Month: April 2009

Even though I flew Ryan Air/no baggage to Germany, I managed to bring back one plant with me. It is a carnivorous pitcher plant called nepenthes. It survived very well in my hand luggage bag and only one pitcher got dented. However, the pitchers are really tough, like they’re made of plastic, so I just stuck a pen down it when I came home and popped it out again. My teenage son is dead impressed with my purchase.

My husband has rigged up a hose off the greenhouse to catch rainwater so that I can water it. 

Did some more weeding and clearing today and my husband potted on the coriander and basil seedlings. Finally cut back my three leggy buddlejas.

Here is my son, Sam, watering the ceramic egg I bought him in Germany.

It has compost and flower seeds on the inside.

Lets see what hatches.

I cut the lawn this evening. There is a lot of moss there and I hate the thought of going around with the watering can with sulphate of iron in it, it takes so long. I have a lawn spreader but that gets clogged up and I end up bouncing it up and down the lawn and getting sore arms. At least the grass isn’t looking yellow like most years. Some of the Fritillaria are in flower. Still no Tulips open yet.

This is such good gardening weather. Growth is still very slow however and parts of the garden are still quite bare looking after the harsh winter. So many plants have succumbed! I’ve been dividing big clumps of Libertia – a tough job as I had left them for years and had no idea they could go so deep! They have been flowering badly so I’m hoping for better next summer. As i weed my borders I’m amazed at the masses of leaves I’m still collecting – this after hoovering them up in the autumn and removing them through the winter. I thought the earthworms might have worked a bit harder at incorporating them into the soil – incidentally I don’t see too many earthworms as I work! The daffodils are still looking good and some tulips are getting ready to flower. I love masses of tulips and hope for a week of calm sunny weather for them to show themselves off though some years the wind puts paid to that! Bye!

The weather came right at the perfect time. Tomorrow the plan is to put in the spuds and I am looking forward to the task. This year I also have growing tables which will allow me to grow beetroot and onions without the need for constant weeding. I have the greenhouse ready to recieve the tomato and cucumber plants. For the first time I am going to grow cherry tomatoes in hanging baskets outside, we’ll see what happens. But for me the season starts tomorrow…the perfect day

This week looks like if the weather are gracious to us at last. Snow and ice is melting,  asphalt is drying, and we have nice sunny moments. I know the  place on the bank of the river where daffodils appear every year – now this place is free from all snow.

My seeds are germinating rapidly, and looks very healthy. Hope for success! 🙂

The  best thing to unwind the spring – homemade little pies with green onion! 🙂 

 

I found three large clumps of Bluebells hidden under two big spruce trees. They have grown elongated due to lack of light. I managed to dig them up and replanted them down in ‘Bluebell Wood.  I also had to dig out more of the rogue ‘orange crocosmia’ which keeps popping up everywhere. I am enjoying the sight of the Camellia which is full flower at the moment. Every year I give this a thick mulch of pine  needles.

The day went brilliant. Got out of work early and got into the garden. Got about a third of the spuds in. Happy but tired. I suppose there is no gain without pain. Tomorrow is another day and I am looking forward to it.

 The garden is looking as good as we have ever seen it at this time of year an absolute abundance of daffs, narcissus and tulips and beautiful polyanthus.

the early scented brooms are just cominig into flower. We have finished edging and weeding the beds .The lawns got their third cut yesterday

 

I potted up the three eremurum bulbs I recently bought. They have good shoots developing already. I put them in a mixture of 2 parts compost 1 part cactus compost as I believe they need good drainage.

I plan on eventually planting them near some stipa gigantica as I think the combination is magical.

I opened the packet of Strilizia Reginae seeds I bought recently in Germany and was amazed at their wierd appearance, with bright orange fluffy bits! Photo to follow. I chitted them by filing with a nail file until a white dot appeared under the hard shell – quite hard work! I then popped them into warm water where they are resting overnight.

I also sowed more sweet pea. I have promised some to the local primary school as the teacher provided me with a bag of loo rolls in exchange.

I also sowed a tray of calendula candyman orange.

Just went to garden shop to buy compost and some other things I need – and I didn’t resist this plant. This is the same kind of kalanchoe I have already, but another colour. Gorgeous rich pink colour and I couldn’t pass by.

Is it a kind of madness? I spent last money in garden shop and I’m empty till 17th of April.

But HAPPY!!! :))))

 

A nice surprise to find this lovely Pulsatilla flowering – I hadn’t expected to see it survive into a second season and in fact had forgotten about it until I spotted it –  not a plant I know anything about – looked it up  and think it’s Pulsatilla. Just put five more photos in an April album. Bye.

Yesterday I planted out seedlings of cosmos, which were growing strongly in Yoghurt cartons. I dug each planting hole with a trowel and softened the soil in the bottom, put in some rose fertiliser and mixed it into the soil.

Then I cut the bottoms off the cartons so that I could gently push the seedlings head first into my hand without damaging the stems or roots. Having planted the seedlings I staked them because strong winds toppled the ones I grew last year when they became bushy. I had a job straightening them up and staking them. Also, I made the mistake of planting them too close together because I didn’t know how much space each one needed.

This time I have spaced them about 15 inches apart. In the front garden I experimented by growing one set of three plants in a triangle and spaced them about 6 inches apart. The remainder I set out as in the rear garden i.e. 15 inches apart. I will let you know how they get on.

I potted up the last of my bulbs today – acidenthera murielae, oxalis deppei, triteleia fabiola, spraxis tricolor & regal lilies.

I also planted 80 Dutch irises in the border and did some more clearing and weeding.

Pots in the greenhouse are now also on the floor as there is no more room on the staging.

One of my two small dicksonias is unfurling a frond.

I’ve added a new photo album, April 2009.

a great afternoon in the garden!!!  and 200 odd Lts of Ericaceous Compost.

Spent the afternoo working in the garden. I received two great plants for my birthday, the Kiwi I mention in my last journal entry and a Magnolia Denudata.Oh Joy.

However they both need what I dont have – Acidic Soil.  So I had a lot of digging to do and a lot of Ericaceous compost to buy. Felt I was digging my way to Australia!! Had to get other half to help me dig. I do hope they will be alright!!! I would be gutted if amything happened to them.

I thought the Kiwi had come on so much and had grown so much since I got it a week ago, but it looks tiny now planted out.

Once out there, there was no stopping me. I will no dobt pay for it tomorrow. Soak in the bath on the cards tonight before ER.

 

Watch this space – veggie garden going in tomorrow. Went to garden centre in Navan- Had a ball  !!!!!!!! On holiday for the next two weeks , as I work in school. Weather better be good so I can get out or I will NOT be impressed.

I was weeding and having a real battle with the ivy under the hedges. Its really getting out of hand. It will get the ‘Roundup’ when the temperature comes up a bit. I was looking at the Daffodils that were opening and others that are not yet open and  particularly for a very old scented species that I got from a derelict house in our field. I also wish I had kept all the names of the different varieties. When the daffs have finished in the cut flower garden I throw an old carpet over the area so I dont have to weed.

I received some presents with my last plant order from Bakker. There were some bulbs and a cute little wooden tricycle which is used as a pot holder.

The biggest mystery, however, is the object pictures here. It was in a plastic envelope and was clearly marked as "gift". It is made of plastic, with an opening at the top. I have no idea what it is supposed to be. 

Does anyone have any thoughts?

I lightly trimmed my Sambucus, ‘Black Lace’ , as its only small, around the  middle of February. These are the trimmings I potted and put in the homemade greenhouse. I wonder have they rooted, I won’t touch them until the back end of the year in case I do damage! Swinford Garden Club are taking bookings for a coach to ‘Bloom’ on 31 May. I’ve my name in already. Westport Garden Club are going to ‘Tullynally’ and Ballina Garden Club are going to ‘Glenveigh’ I’m going to have a great summer.!

Today is a day that shows that ‘green spring’ isn’t close to us.   The temperature is +2 C… and I saw first sign of daffodils on the river bank, but… It’s snowing right now!!!

To add some green I recall lovely rainy day 12.08.2008, when I visited Irish National Heritage Park with my friends. It was so green, so fresh, saturated with smells of damp grasses and trees, filled with secret sounds of living! And it was an exciting history trip.

Don’t believe anybody who says rainy weather is awful! Your feeling of weather is INside.

Find more in my new album ‘Irish National Heritage Park’.

I removed three withered pitchers from my Carnivorous plant to give my daughter something to disect.

I had read that you could see the skeletons of insects in the skin of the pitchers.

However, my scientific yet grotesquely inclined daughter did not find this to be true. Instead she did find two half digested insects in the liquid in the pitchers.The black bits in the photo are the insects.

We planted 17 pots of sunflower Little Dorrit today. Two seeds per pot. It is not a tall sunflower but it has a big skirt of vegetation, according to the description. My daughter and her reluctant boyfriend helped.

Afterwards I planted a tray of Squirrel Grass (courtesy of Bill), the last of Lorraine’s Cosmos, some more Dahlia seed (thanks again, Lorraine), Giant Marigolds and the soaked Bird of Paradise seeds from Germany.

I am now officially out of seed trays again.I only had spare trays because I gave up on two previously-sowed-trays which were reticent to germinate for me. Apologies to anyone I gave Helenium seed to – I don’t think they were good. Did anyone have any luck with them I wonder?

These Daffodils were growing in the hedge when we moved here but the clump then didn’t flower at all so I dug it up, separated out the bulbs and replanted them with plenty of room.  This year they have flowered again and I have noticed another clump in the hedge awaiting the same treatment. I wonder are they wild or were they planted there originally? They don’t last as long as others but they are lovely.  I just learned there is a man in Edgeworthstown, just a few miles away, who breeds daffodils, and there is one named after the Inny river nearby so I will have to get my hands on a few of them.

This badly shaped tree wasn’t always like this, in fact it was lovely. Its been here for years but then suddenly started dying. I think it is planted on a big boulder. Anyway when I was digging around the sunken boulders I piled up all the soil around the base of the Cherry and it sprang to life again! I hope it forms a better shape in the coming years.

We are having heavy rain now but this morning I managed to photograph this very brightly coloured Kerria ‘Pleniflora’ . Its growing in a north facing bed. These shrubs put suckers under ground which are easy to dig up and increase.