My garden makes me so happy

[HumphreyCobbler]

I wanted a garden all my adult life, and for the last three years I have had one.

To begin with I was worried it wouldn't be as much fun as I thought it would be, but I soon discovered it was even better.

It was an overgrown, tangled mess when we moved in and slowly we have transformed it. I am still a beginner, but I already know so much more than I did.

Today I came home to find a massive pile of well rotted horseshit waiting for me. It was brilliant.

I don't really know what the point of this post is, I just wanted to share

Looks like it might rain here in the next few hours.. the temperature's dropped substantially.

Had a bit of a find today after the disastrous acers from Parkers; I found 2 really nice ones in Focus of all places, a 40cm one for £9.99 and a 30cm for £6.99! Really nice bushy ones as well, and very pleased for them. Have emailed Parkers asking for a return and refund for the twigs that they sent me. :)

Oh dear, Jareth. I feel very guilty for introducing you to Parkers but, as I said, my experiences with them have always been good.

Once again I am agog at Humphrey's rural idyll with the pigs. I am visualising Felicity Kendal in The Good Life!

My parker plants are doing brilliantly (sorry Jareth).

My first ever crush was on Jareth I WANTED that man.

I wish I looked as good in dungarees as Felicity - my gardening trousers keep sliding down

Come and visit Maud, you could be my gardening guru in person and design me a black and white border.

Don't worry Maud! I'm happy with them otherwise, and have loads of free gladioli bulbs (which I'm not entirely sure what to do with!)
Has anybody got any experience with their customer service? Hopefully they'll agree to refund.

Just planted my two acers and sambucus black lace along the back wall.. looks bloody good

Ooer humphrey, hadn't seen your comment before I posted

just had a hilarious scene with new pigs

put it this way - they in no way respected the electric fence

Have never seen DH run so fast, they just barrelled into the fence, squealed and kept going

They are shut in the house while he adds another wire to the top. VERY cute though.

I want some gardening braces for that very problem, Humphrey. Please don't get the wrong idea, though. I am a fanatical gardener but an untrained one and somewhat hit and miss in my results. I am desperately unqualified to design you a black and white border or to take on the role of guru!

::Wonders: do pigs bite?::

Jareth - When I contacted Ps to say that some plants last year were not as labelled they gave me an instant refund, but I've just remembered that I've had no reply at all to a recent email pointing out that a packet of 6 whatevers only contained only 5. So 8 and a half out of 10 for customer service, I think. (I'm afraid I had to google who Jareth was. The Thin White Duke is more my era).

you know a lot more than I do

like the names of actual plants

Ah but, Humphrey, on the scale on which you're gardening, your experience will soon outstrip mine!

And you have pigs Humphrey! I'm not allowed any livestock - was really trying for chickens but knew I had lost when DH stated that he'd rather have a third DC than chickens...

We're making another attempt to convince the owners of our 'adopted' garden to let us buy it. This time going through an estate agent in the hope he'll convince them (they know him quite well). Going to pop marked up plans in to him today. Can you all keep your fingers crossed please as think we'll need all the help we can get. There may be tears if they say no again.

Hello all, I sort of posted and ran near the beginning of the month. Went on holiday for a few days.

Six days in all I was away, and all my seedlings were quite happy. Then I came back and my radish seedlings died within a couple of days! It was too hot - they were in the 'potting shed' (worktop under window of normal 8x6 shed) but also under a propagator cover. Shallots in the ground very strong, and my broccoli has sprouted (not purple though, just sprouty).

Have been amazed at how fast my potatoes have grown. I hardly have any earth left to build them up more. They're going to be super-early. Have chitted another couple of Desiree spares from the bag, will put them in the ground next, and my friend's bringing me spare Pink Firs that she has.

Slightly impulsively, bought Jerusalem Artichoke tubers at the weekend. No idea where to put them now I've actually read the label and see that they grow up to 2m tall!!

New lawn is almost ready for sowing. Have bought seeds for primula, cowslip and cornflower to plant randomly across the lawn area (about 40m^2) and commissioned husband to buy lawn seed. A real meadow lawn is beyond us, really.

Did some sorting out of a filing cabinet indoors yesterday and found a 'garden dreams' folder from about three years ago. It even has some wildflower seeds in it from Nicky's Nursery - win! If my current efforts to eradicate (ha!) the horsetail in the border by the path to my front door are not successful, I may just wildflower carpet it. Give the bees and butterflies a treat.

Two massive orders from Suttons are arriving the month of May. One all perennial flower plants, the other veg plug plants. Desperately need to build at least one raised bed.

Now to go back and read what everyone else is up to, and try to avoid SQQUEEEEEEing too much at the idea of Humph's piggies.

Oooh you are all enjoying watching seedlings come up too. v exciting. I wasn't seeing anything from my sweet pea seeds but they are starting now. Am no good at seeds so I have to properly read up on when to prick out / pot on / lift / separate...

Regarding pruning of lavender, none of mine are old enough yet but I do have a curry plant which is looking woddy underneath. Wonder about cutting it back too.

I forgot to mention my pest issues. I need to say this very quietly but... I don't appear to have any slugs yet. I have seen a couple of small ones (less than an inch) quite deep in the soil when I have dug holes, so perhaps they are only just hatching. Well they will have a surprise soon, I've ordered Nemaslug and they'll get nicely whacked with that, probably this weekend.

No white/blackfly on anything yet either, and some fairly loose netting has kept any caterpillar eggs from being laid on my cabbagey things. Or perhaps the Small Whites just haven't arrived yet.

Starting to see ants though. Any ideas on those? Are they harmful?

I don't worry about ants Lexilicious, but I could be wrong about that. Glad to see you back. We had a lot of Jerusalem artichokes that we sadly had to get rid of when we dealt with the bindweed/ground elder jungle that was our garden. Delicious though.

I can collect the slugs and feed them to the pigs again. Hooray (but not for the slugs I guess).

Our wildflower meadow is just a temporary solution to the problem of our paddock. We are still mulling over what to do with it eventually. Hopefully it will look nice this year.

All my verbascum are beautifully in flower, they look very pretty. I am pleased as they are the first flowers I have ever grown from seed.

Hi Lexilicious. I have Jerusalem artichokes which I cultivated from a patch growing wild in the orchard. Just chuck them in a hole and leave them to it - so easy, and very yummy. I keep a few plants back at the end of the season (I grow 30 - 40 plants) then replant these tubers to keep them going. They do grow tall so be careful about shade if you have sun loving plants around. Also, you never get all the tubers up so they can spread on their own if you're not careful.

I have my slug nematodes in the fridge ready to go but it's too hot and the ground is too dry to put them on. Weather forecast has some rain coming on Friday (first time this month!) so I'm hoping I'll get them in at the weekend.

I had a tray of various seeds outside in the sun today (cosmos, calendular, white and red Livingstone daisies , echinacea... )

He put the frigging lid on all the seedlings and now they're all crispy :(

Silly DS. Not his fault.. but grrr.

Oh dear.. I've just found the Hairy Pot Plant company online

Sorry about your seeds, it is disappointing when stuff like that happens.

You've just reminded me that after all my endeavours to find seeds for white cosmos, I haven't actually sown them. Oops.

Hi again!

five little Lofos 'Burgundy Falls' plants arrived in the post today (going in two half-moon baskets on the outside of the shed) so I've potted them up and given them a nudge to get growing. Nemaslug also arrived, is in the fridge - like Pkam will wait till the ground is wet. Also I decided that a good place for the JA tubers was the front garden so I dug a round hole in the grass this afternoon and chucked them in, as you say. Only started with 5, like.

Read the Aquilegia seed packet properly. It says it could take weeks for them to germinate. Bah. And DH and I sowed the lawn together this afternoon (bunked off work ) and I put cornflowers, cowslip, primrose and camomile in amongst the grass. Ridiculous high-maintenance germinating instructions on the two cowslip and primroses - given they're supposed to be wildflowers, what's all this crap about putting them in the fridge then the greenhouse? I've just scattered them in little clumps.

Oh Jareth, that's gutting :(

I've planted out my sweet peas now and tied them in - can't believe how enormous the seedlings are, grown from nothing to 4 -6 inches in a month! My VB are still teeny tiny and I'm wondering if I can be fagged to grow them all on - the rate I'm going, I'll get plants in about three years :o

Verbascum and astrantia are just coming into flower :)

I will put some pics up on my profile of the hugely magnificent montana/honeysuckle combo plus allium/bluebell/humulus which really is eye-popping colourwise. I take no credit for either - they were here when we moved in. I just think they are so, so beautiful I thought other people might like to see

looking forward to seeing your photos. I love the montana flowers, we have a few small clumps dotted around but none have been in long enough to be spectacular yet.

I want bluebells and cow parsley to grow somewhere in my garden, I am just not sure where.

The paul scarlet roses from the pound shop are still alive. Tomatoes are growing well too. All my peas are up, radishes coming though and my first salad crop is ready to go (in the greenhouse).

I will try again to put some of my photos up. If you all promise to bear in mind that it is a work in progress.

I have put them up. I am a totally crap photographer and the landscape ones don't work very well but I think you can see how utterly glorious the montana is (even if you can't really see the honeysuckle). In my old house, mine was about 1/3 of the size and it had been there nearly 10 years so I reckon this one must be at least 20 years old. Something to aspire to Humprey

OFGS why on earth can't I spell humphrey right?

you don't seem to have a profile atm ChristinedePizan

This is what happens when you namechange :o Hang on ...