Full of the Joys of Nearly-Spring

ferlonda  and dadgaderie  have just come up from the south of England and report spring is already in the air down there with snowdrops and crocuses blooming and cherry blossom starting.

Here we're much later, but catkins are on the willows, daffodils are now about six inches high and further down towards Huddersfield (much lower than out 1,000 feet ASL) I saw cocuses in bloom on the grass verge.

We may, of course get another flurry or two of snow, yet, but if we do it won't stay for long.

On Thursday I cleaned out the back porch - which is the closest I get to having a greenhouse - and put ten first early potatoes to chit on the landing window (north-ish facing). They are for growing in bags - in the porch for starters. The garden centre had some planting bags at six quid apiece - and then at the checkout their own hessian carrier bags - at £2.00 - looked about the same size so I bought one to try it, though I reckon Tesco's 'big green bags' at 39 pence each will do the job nicely if I punch some drain holes.

This morning, in a fit of enthusiasm I:
* moved the hanging-basket fuschia (overwintering inside) back into the porch from the living room, washing it in soapy water first because there were some suspicious white specks on the leaves. It's going out by the front door as soon as the frosts have safely passed.
* potted 6 fuschia cuttings (well rooted) and put another six fuschia cuttings into the water-pot to root
* potted 4 strawberries bought as plug-plants
* started 2 types of tomato from seed - one is '100s and 1000s', a micro-tom for hanging baskets, and the other an F1 hybrid - 'Shirley'
* planted about 15 purple sprouting broccoli seeds
* planted a small tray of cos lettuce seeds

The seeds, strawberries and fuschias are up on the bedroom windowsill (trays in plastic bags as quasi-propagators) and the porch is currently waiting for a new shelf to extend the existing windowsill into an 18 inch deep growing area for (mostly) tomatoes

BB is talking about using some of the old joists saved from the barn renovation (and too wormy to re-use for building) to make three raised beds on a section of the garden. My back is not good for grubbing around at floor-level, but hopefully I'll be able to manage the raised beds.

In another part of the garden we have to wage war against a horible broad-leaved ivy-type weed which has been encroaching for all of the 29 years we've loved here. We thought it was coming over from the farm-field next door but they thought it was coming over from our garden. It probably started in the farm but it's well-rooted in our garden now (probably beep beneath the dry-stone wall) and has crept along the ground from its corner - all the way behind a row of conifers and dense saplings (that we can't really get behind for undergrowth). Two years ago we had to pull it away from the trunk of a sixty year old ash tree and last summer I spotted it poking out of the top of a 25 foot Leylandii.

There's also a row of old English dog-roses which I take complete blame for as I bought them about eight years ago, intending them to make a dense hedge at the top of the garden. Unfortunately they are encroaching rather more than expected on a path. Ah well.

But in the same border we also seem to have sprouted a bramble which has bridged the path and tried to dig its way into a regularly mown lawn. The bastard!

War has been declared.

 

Full of the Joys of Nearly-Spring

ferlonda  and dadgaderie  have just come up from the south of England and report spring is already in the air down there with snowdrops and crocuses blooming and cherry blossom starting.

Here we're much later, but catkins are on the willows, daffodils are now about six inches high and further down towards Huddersfield (much lower than out 1,000 feet ASL) I saw cocuses in bloom on the grass verge.

We may, of course get another flurry or two of snow, yet, but if we do it won't stay for long.

On Thursday I cleaned out the back porch - which is the closest I get to having a greenhouse - and put ten first early potatoes to chit on the landing window (north-ish facing). They are for growing in bags - in the porch for starters. The garden centre had some planting bags at six quid apiece - and then at the checkout their own hessian carrier bags - at £2.00 - looked about the same size so I bought one to try it, though I reckon Tesco's 'big green bags' at 39 pence each will do the job nicely if I punch some drain holes.

This morning, in a fit of enthusiasm I:
* moved the hanging-basket fuschia (overwintering inside) back into the porch from the living room, washing it in soapy water first because there were some suspicious white specks on the leaves. It's going out by the front door as soon as the frosts have safely passed.
* potted 6 fuschia cuttings (well rooted) and put another six fuschia cuttings into the water-pot to root
* potted 4 strawberries bought as plug-plants
* started 2 types of tomato from seed - one is '100s and 1000s', a micro-tom for hanging baskets, and the other an F1 hybrid - 'Shirley'
* planted about 15 purple sprouting broccoli seeds
* planted a small tray of cos lettuce seeds

The seeds, strawberries and fuschias are up on the bedroom windowsill (trays in plastic bags as quasi-propagators) and the porch is currently waiting for a new shelf to extend the existing windowsill into an 18 inch deep growing area for (mostly) tomatoes

BB is talking about using some of the old joists saved from the barn renovation (and too wormy to re-use for building) to make three raised beds on a section of the garden. My back is not good for grubbing around at floor-level, but hopefully I'll be able to manage the raised beds.

In another part of the garden we have to wage war against a horible broad-leaved ivy-type weed which has been encroaching for all of the 29 years we've loved here. We thought it was coming over from the farm-field next door but they thought it was coming over from our garden. It probably started in the farm but it's well-rooted in our garden now (probably beep beneath the dry-stone wall) and has crept along the ground from its corner - all the way behind a row of conifers and dense saplings (that we can't really get behind for undergrowth). Two years ago we had to pull it away from the trunk of a sixty year old ash tree and last summer I spotted it poking out of the top of a 25 foot Leylandii.

There's also a row of old English dog-roses which I take complete blame for as I bought them about eight years ago, intending them to make a dense hedge at the top of the garden. Unfortunately they are encroaching rather more than expected on a path. Ah well.

But in the same border we also seem to have sprouted a bramble which has bridged the path and tried to dig its way into a regularly mown lawn. The bastard!

War has been declared.