26 August 2010 10:45:05
Baby Tree Fern
Just a picture for Martin to access if this is a suitable candidate for transplanting to the top of my dead tree fern. Martin it's growing out of the side of the small trunk of some baby tree ferns that I had... I have three of them what do you think? I have'nt tried seperating it from the trunk though...
21 August 2010 22:12:06
Sam and his puppet
Today we all attended the Bunclody Horticultural show and it was our first year to put entries is and we learned a lot from the occasion although were all pretty wrecked. I was out at 7am collecting blackberries with the kids which won Ben a 'highly commended' strangly Faith had the same blackberries and did'nt win :-) Anyway Ben also go €7 for 2nd in the Short story and Sam €3 in the same catagory. Sam came first in the puppets and 3rd in the handwriting (medal and a pen). Faith came 3rd in the occasions card and 3rd in the Biscuit tin which was brilliant as there were 15 entries all under 13 so she was thrilled (two medals mind you she won no money which did'nt go down well)
My wife Gabriel was pretty dissappointed that she just got a highly commended in the Victoria sponge cake but she entered both baking and flower arranging which were really hard catagories with a lot of high class entries.
Finally I won a first for my Asters (although there were only three entries) a second for best portrait photograph, a second for Cactus Dahlias and a Highly commended for my Black Cherry Tomatoes (thanks Dave aka Chilli pepper) and a highly commended on my Tithonias. Pretty ok for our first outing I think but a lot of lessons learnt. The big lesson is more preparation and not leaving so much to the last minute. This year I really have'nt had as much time look after my plants as I woulod have liked as I was so busy with structural elements in the garden and had less good material available to me than I'd hoped, maybe next year.. but then Rachel will be back and the competition will be much stiffer :-) Oh Rachel if your tuning in no prize in the country garden catagory sorry..
19 August 2010 00:20:20
Mount Stewart
Hello and sorry have been on the missing list for the last while, as people will know I've had my internet problems I also have three demanding children who either keep me from here or sap my energy to stop me coming on here more often so apologies for that.
Just a quick update on a busy month I spend two weeks preparing the garden for our weeks holiday up north but the weather did'nt always behave itself. I also put paving down in most of the greenhouse which took me a couple of days and looks good now , I'm hoping to get my brother to make metal staging for me over the winter so I can have a more orderly and organised greenhouse. My wife wowed at Rachel's organised greenhouse when we visited so been pushed to do it a little since then. We also got to plant up most of our shrubs and plants into the new borders the budget did'nt quite stretch to bark mulch but hopefully next month as the weeds are growing faster than anything else!!
In any even the greenhouse is looking 200% better than it did a year ago and I'm very happy with it. There had been a question of more structural work in the garden in September but I really at this stage dont have the energy for it but you'd never know!
On our holiday the kids had a ball at W5 in belfast and if your ever there is a must see for all kids young and old in the Oddyssey arena, they also got to see the Red arrows perform on Newcastle Beach which was brilliant. Of course the car was filled with pound shop tat but I guess that what kids holidays is all about.
For us we only got to see two gardens the famous Mount Stewart while was lovely if a little unstructured it had some fabulous old trees and shrubs and a few unusual perennials. We also visited Seaforde Tropical Gardens which in my mind were'nt that tropical (maybe in 1950's) it had a lovely tiny butterfly house though and a very tough beech maze both of which the kids loved. Our car broke down in the last two days and it was all very stressful but we got home in the end thanks to a local garage pulling out all the stops to get us home.
When we did get home we spent a day watering!! most of my greenhouse stuff was ok as my brother in law had taken care of them but my wife had planted stuff the week before we went (I told her so :-)) and it suffered badly in many cases but in the end we had'nt many casualties.
This week I'm busy travelling to wexford town again for one of my boys to go to computer camp but also were busy preparing for our first entries into the Bunclody Horticultural Show which is all very exciting. I met Rachel today for coffee for advise as she wont be there this year (next year it's war maybe :-)) while my kids went ferral around the coffee shop (I kid you not!).
I will try to put up some photos during the week of the gardens we visited and of the garden but it depends on my internet speeds and time constraints.