Month: March 2013

Bought these seeds in Lanzarote 12 months ago. Nothing happened by way of germination then, but I held on to the packet of seed. ‘Lo and behold, yesterday one seedling has just come up after a repeat sowing.

Now, how do I look after it from here on in?

I was going to post this last evening but lost the internet for some reason.

I posted a journal about this programme some weeks back. I had the TV to myself last evening and watched the recorded last 4 episodes.

The A-Z of TV Gardening BBC2 9.15 Sunday mornings.

It is snippets of all different gardening programmes and they are working their way down the alphabet.

2 hours of un-interrupeted garden TV ;-))

Check it out.

March is my favourite month of the year. I celebrate my birthday, mothers day, st patricks day and sometimes even Easter! And today was the best that March can offer – bright sunshine and gentle breeze – so I spent as much time as possible in the garden.

It was planting time for the goodies I’ve bought recently – so the rose bushes got planted in the new rose garden, the bulbs were too good to pass up – Dealz best – two for the price of one! I’ve planted them in modules and small pots this year. Last year I got some bulbes from Dealz and planted them all in the ground and spent months trying to figure out which was which 🙂

I’ve reached the lower end of the garden in my progress of cleaning and tidying the various areas in the garden. I’m getting impatient now, as when I’m going down to the latest bed to clear I’m passing by the ones not done yet and their weeds are screaming at me!!!

The bed I was working on today is the one where I planted all the lovely gifts from visiting .ier gardens. Most of them are doing well, and one in particular is doing more than fine – it definitely is aiming for World Domination! And gues who gave it to me? Yes, Bruno, the king of the invasives!!!! It is a really pretty Euphorbia – Euphorbia Sequieriana Niciciana  – which is described as clump forming – but it managed to make a pretty little clump and has sent out runners for about a metre all around it!

I need to move it to somewhere it can spread to its hearts content!

As usual, time ran out before I got finished – really must look into putting in those lights they use for playing football at night 😀

For the last 7yrs I have taken my holidays in the winter months, as I would be so concerned about dead plants in work in summer. We have booked this years holidays at this stage, and for a change will be the end of August. Oh, bring it on!!!

However, a problem arises. What am I going to do with my plants while I’m away, especially in the greenhouse. It’s just Steve and myself here now, so there is nobody to water my plants. Steve rigged up an irrigation system last year, which can run independently of the regular hose, if needed. Talking to him tonight, it is possible to run it for the two weeks that we’re away, but it would need to be on a timer, which doesn’t seem likely.

Yesterday we got these growbag waterers in. They state that the reservoir holds enough water for 14 days. But that would only cater for 2 tomato plants. And it costs €39.99 – 15% staff discount. Has anybody got any better ideas? I will have at least 6 plants, if not more. Plus cucumbers, chilipeppers, and God knows what else at that stage.

Finally today, I was able to spend a good length of time in the garden, over two hours this afternoon. It is the first time this year that I manage that, and how good it feels! (well not so good for my back, but for my mind…)

It wasn’t planned at all, and in fact with the usual Saturday activities, I didn’t expect to have any time in the garden, so when plans changed a little, I jumped in my old trousers and top, garden gloves, got the tools, etc, and….WHERE DO I START???

There is so much to do, I  could spent the whole week outside easily and would not be finished. I have lots of plants in pots that I want to put in the ground, but realistically, I needed to tidy up the flower beds first. I started by the cold frame, which is looking a bit sorry. I cleaned it up and also cleaned the old pots that were in there, and gave a general tidy up to the area around it. Then I tackled the largest bed, the one right in front of the kitchen window: pruned the Ceratostigma, which never looks great at this time of the year, removed lots and lots of weeds, and moved the soil around the plants. I only managed half of the bed and if I can, will continue tomorrow. This looks neater now and especially, I can now see where the new plants waiting in pots can go.

There is so much growth everywhere at the moment, I had to be very careful not to damage anything just peeking out the the ground.

Two disappointments: I lost my lovely blue lupin, and also a really nice sedum bought at June Blake’s garden in September. I’m never very lucky with lupin, but sedums usually grow really well, so I’m not sure what happened to that one. It’s a shame as it was really lovely. I have 3 or 4 other sedums growing in other places in the garden, and I could see no little heads peeking out on this one, and when I pulled the remaining dead stem from last year (which I left in order not to forget the plant was there) I could see there was nothing underneath at all.

On the other hand, the echiums are looking good. I removed the fleece as the leaves looks like they were getting damaged underneath, but I will need to keep an eye on the weather and possible frosty nights.

Thinking that last week I was taking pictures of the garden in the snow, and the girls were making a snow man, it is hard so believe how lovely and mild it was today.

My only distraction during all this was an army helicopter which flew VERY low around the estate a couple of times, and then went to land right across the road in the field beside the swimming pool!! Not the usual Saturday afternoon attraction around here, I still don’t know what it was about…

My good Pal sent some more ferns to me at the Johnstown get together.

The first photo shows the class of 2012, you can see how tiny they are at this stage.

All going well they will equal the success of their predecessors, the second photo show some of the class of 2010/2011.

Where will they be planted is the next question?

Once again Martin, I thank you ;-))

Most of mine are blue, and i have had the odd pink one, but this is the first time I’ve spotted a white one.

And before the plank split, I discovered a pond plant that I haven’t seen since the building of the Upper Pond 4/5 years ago. I wonder why it has decided to grace us with its presence now. I must have the label here somewhere, but regardless of its name – I LIKE IT!  Every cloud has a silver lining – and I didn’t have to get wet to discover it!!! 🙂

I got  load of chippings yesterday so began putting them down today. I had one sheet of black polythene in the shed so used that to begin with. It will be much more tidy when its finished. The final two raised beds were put in earlier in the week. Some more pics added to album “Preparing the Veg Garden for 2013.

You may recall I was going to bid on a garden seat and a statue. Well the garden seats went for €650  each !! The statue went for €250 . Needless to say neither are coming to live here! I was not at the auction but someone else was bidding for me.

I can’t make my mind up as to whether I like this plant I grew from seed or not.

It came highly recommended, from two sources, and is quite an easy plant.

It likes shade, flowers early and is low maintenance.

I saw the March Irish Garden featured it but it just strikes me as very boring!

I’ve give it another season before making up my mind, I reckon.

myself and becky went looking for old logs yesturday evening well she is quicker at getting in small spaces than me, we found loads of lovely logs and some with moss i was thrilled, my daughter told me its easy to keep me happy when i got excited over a piece of moss.

once i had dug over the area i set out the stumps, it is not finished yet there are some primulas to go in and at least 2 more ferns. this area is semi shaded with just some morning sun hitting it so it is perfect i also have some bulbs for it.

all the beds are cleared and edged now i can get on with what i love seedsowing. i spent hours taking out weedblock and stone from the last area to be done, and boy was i glad when the last bit of stone and mypex was gone. 

today was just a matter of digging over along by the front wall and moving a few bits back from the edge of yesturdays border then i fed everything with blood fish and bone and watered it in, now it is all done and dusted.

OMG He’ll kill me for posting this. But I’m still laughing. 

He got jealous watching me doing stuff out in the garden today. So he came out to to join me, and proceeded to cut back some of the pond grasses. We have a couple of planks that Steve uses to stretch across the Upper Pond to gain access. But right in the middle of his job, the plank split in two. He wasn’t a happy camper when he got dunked in the freezing cold water. 

I haven’t been posting many albums recently as, I am still downloading photos the ‘old’ way. Blind as a bat and have to double click onto each individual photo. So I’m stuck with waiting FOREVER for downloading. That’s why most of my photos are now getting downloaded onto Facebook. It’s much quicker.

I really wasn’t expecting such a harsh frost this morning, even though it had been forecast. It’s a case of ‘just when you think it’s safe…..’.

This beauty giving a solitary display in my garden last may

Some of the seeds i sowed on Wed are up already, including my “mixture” ,(by mistake)of Coreopsis and Laurentia at one end of one tray, Brachycome at the other end and Sanvitalia in another tray. This is the bit I always find exciting, the hard work and disappointments come later  on!

You may remember last year I commented on damage I did to the trunk of the Sumak, how I bandaged it up, but it kept ozzing a stickey resin for a couple of months.

I was really worried when the Autumn colour did not develope and the leaves quickly shrivelled, turned brown and fell off.

I was delighted yesterday to see definite signs of buds swelling. All is well with my favorite tree.

From the photo you can see why it gets it’s common name of ‘Stags Horn’, with the covering of downey like hairs.

Looking like it will be a good day so enjoy ;-))

Thanks to the Sun making an appearance today, I finally got a chance to get some decent photos of this clump of wonderful little flowers.

Well, the cloud-pruning area still isn’t planted. I am so remiss!!!

But the lawn mower is fixed. In the end it costed €17 but involved help from a resourceful brother-in-law from Meath who was paid with a meal of spaghetti meatballs and advice on sowing vegetable seeds.

And, finally, I sowed a few more seeds – to take the place of the ones that have germinated and migrated off the heat mats. Hubby even convinced me to sow some tomato seeds for him!

Have great plans for my own garden tomorrow. And I was finally going to pot up a nymphaea (water lily) that a member gave me in Johnstown. Bought the basket and when I got home I realized I had no blinkin’ topsoil. Ah well. I won’t be going back over to work tomorrow so that will have to wait – unless they sell topsoil in Lidl. New store opened here since yesterday so looking forward to having a nice gander at my leisure.

Dad’s garden again on Sunday. And thankfully most of the heavy work is now done.

Bought another lot of seed potatoes yesterday ‘Sharpes Express’ (First Earlies) so they are also chitting out in the garage with the first lot.

Talking about this solar ornament yesterday got me checking today if it still actually works. Normally I draw the curtains when darkness approaches so I wasn’t sure if was at the end of its expiry date.  Happy to say, nearly three years on, it is still in fine working order. 

Just posting an album of some of my garden ornaments.

It was last Wednesday and I was weeding the long border and a heavy thankless job it was and I wasn’t sure what I was digging up and disentangling from scutch grass and slashing through lily bulbs and wishing I could have been working on rocks like Wednesday-more of that in another journal- when my left eyebrow began to be a mite itchy. I rubbed it a bit and forgot about it.

Later when washing myself I saw that a red  bruise was covering  the right side of my eye and spreading outwards! I had had a collision with a midge and she/he bit me under my
eyebrow and my face and eye swelled and swelled and I looked like Charles
Lawton as Quasimodo, (except you are all too young to remember that film ). Later that night it ballooned nicely into something  one would see on the roofs of an old cathedral-a gargoyle? And the eye sank way in and became a very frightening looking slit!

Next morning I was told to go to the doc and he had had two patients that week with similar stories and presumably faces to match.I wore my sunshades in and looked ,though I say it meself a little like Jack Nicholson.

Today with the help of Aunty Biotics and Aunty Hystamine I am gradually recovering my
former beauty! And can garden tomorrow-having made a haul in Glanbia again this morning
and been given some lovely path-edging rocks by a farmer friend.

But I thought Id put up some pictures as a warning to others NOT to bang into midges. One’s grandchild may think its cool to have a ‘Mownster’ as Grandad but its one heck of an itch and NOT TO BE RECOMMENDED! Youse have been warned!

how did this Dandelion get so big without me noticing it?? And when i went to dig it out there were loads of other weeds there too. Anyway the upside is that i had enough space to plant out an Eryngium that someone kindly gave me at johnstown and that was looking a bit tired of sitting in its pot!