Month: July 2011

Lupins are in full bloom now, have planted lots of marigolds and there’s a really nice smell when walking up the path to my house. Cats dig up my garden. Recently bought small green crystals in a bottle that are supposed to keep away cats and dogs, hasn’t worked yet tho:(

My 3 sunflowers grown from sees are now 6ft tall and 2 of the 3 have opened. Huge heads and displaying bright yellow. Very proud of them having grown them form seeds

Hi all! I’m just back from a trip south and, as always, the car looked like a garden on wheels!!

Saturday was given over to Garden visiting. We headed to Co. Wexford, in the sunny South East! First visit was to the delightful Bay garden, at Camolin, where we explored the many and varied rooms in Francis McDonald’s well matured garden. This is a garden well worth a visit as there are so many different styles of planting displayed in the different ‘rooms’. One is constantly being surprises by a totally new design as one moves from one area to the next. Many mature trees give this garden a sheltered climate that enables more tender shrubs and plants to survive.

Then it was on through Enniscorthy to Coolaught Gardens and nursery. After enjoying our picnic in the Car Park, we made our way into the Nursery where we were met with a large collerction of Shrubs and trees as well as herbaecious plants, climbers and annuals. But it was the trees and shrubs that caught my attention and before leaving I had purchased two smallish trees which the owner of the nursery’ trussed-up’ sufficiently to enable them to travel in my small car!!      Again the gardens here are just fantastic, with paths winding leisurely through beautifully planted areas, displaying a great selection of trees and plants. The owners of this Nursery and Gardens are generous with their time and knowledge and certainly I would want to visit them again and would recommend their nursery to anyone looking for good healthy plants.

On my way home today, I called on a gardening friend in Co. Cavan and,before taking me on a tour of her garden, she first went to the shed and brought a spade with her!! Needless to say there were a couple of extra plastic sacks going in the back of my car!    

A lot of work to be fitted in to tomorrow!!!!

how to make the text bigger on the screen? I touched something by mistake and now I am looking at very small text – (possibly 8) and don’t know how to get the usual size back. It remained after I closed and opened up again.

what is best weedkiller 2 spray on big long  path to kill weeds and stop new ones coming up

Hi well everything in the garden is looking good. Sadly to say my baskets are  no more, I think it may have been the frost which we had eartlier that killed off the flowers. I may plant some more flowers in the baskets but we’re off to Medjugorje on Friday morning and staying in Dublin tomorrow night so it will have to be when we get back. The runner beans are doing really well and have a lot of flowers on them now. must take some more photos and upload them. The weather is supposed to improve so happy gardening everyone.

About 20 years ago I got a present of a No.2 Felco secateurs. This has been with me through thick and thin. True there were narrow escapes when it was retrieved from the dump a couple of times. We were the best of friends and no trip into the garden was complete without it. It is nearly a week since it went missing, I have searched and searched , gone through mountains of rubbish and failed to find them. The loss has really affected my working in the garden, I know that sounds totally mad but it is just not the same. I have a cheap one that does the job but the grip is all wrong and not the hand extension the other one was. I need to get another Felco and start a new friendship just hope it gets me back to work before the dreaded brambles take over.

Puzzling about the singular and plural of secateurs. Referred to as a pair , sounds so wrong saying ‘it’ for what appears to be plural;  yet a single item.???? Going off to Google ‘secateur’ ………

for the last week i have done damn all in garden, tidied the patio and along the back of the house yesturday and fed everything today. that was it. i sat out in the garden yesturday and didnt feel one bit guilty, it was lovely just to see everything growing and sucking in the sun when it was out.

sunshine and heat now needed

i took some photos of the plants in the garden and hope to upload them in a while

Yesterday, Liga and her daughters came over for a visit.  My daughter had her nose out of joint because Liga’s youngest daughter is roughly the same age and this didn’t suit my one.  The weather wasn’t great but it was a lovely afternoon.  We didn’t get long enough to chat but I will probably make a return visit in a week or two.

Liga came armed with a load of home grown vegetables; much to the delight of himself.  I had cooked a joint of bacon earlier in the week and all I heard was how lovely a bit of cabbage would go with it.  Mind you, I can’t see why he can’t plant a few as his arms are in perfect working order!  Liga brought 2 heads of cabbage (among other veg) so himself got his bacon and  cabbage last night.  From himself and me to Liga – a big ‘thank you’.  

It was only after they had gone when I realised I hadn’t taken any photos.  Wouldn’t mind but I had the camera in a handy spot.  

Sorry to the rest of garden.ie members – I am under pressure this morning to get work done so I don’t have time to either read or comment on journals.  Apologies.    

Just bought geraniums today, add a great splash of colour to the garden.

Made fennel tea, tasted ok, kind of refreshing 

is on BBC 2 now!!! ANd again tomorrow night 🙂

Was in Athenry yesterday, & at the market, got 3 plants heuchera stoplight, heuchera rave on, and dicentra king of hearts. all terra nova introductions.

Just noticed I have honeysuckle in my garden, and what a glorius smell is gives off, also I ws surprised to find i had mint in the garden, i will make mint tea now, i’ll tell you all if it works out:-)

Well there I was strolling around the garden retrieving the tools I too frequently forget to gather every evening. The baler was at work in the field so I stood and watched this miracle for a while and though in awe of the machine had a nostalgic moment remembering hay stacks of yore. 

I  had now  collected a fork, axe and scissors as I reached the biggest compost pile in the world. About to pass by I thought ‘ it needs a bit of a shake up and my ie friends have sent vibes about my missing secateurs ‘. So as the fork was in my paw I started lifting and tossin , finding this turning of compost rather heavy work for my aging joints.

Then it happened.   Yes, a glimpse of red, then steel and lying surrounded by rotting vegetation was my SECATEURS!!!!!!!!!!  Dirty, stiff, rather like me, but alive and well, also like me. We had a great reunion and I apologised profusely for my lack of care and promised it would never happen again. Dumped the other tools in the shed and into house to give my friend a wash. Next it had a feed of oil, not that common 3in1 but pure extra virgin olive oil.  Once rested, both of us, there will be a sharpening session and so back to work.

Thank you so much for the vibes, I am being honest when I say that looking in the compost yet again was influenced by those good wishes.

My garden is 25 years old and was a green field site when I laid out the design. My mother and grandmother were both enthusiastic gardeners.

There is an orchard with apples, pears, plums, gooseberries and recently I have added blueberries, strawberries and rasberries.

There are rosebeds and 2 ‘woodland’ style areas. Also a wild flower area where I keep a beehive to assist with pollination!

I am currently redesigning the rockery.

I hope this is not a too sexist entry but I would like to know if the ladies feel like I do.  Watching taped Tatton park today and Carol Klein’s garb made me think.  Carol was dressed up for the occasion and while I didn’t think the white tights were a good look I knew she was dressed ‘for an occasion’.  I think Sarah Raven was a very intelligent and basically superb presenter but I was  always wincing when I saw her garden.  In those skirts wouldn’t her legs get scratched?  Kneeling, would that be comfortable?  Why did she not wear trousers/leggings?  What do you think girls would you garden in a skirt?

i did absolutely nothing in the garden this week, now i need to get back to it again. i just needed to recharge the batteries. i had a stroll around earlier and saw plenty that needs to be done in the veg garden, so tomorrow afternoon will be spent in the raised beds. does anyone know when i should start to earth up around leeks, i am thrilled to bit how they have turned out and will definately use theese again next my sweetcorns are also doing fantastic

while i was out for a stroll i noticed something is knocking the petals of my rudbeckias, maybe the dog but not totally sure about that.

the problem I have viewing peoples albums. OK so I click on the first photo and that may enlarge and be fine  but then as I progress the next picture just flashes up for a second and vanishes; usually the strip at the bottom with the forward and back sign is there as is the close icon at the top but in between no picture. It is so frustrating. Mostly this performance starts with the first picture flashing and vanishing. I tried starting in the middle of the album but no luck. Occasionally all works well just to confuse the situation!!

Managed to view lots of your pictures despite photos vanishing (see my last post).

Your garden is just stunning , the plants and planting are wonderful it was a pleasure to view them. I look forward to your updates.

It is so hard to work in the garden with all the flies we seem to be having, they just buzz around and try to land on our faces…is anyone else having this problem and more important does anyone know how we can keep them at bay. I have used a spray and also "jungle formula"it just seems to attract them  .. 

When I was hoovering today I walked on my laptop and destroyed the screen, I took it to PC world who told me it would cost 180 euro to fix it. I am having problems with it overheating so it would cost over 300 to have it all fixed and it is 3 years old …. I am wrighting this journal on my brand new Dell lap top … Happy camper tonight .. no photo to put up as I need to  transfer all my pics 

how the hell did i do that. put some of u on face book

I can’t find my camera anywhere, so many things to take pics of and my camera seems to have gone walkabout, i don’t like posting journal entries without a picture.Elizabeth7 I know how you feel when you lose your secateurs, this is so annoying!

Poor old Fran is stuck for words, where to start I do not have a clue, maybe I should just let the photos tell the story.

Set this morning heading to Mary and Paddy’s garden in Waterford. I knew we would be in for a treat, we were not disappointed. Paddy and Mary’s love for gardening simple oozes from both of them.

While Maria is not a gardener, she does love seeing gardens, she as I, was well impressed. Oh to be able to reach anything close to such a wonderful garden. A wonderful lunch was had an a great conversation. It really is amazing how relaxed a bunch  of people us gardeners are.

Then on to Scrubber, again sorry for been later than expected, Peter. I will be totally blunt now, there is no other way to say this, but this guy Peter, is one major dark horse. 

A totally different garden, but what a setting. You have the main garden surrounding the house, great selection of trees, shrubs and a great mix of all plants. Peter, must have some Superman traces in him, the size of the some of the rocks all moved by hand were enormous.

The garden then drops to the Scrub, wow what an area. At this point I think I will let the photos tell the story of both Gardens.

Thank you all for a truly great day, that will be remembered for long and many a day. Maria and Fran.

Bare with me please, lots of photos to be sorted.