all soaking wet and vaguely stunned, I swear I heard the faint sound of mousey laughter.

Other than that, I spread out some decorative bark in the back border, evicted a sneaky sycamore tree growing in a balcony pot, towel dried the dogs and planted a few petunia plug plants.

I hope everyone and their gardens are doing well and are devoid of mice

 

I do to remove a double post but I would prefer it not be there.

 

Sowed some more sunflower seeds as the birds ate the others!
Potted on some seedlings, watered pots and tidied the patio

 

Today we planted up a couple of hanging baskets. As a result, I was able to rearrange the cold frames. I also planted out three Alstroemeria I received yesterday, just after the rain started.
I started a few more Morning Glory under the lights and on the heat mats but I intend to sow the rest of the seeds directly in the ground later this month.

 

Today have been in the greenhouse as 3-4 mm of rain fell outside slowly. moved most cacti and succulents from the house to the greenhouse, now shaded with fleece. Sowed seeds of Runner bean, French beans, Tithonia, sunflowers, sweetcorn, wallflowers and Sweet Williams.
Split a couple of dahlia plants and rescued some of the seedlings from the propagator including ipomoea alba, Nasturtiums and Ricinus.

 

Needs-must-stuff. We'll be away for over a week soon so seedlings in small pots are unlikely to survive. I have hardened everything off for weeks now, and as expected, the growth of the warmth loving plants has halted but everything looks fairly ok-ish.

So, toms and cucs Venlo Pickling went in the raised bed and other stuff got planted into large pots and placed on the surface to wait for their final positions. It's way too early for toms and cucs to be out but they have a better chance to survive there than in pots indoors.


Potted on everything, including The Monster, aka Dragonfruit, grown from seed of a supermarket fruit. The plant is ugly, has not been watered since October, has a fancy netting of cobweb on it and aerial roots to reach Argentina. The thorns are viciously thin and catch everything in 10 mile radius so I'm not exactly sure why I decided to give The Guy some fresh compost.


Re-built the big herb pot with chives, thyme, marjoram and newcomers tarragon and lemon grass from seed. This year Parsley is not allowed to come out to play after I proudly harvested some in November and was met with an array of pretty, tiny caterpillars on the chopping board.

Caterpillars are nice but as I have a wormophobia, anything elongated that moves in my food seriously puts me off.

Tomorrow the Agastache will go in and that's the spring planting sorted.

 

By that definition I think I have wormophobia too

 

Sowed some dwarf french beans in pots indoors - green podded Nautica, yellow podded Cala d'Or and purple podded Purple Teepee. Last year I sowed directly outside but I'm hoping to get an earlier harvest this summer by starting them off indoors.

Also soaked some gigantes beans overnight and left them to sprout in some damp kitchen roll. I really hope these germinate. The beans are huge once they swell!

 

Potted up some perennials that arrived as Postplugs, then were potted up in seed cells and now need to be moved on. Most of the perennials I will plant straight in the ground from the seed cells but "my" garden (the damp, shaded, unloved bit) is so crowded I want those destined for there to be up a bit bigger before I plant them out.

 

Finally today I had some work to do on the balcony - well not so much as work but I put out the Geraniums & Pelargoniums that have spent the winter in the big kitchen window. That entailed quite a few trips back & forth from kitchen to balcony - through the living room - & back!

The pigeons that mess up the balcony this year have made me miss a row of pots that are normally behind the 3 long white troughs on the balcony floor up against the railings. As their dropping make it impossible to put anything there I had to move all the pots further in during the early part of winter. Now I'm robbed of space!

I found it difficult to put the pots of plants from the kitchen to the back of the balcony. I wanted to put them there to give them chance to be accustomed to sunlight with its UV ration that can't pass through the double glazing of the big kitchen window. At the back of the balcony the sunlight only reaches the floor for a couple of hours late afternoon so they shouldn't burn too much. Fortunately the afternoon has now clouded over so the UV radiation shouldn't be a problem.
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