Month: March 2011

question? could you freeze jeruzalem artichokes??? i going to harvest mine this week and its looks like i have lots(thanks to rachel last year).. also if anybody wants some tubes i can post them.

 

Enjoyed the get together on Sat, had to rush off, so sorry if anybody brought me a plant and I did not collect it .. Thanks to Jacinta for the Berberis and the shamrock. also to Dick for the Aloe vera.  I also got another ground cover plant but I do not know who it was from, so thanks for that. I look forward to spending my voucher, I did not get time on Sat, but I do not live far from Johnstown so I will pop up some day and have a good look around.  Thanks to whoever gave in my Kris Kindle ( Gloves and book mark) you will know who you are 🙂 I found out on Sat that 2 Garden.iers live very near to me in Roscommon, so I hope we will meet up down there some day over the summer. 

Hosta very kindly sent down some Darmera Petalta with Paddy and Mary (Gracedieu Lass) on Saturday as I couldn’t make it.  I had coveted it since I saw it in NoelFitz’   photographs.  My good fortune was doubled as I got to go out to Gracedieu to collect it!  OF COURSE I counldn’t wait and went out first thing hoping to have a look at their goergous garden.  They were so gracious and gave me a guided tour.  I was there for nearly two hours!  If anyone gets the chance to visit I would strongly reccommend it.  The sun has come out now and I’m readly to go back out to my poor garden full of ideas and enthusiasm and of course my new plants.  Thanks so much to Hosta, Mary and Paddy.

nothing like stewed rhubarb and ice cream or custard. my old plants are sprouting lovely.  i grew rhubarb-timberly early- from seed last year, will  have produce of them this year. have 12 new plants going to good homes. rhubarb freezes really well when cut up and froze raw.

Planted my onions this evening, then came in and heard the weather forcast for later in the week, went back out and put fleece over them. hope the snow does not come back. not sure how they will be affected.

Have managed to get all the old raised beds dug over, everything done now and waiting to start planting. Must start the peas, brocolli and sweet corn inside and then transplant them out when the weather improves,.

Well – I didn’t enter anything for ages but have been busy – planned to put new patio in place of very small plot  of grass in the back garden – but it you take up sods where do you put them? Decided (in summer 2010) to re-do the weedmatting and gravel on the bed in the front garden and give it a good tidy up – which ended up in taking out the agapanthus (which was taking over) – and then using the sods from the back garden to bring up the level in the front garden which had setled quite a bit, and then putting down new weedmatting and putting back the gravel.

The next question therefore is what to do with a huge ammount of agapanthus! Thankfully a friend was only too delighted and dispatched her husband with the horse box – which was ful of plants by the time we were finished loading!

The remaining issue is the back garden which still has no patio! having spent the late summer doing the above (have you EVER tried to dig out Agapanthus?) we didn’t get around to doing the patio so its a priority for spring. Unfortunately budgetry constraints have hit us all so we will have to be inventive – at the moment the area is covered with weedmatting so we do have time to shop around and then fit the slabs. After that of course there is a lot of spring cleaning to do in the garden and I have to find something to replace all the fuschia bushes which succumbed to the frosts 🙁

After all that, or more likely somewhere in the middle, the allotment is calling!!!!!!!!!

Happy gardening friends!

busy too. plenty of time to catch up.

ur wecome. good luck with the rosemary.

Having bought some seeds, I got some more seeds from my sister in Dublin and again some from Jacinta, after her good offer. Some antirrhinum seeds from last year’s flowers were planted early in January and as they failed, I sowed some more. They like the other types are now germinated. I am going to have some work laid out potting up what I have. I was listening to Gerry Daly on RTE Lyric FM on Saturday morning and he spoke about the idea of sowing your own seed for flowers and vegetables. At present I have parsnips and beet root as well as tree lupins sown and perhaps more of the garden tilled than last year. How fortunate we have been having so much dry weather. I can remember some years when we had so much rain and were waiting for the odd fine day. I know that there is a change coming but we need the drop of rain and mild nights.  

`being a lover of PUSSY CATS I have had to forgive Kitty next door for decimating my precious window box of pansies. anyway , hardy little things that they are, they are recovering rapidly and I even have some blooms, not long now until I get my begonias out again, I had a great display last year and hope for similar again, all with the help of my good friend Jean, watch this space!!

I have not had much to do and say about the Garden since last September, however this year has started in earnest.

In November 2010 I had the digger man come back and dig two new large veg plots, another huge flower bed and a conifer bed, plus scrape some grass off around the geenhouse & shed ready for informal paths.

The hard frosts we experienced over the winter has broken down the new beds really well.

My wonderful husband has dug over the majority of the two veg plots as the weather has been good and unfortunately I had a bad cold and was unable to do much digging (shame!).

I am really looking forward to growing more veg this year as last year’s was so successful and tasted so good. In fact I still have a few potatoes, parsnips and leeks so see us through the next couple of weeks.

The new confier bed has been dug over again and all the conifers added. I have put landscape fabric down around them all and used some of the mountain of stones dug out of the garden to edge the bed and place in the bed. I am going to get some decorative gravel to infill the remainder of the bed to finish it off. It should look really good when finished and be very low maintainance.

The snowdrops and crocus were lovely this year and are just going over, however the daffodils are  now starting to flower.

As I walk round the garden each morning I see more plants coming back to life after their very cold winter break. The rubarb which I planted last year is doing exceptionally well and I can hardly wait to try it.

 Just back home after a great weekend! Always lovely to catch up with the family, but this time was even more enjoyable with being able to attend the Get- together on Saturday! Many thanks again to Rachel for getting it all organised so well. It was great to meet so many of you for the first time. A bit unreal really!! as I felt I had known you all before on the site! But great to be able to put faces to names!

I am in the process of unloading plants from the car. The boot was completely full and one had to go in the back seat! Many of them were very kindly given by folk on Saturday, some purchased in Johnstown GS and some in Mount Venus GS which Myrtle and I visited on Monday! Now the task of working out who gave me what begins!! Just for now I want to thank you all SO MUCH for your generousity. With all these new plants I just have to keep on gardening!

Today is cold and blowy, with showers of hail here. Everywhere very wet. Hope the plants that have enjoyed the comparative mild southern climate are able to adjust!

As this is my first time growing snowdrops I was wondering if I should  dead head them or just leave them.  Any advice please..                  Bernie

the second half of the week is starting to shape up nicely now with gardening programmes….Garraí Glas on Weds, Dermots Secret Garden on Thurs, and Gardeners World back on Fri, looking forward to seeing Monty’s garden.  We are almost being spoiled…..

It has been a while, seems like forever waiting to get into the garden after the winter. Have kept digging over the veggie patch keeping it in good fettle. Should have added fertiliser at the end of last year but got too busy at work and not enough time during daylight hours. Oh well we will see what happens. Have the tomato’s, cucumber and cauliflower seeds in propagation ( old milk cartons ) and sat them in the utility. Onions have been in ground since November last and still on the go, even after the severe winter. Sprouts have been in propagation since nearly two weeks and have broken ground already. Waiting to get spuds on the go but they are chitting stage for now. Intend to get sweet pea, carrots and my favourite, beetroot on the go as I now know what the family will eat. Will try to keep posting when I can.

Hello  I am looking for a plant called ‘Rose of Sharon’ Hypericum. It is a low creeping plant with large yellow flowers.  It is for a piece of difficult ground at the end of steep bank.  Thanks.

 

we live just outside carrick on shannon.  we built our home on my husband’s family farm. we have a huge site. very large front garden, 2 side gardens and a wide back garden.

 

living here 5 years now, but only getting around to the garden now, becuase i’ve been pregnant pretty much for the last 4 years!!!

am so excited here. i ordered 30 barerooted trees for my garden adn they are due to arrive anytime now.

 

i have an overall plan in my head, and i am going to do it bit by bit, unless i win the lotto!1

i am so passionate about gardening but never had a chance to do much the last few years as i was pregnant for nearly 4 years!!

 

will be thankful for any advice i get

garri glas on tg4. for veg growers.

thank you everybody for info. such a loss that it is gone.

the blue and white border came about as a result of my love of summer moonlight outside my bedroom window, and the way whites and blues appear after dusk. the larger plants were divisions of ornamental horseradish and per geranium johnstons blue. have grown modules of lobellia, nigella, cornflower etc  and cal poppies, planted them and let them self seed. chives are great too for the blue pompom effect.

As I felt pretty good last night I set off to hear a talk being given by the queen of vegetable growing Joy Larkcom.  However, as she is cutting back on such talks, it was given by Kitty Scully, who is the farm manager at the nearby organic farm at the Nano Nagle Centre near Mallow.  Some of you may know her from her appearances on Richards Corrigan’s cookery programme.

She told us that she is involved in a new gardening  programme to be based at Fota House in Cork along with Peter Dowdall who is TV3s gardening advisor. It will show how each of them will go about creating a garden from scratch with Kitty’s being made organically.

David O’Regan who is head gardener at Fota and was head gardener for the great Christopher Lloyd is also involved she told us.

It is due to air March 28th on RTE

I also read in the last few days that the new Alan Titchmarsh series for ITV may be broadcast at the same time as Gardener’s World.

weather here is wet wet wet

i’m like a child on christmas morning here!!

my trees have arrived by courier!

desperate wet here today though. am itching to get out…but its not looking like it will happen

 

rain rain go away……

Is anyone going to the Mount Venus hellebore weekend either tomorrow or Sunday?

I am trying to make my mind up whether I will go.

I know if I go I will probably spend a fortune. Did anyone who was there recently see the hellebore prices?