Month: September 2012

Pumkin 2012!

I was hoping to transplant my Fremontodendron down to the new area at some stage as I would prefer the greenhouse area to contain low plants.  But it is still in full flower, and doesn’t look like it may stop anytime soon. So I think it may be unwise to move it just yet. Advice welcome.

Won’t be able to plant trees on Sunday cos the eldest kids have got to finish their packing – they’re going to London on Tuesday for college and won’t be back again till Christmas, and taking our Cathy Bee with them. Thank God for Skype or I’d have to go too.  So we planted the first bed of trees today as the weather was too nice not to. We have 2 lonely sumacs in the front lawn which are neither here nor there as design features, so they are being joined by a bee tree, a Himalayan birch and an ornamental rowan each, plus festuca glaucas and junipers which were completely out of place in the border. And some Tete a Tete daffs and snowdrops cos Scrubber said I had to!   Not that I needed much persuasion…..

Oh yes, and some Caen anemones from Lidl. I bought some last spring and sowed them in pots in the polytunnel and not one germinated, so hoping they do better from an autumn sowing outside. Think they will as my other son’s green-fingered lady also bought some and hers were a picture in her exposed outside pots!

Not quite concrete shoes to go eating with fishes – a la Tony Soprano

It is only seven or eight months late but eventually the foundation went in this afternoon.

Mason lined up for next week

This frog is not the easiest to digest but hopefully he will be fully eaten next couple of weeks.

I think it may have been Conrad who sent me these primula denticulata seeds. I sowed them, and put them out of my mind completely (in other words…..I forgot I had them).

But now that they have germinated, would it be wiser to leave them as they are for a while, or try to separate?

I can’t believe it’s a month since the visit to Rachel’s and Altemont.

We spotted this grass like plant in Altemont, this is the seed head. I meant to go back and get a better photo, but got distracted.

Some seed did find it’s way into our mindful hands, so hoping to get an ID. I’m going to sow some seed now and keep the rest till the Spring.

Havnt got a lot done in the garden of late but I got a couple of hours in it today and these are the the plants that gave me the most pleasure:

As always, my Eucomis ‘Sparkling Burgandy’, only one flower this year as I had split it, but very happy that I now have 2 pot fulls and didnt kill it:)

Then hidden under other plants I found this lovely dahlia, a slug had only taken a little bite!

Then I discovered that this Agastache had come in to bloom, sown this year and it is the perfect colour for the bed that I happened to plant it in:)

Hip! Hip! Hurray!

A lot of personal trauma going on here for the last 18 months. Today saw the end of all that crap. Now it’s out with the old, in with the new. Lots of plans. Will be revealed at a later stage. 

With my week off next week, I hope to plant a few shrubs into the NEW area. Hail, rain or snow I will get that other 2 ton of soil on top of the cave and start planting in earnest.

It was a good, dry day and by the time I got home the front hedge was annoying me.

I meant to trim that Elaeagnus ebbingei hedge weeks ago but didn’t. And now I was afraid to in case there’s a dreadful winter. But today I just did it anyway!

I trimmed the hedge with the shears. My mum’s shears is great since we got it sharpened. I’m sure they don’t make tools like that nowadays. But I really must invest in an electric strimmer soon as we now have a lot of hedge.

Claire was talking about echiums. I do hope we have a mild winter so I don’t loose mine either. Apparently Echium wildpretii is a bit hardier than most but still…

One day they are just a cluster of withering leaves and the next a long stemed bud appears!  My Nerines are looking promising this year!

i have just discovered this at the bottom of my sorbus aucuparia, i wonder is this down to the damp weather? i know its not honey fungas as it is too dark in colour and the tree is doing fine despite the wind striping it of its leave, i did a bark test to make sure and all is fine, this is the second time i have seen this in that area.

this is the last of the bulbs for the bottom of the wardrobe. got some more tulips, anenomes, not getting anymore now have loads just need to plant them.

i havent done anything gardening wise in the last couple of days as becky was sick and now chris is sick same thing sinuses and i am starting to get it. this weekend should see the end pot washing, then blanching of cabbage to be done and start bringing in tender plants by the end of the month

got a large pot of soup made today and boy was it yummy and there is enough to last a few days and also made a lovely lamb stew mmm.i tend to do alot more cooking in winter as i have nothing else to do where as i am up to my eyes in the garden in spring and summer and autumn.

wont say i will do something tomorrow as i dont know how the kids will be, we will see, no major rush

hi, i haven’t posted for a very long time and not having the internet for 6months didnt help. ive been looking after/trying to the gardens here since the first of Febuary and have been enjoying myself immensly. i hope a few of you have had the chance to visit over the summer.

We have replaced our unfortunate buxus with Ilex crenata ‘convexa’

Around 320 plants were used and I have to say I’m pretty pleased with the result. Not quite an instant hedge, but not too far off.

Hopefully that will be the end of our woes with box, but I have a bad feeling about the other few specimens on the estate.

Soft and billowy. Miscanthus sinensis ‘Ferner Osten’ is one of my favourite grasses.

I thought this was a nice photo …    of a rare bottle bush.

I grow these cape gooseberries for Joshie. He loves them.

Amazingly last year’s plants came through the mild winter in the greenhouse so we’re going again this year. Although the yield is much less this year.

Josh still thinks they’re yummy (can’t explain the sorrowful look on his face!)

I’m dog walker in chief this week and so for the last couple of days I have taken the camera with me on our trips down the lane.

Just messing about really but there might be one or two photos which you like 🙂

I still haven’t given up on echiums, and these ones appeared out of nowhere six months ago. They have grown a lot since then but will need to survive the winter to get a chance to flower. I lost 2 about the same size in 2009, and really REALLY hope we have a mild winter like last year, to hopefully see flowers on these. Fingers crossed!

Rachel must have found out that I’m an Airhead when it comes to house plants.

She gave an Air plant (Tillansia) last week.

I had a great display of these  years ago, dead easy to keep (even for me).

I knew I had a few small pieces of drifwood out in the shed, found them this evening.

Drilled a hole in one and a display is born ;-))

Thanks Rachel.

A slightly better day today and two more visitors in the garden!

Not much time to do any real gardening but took some cuttings of catmint ‘Walker’s Low’ and some of pink and red pelargoniums. Probaby too late but worth a try! 

Again took the camera out around the garden, its amazing how plants perk up with a couple of hours sunshine!

Plenty of sunshine to day from early morning until about 4.30 p.m. It was cold enough early but temperature rose and it appeared warmer than it was in reality. I made good use of the fine day. Two flower beds were prepared, in what was part of the lawn. Some stones were removed and if Scrubber would like them they are his free! Eventually, some plants went in, a large Geum Mrs. Bradshaw which came from the rockery, too big for it and in the other bed went plants which came from seeds I got from a member in Johnstown. Plenty of insects enjoyed the flowers, Dahlias, Geraniums and large Daisies. Darkness is coming early now but it was a day I enjoyed.

I introduced you to Echeveria Mauna Loa on 31st July and on 7th August we took a peek the warts. So I thought it only fair that you should be kept up to date on the latest developments 🙂 The flowering spikes are about a metre tall and look as if they still have a bit to go.

Our first lot of Autumn/Winter bedding usually starts with 6packs of what are known as Yodder Chrysanthemums. And I hate them with a passion. They deteriorate so quickly once they come in. They don’t sell quickly enough and then we’re left to reduce, reduce, reduce, until they are looking rightly ‘shoddy’. I hate them. 

However, last year I was asked to plant some up in the raised gravel area in the garden centre for display purposes, and to promote sales of same. I usually advise customers that they will put on maybe twice their height at the most, after planting out. I left these ones in the ground over the winter, expecting to replace them when they started to go over. That didn’t happen. And in fact, this year they are like a small flowering hedge, about 18 inches tall. One of the managers wanted me to replace them a few weeks ago and I refused. Today they opened up, just like I knew they would. He was looking at them today, and I knew he was silently admitting defeat. Hee hee!

are both ‘a trifle indisposed’ nothing much but cant go out today to wheel barrowloads of clay into my new ‘rock pool’ in the rockery. So I wrote out a nice journal and sent it into the ether-its vanished and for once I didnt first do it in Word where I am this time!

Nothing much but I hope to be back into my stride on sat. However as every cloud has…. My silver lining today was the sight of a huge amount of new buds on a rose that had given its best all summer. I had cut off the old sprays to tidy it up and lo and behold! The promise of many more. It is heartening! It is an old rose that someone gave me a cutting of and has flowered well for the last twenty thirty years!

I like Autumn. The business of summer is over and things begin to emerge again-paths, rocks, edges, The urn I put in about two months ago had been completely overcome by ferns and bindweed and stuff but now like a ghost its emerging again and as I strimmed the path beside it it looks fine. Hazel and Elizabeth 11 thought I shouldn’t plant it just enjoy its lovely shape and I think they are right. ‘THINK SCRUBBER?’ ‘Know Hazel!’ I have two small pots of ivy inside it and the leaves trail very nicely so just that and no more.

My new Acer continues to delight and it is to have pink stems in spring! Wot larks. I put in five other acers about eight months ago and only later found out they were to be green whit and pink! The pink didn’t materialize to any great extent but the green and white leaves are lovely in the shade. One died but four survive. I find a good few of my admittedly cheap azaleas have bitten the dust-every second one but as I say they were very cheap so musnt complain, Some do some don’t.

The coprosma for example was on the to- be- dumped -shelf for two euro. I took three and they are fine. You win some. I love the Accidanthera or gladioulis something or other, And the perfume is powerful!No that was definitely not on the bargain bench. Anna bought it for me .

So even if I cant get digging today theres lots to see and maybe plan! Then again I could ring the Duke and have a natter!