Worked from home, finished early and managed to get a decent amount of gardening in! Planted out a load of violets (Queen Charlotte) that I sowed last year, cleared out a very weedy bed against a sunny wall ready to plant out sunflowers tomorrow (from the GW free seeds), and did a bit of mowing, deadheading and weeding.
No today we didn't...but we visited a great garden that we had last visited 30 years ago and still an amazing garden. Had a great chat with one of the new owners and really enjoyed being on the other side for once.
Never thought Verbena bonariensis would ever become a weed in my garden but it has seeded so prolifically since last year I've spent ages today digging most of it up. I potted up the biggest plants (for what I'm not sure) and binned the rest
Clay soil - Cheshire/Derbyshire border. I play with plants and soil and sometimes it's successful
Planted out Cosmos, Agastache, Heleniums and Michaelmas daisies. Potted on Gaura and Echinacea seedlings and pricked out some French Marigolds. Put a load of poppy seedlings into pots.
Washed a load of pots. OH cut the box hedge in the front garden, didn't take as long as usual as the caterpillars have had a go at it. It will be coming out eventually.
I decimated the nettle patch, once that started I couldn’t stop. It wasn’t on my to do list today but it was starting to seed. So satisfying getting its roots out.
I also pulled up all the fgmn and filled up two wheelbarrow loads of it for the compost. Felt like Monty Don when he did that.
I also tackled that dry stony bed that used to be where the huge fir trees were. Lots of digging over and finding huge rocks, some the size of spuds, does clay soil just create more rocks or did the last gardener just chucked all their rocks there? Tiring, dirty work…
Weeded an area towards the grapevine greenhouse, tied up broad beans that keep falling over, stacked up some dwarf beans to stop the pigeons, sowed some different dwarf beans, collected surplus lettuce and made soup and put in the freezer, dug up a surplus rodgersia to give to our son, watered the veg that needed it....and continued to move on the pigeons from eating the leaves of the fruit trees.
Reminds me that something’s eating my peas just as they’ve popped their heads up (I’ve forgotten to protect it), and something else has dug up a few peas and beans that were sown directly.
I have a bed of bonariensis where my onions grew last year so I have experimented and potted up two plants in large containers, interplanted with cosmos Purity, some antirrhinums, giant scabious, bergamot and balsam. I will plant any surviving plants in the garden next year. It was not easy transplanting the viburnums as they were large plants and the stems are very brittle and easily broken. I have put stakes in as protection against the wind, my cosmos always get blown over in this garden.
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Planted out a load of violets (Queen Charlotte) that I sowed last year, cleared out a very weedy bed against a sunny wall ready to plant out sunflowers tomorrow (from the GW free seeds), and did a bit of mowing, deadheading and weeding.
I play with plants and soil and sometimes it's successful
I play with plants and soil and sometimes it's successful
Potted on Gaura and Echinacea seedlings and pricked out some French Marigolds. Put a load of poppy seedlings into pots.
Washed a load of pots. OH cut the box hedge in the front garden, didn't take as long as usual as the caterpillars have had a go at it. It will be coming out eventually.
Tiring, dirty work…
It was not easy transplanting the viburnums as they were large plants and the stems are very brittle and easily broken. I have put stakes in as protection against the wind, my cosmos always get blown over in this garden.