Humph's Happy Horti-cult: harvesting, preserving, mulching, leaf-gathering, bulb-dibbing, seed catalogue-surfing and hunkering down for winter

[Lexilicious]

Following on from the original March to August thread. For all - whether still gardening through the winter or planning to sweep the shed, hibernate, sharpen the tools and get started again in the spring.

Happy gardening again!

O, can I join? Having mastered potato-digging whilst 33 weeks pregnant (feet wide apart, lean on fork, lurch towards tubers hoping no-one behind to witness builders bum or unattractive grunting noise) I have just returned from the allotment with a satisfying collection of harvested lovelies, sigh. Maternity leave coinciding very well indeed with garden calendar.
Mind you is it just me or do all the biting, stinging insects in the world find pregnancy hormones even more attractive? Wasp yesterday, nasty stingy black thing today - b**tards.
Sharpening tools eh? That could work.. sounds like a sedentary yet robustly satisfying job..
Hmm, maybe after a sleep :o
Ideas for large bag of under-ripe pears?

ooh, yes, do join in!

Hi Tiddley!

Like the new title Lex.

Following on from the newspaper references in previous thread, my mother cut me out an article from Sat Telegraph (30th July) on making your own slug nematodes. Looks interesting though does involve collecting slugs so not for the faint hearted!

Just popped out to pull up the rest of my now-finished peas in readiness for the curly kale plants that are coming up nicely in their tray. Don't like having bare patches so hoping they'll be big enough to plant out soon. Also going to have a go at mooli but needed a spot for them too so they're going where my cauliflowers have just finished.

Garden is looking fantastic and we had a weekend of socialising in it so have got my veg plot guided tour down to a well practiced self-indulgent patter now.

Would also love to join!

Have loads planned for garden over next few months. Partly because building work means the house will be out of bounds for a good while so I will have to spend days in the garden and shed (new shed - v excited).

So am planning to put in some new flower beds, 2 new raised veg beds, soft fruit, loads of daffs and tulips and probably some box hedging. Anyone know alternatives to box that do the same job and look neat (but maybe don't cost as much?)

I feel very pleased we made it to another thread. Excellent title Lex.

Hello Tiddleypompom. We have a fair few potatoes here too. I got bitten a lot whilst pregnant, but I certainly didn't manage any gardening at 33 weeks .

I have my ILs coming to visit, cue much tidying up etc. They have a rather inspirational garden.

DH put in a load of winter cabbage and purple sprouting yesterday.

EssieW - if you are prepared to wait you could raise your own box from cuttings. It is a long term investment though, I reckon on about ten years till we get the hedges we want.

Hello Essie. Nice to see someone else gets excited about sheds. In mine all my gardening implements are hung up on a little row of nails. In DH's shed we just sort of open the doors and throw things in. I have nightmares about his shed. He's not allowed in mine unless under instruction.

EssieW You can do hedging with lavender - no idea of its relative expense but you can do cuttings very easily and quite quickly, however it won't be as tight and neat as box (hmmm, totally ignored the brief there, haven't I...!). I have a 2.5m edge of decking which I softened with alternate lavender (Hidcote) and rosemary plants. 1 litre pot sized and this evening I just gave them all a haircut, but they smell lovely and are already (in six months) looking like a little ankle-height hedge.

I cut down all the nicotiana in the back garden this evening, and cut down the tall slightly mildewed stems of the red bergamot I got from Hampton court FS (it already has lots of new shoots about 3cm or so coming from the roots!) Also cut my VB almost in half and have it all as cut flowers indoors now.

Ate a great handful of dwarf french beans before dinner, and picked a lovely thick courgette and lots of perfect tomatoes from the hanging baskets.

Got some clary sage seedlings emerging and (I think) angelica but then again it could just be weeds in the spot I put the angelica seeds. And I found a frog i don't recognise hiding behind the water butt. Don't laugh, I do think I can recognise my frog population, and this one was definitely youngish and may even be one of this year's babies. I hope he's living under the decking.

It is the other way around in our house, DH is the tidy one. When I harvested the onions I left them all balanced around tables/benches in order to dry. It was workable but untidy. I came home later to find that he had strung a wire up and hung them in a beautiful row all along the veranda(h?). It must be pointed out that I am invariably accompanied by two small children whilst he tends to work alone.

Sorry, pressed post too early as I meant to comment on Pkam and her DH having a shed EACH

Very sweet that you recognise the frog population. You should give him a name Lex.

Well we are in this garden for the long haul so box cuttings are not out of the question. V tempted to see if I can take cuttings (with permission!) from neighbours hedging or bite the bullet and buy some plants for one area of the garden and then do cuttings for the rest.

Do like the the idea of a lavender hedge - could maybe do that in another area too.

We have loads of dwarf french beans! Mostly purple and yellow - only seem to have one plant with green beans. This was (mostly) by design but didn't know that about the yellow ones as they were cheap plants from a farm.

Arghh - my dwarf french beans came to nothing at all, pathetic little heaps of leaves with an odd withered bean poking out. Do they taste delicious?

We have about 120 box cuttings from last year and plan to try to do more next year and the year after etc. I want to make a knot garden on the front lawn, DH wants to hedge the round veg plot. We could do that in lavender and rosemary instead, I will suggest it to him. We have found someone with a hardy rosemary bush that survived last winter to take cuttings from.

They do taste lovely! I decided not to grow runners this year as I've never been a huge fan. Love french beans though and also growing borlotti beans too.

Do have some veg disasters this year - cabbage not great and courgettes also not doing brilliantly. Sweetcorn never really got going!

I second the lavender hedge recommendation - ours is 3 years old now and knee high. Stacks of bees every year. We put some 'readyhedge' box in the front this spring whack looks great and is def more formal and neat - but was expensive. Veg disasters this year are greenhouse cucumbers (went brown and shrivelled after first fruit) and fennel which bolted. Cabbages great - greyhound - but all under nets as last years went to the caterpillars. Wasp sting update - have been very brave (!) and vinegar helped though stinks! Bump making below-knee gardening difficult so good job weeds are waist high!

My dwarf french beans taste heavenly too Essie. My runners are nearly ready too - although I've been really enjoying the flowers as I went for ones this year that were red & white and they're really pretty. SIL says at her allotments someone has purple flowered runners - anyone seen those before?

Friend brought round a huge bunch of agapanthus cut from her garden today (she's moving the plants so had to cut them) and they look amazing in my hall.

My onions are now strung up drying in the garage. DD1 thinks they look like shrunken heads. I will string them when they achieve the proper state (or we get fed up with oniony hair every time we go to the freezer).

I need to learn how to string them properly, I had a go last year and it was rather a failure.

I havent done it yet but found a reasonable description on 'tinternet so will give it a go. I read somewhere that you should put as much effort into storing onions as growing them. Which sounds like hard work to me.

I went to Hampden Court Gardens today, for the second time this summer. The opium poppies had been replaced with beautiful dill, sage, cardoons and some other random purple flowers I didn't know. It was a good combination. These gardens really are my favourite, the planting is so beautiful and unexpected. I like the walled veg plot the best, the combination of veg and flowers particularly pleasing. I loved the leeks interplanted with violas. The waterfall and the maze help to entertain the dc too. I must make it down to see the wisteria tunnel in bloom, it is 150 years old.

Haven't seen Purple flowered runners - bet they would look lovely. There is a purple flowering and purple climbing French bean which I may give a go next year.

I love wisteria - have a small plant in pot that was grown from a cutting taken from the grounds of the house where we got married. Sneaky DH aunt took a couple of cuttings and gave one to us. Need to work out how to train into standard as can't put against house although maybe a pergola would be possible.

I have a feeling that the purple runners that my SIL has seen are actually the purple french beans. I need to get down her allotment for some spying. I love allotments...

Some people down our road have a standard wisteria out the front of their house. Looks amazing. The RHS magazine had an article on growing wisteria a couple of months ago - covered standards too. Not sure if it's available on-line anywhere.

My boss gave me an arum lily and a cordyline as a leaving present today dug up from his garden. Anyone have any experience of arum lilies? Think my long bed may be a bit dry for it so am going to try it in the corner bed I think though this is pretty shady. In two minds really - full sun but dry or partial shade and damper. Any ideas anyone?

pkam I have two arum lilies which stayed in the ground over winter. One is flowering now and the other has a number of leaves but they're only about 6 inches tall and nowhere near flowering. Full sun, dryish clay soil but the soil isn't very open to the sky so prob doesn't lose moisture that badly.

If I were you I'd put it in your shadier place. Having said that, do they need to get lots of energy stored away in the root/corm/tuber/thing to kick them off next year? If so, long bed it is, and watering.

Hello everyone.

The autumn raspberries are coming on and my sweet peas are finally in full swing. It is rather nice now that I was so late in putting them in as they really brighten up the garden. I picked a truly enormous bunch this afternoon, I am bestowing them upon all who come near me. The gladioli I grew for cutting are all coming out at once (why didn't I stagger the planting?) with a truly fabulous bright pink one that wasn't supposed to be there. An unexpected bonus are the butterfly gladioli that I got free with my thalictrum order, they look good in a huge tub.

The wildflower meadow is rather on the wane now, but still beautiful. There is another fine crop of flowers on the strawberry patch, will we actually get any more fruit? Maybe if we get a bit of fine weather.

I need to go and see if the Damsons are ready early. Today DH found a lot of ripe apples on a tree we bought in a car boot sale four years ago, and had in a tub till we moved here. DS was delighted, he is obsessed with apples. Especially red ones. This is a good thing, living where we do. Our tree man has got four local apple varieties for us. Monmouth is a historic apple growing county and our orchard has been there for at least 120 years so we want to grow appropriate apples here. We might get him to keep them for another year as they are only tiny and he can probably over winter them better than we can.

Also enjoying the fruit harvest-to-be, and happy with prospect of picking from up high rather than bending down... Damsons are early here. I made ketchup last year, which was really good though still have stacks. Planning to make puddings for the freezer in readiness for LO's arrival but may also make jam - all good nesting fun.
Sweet peas all over the house - I can't get enough of the smell.
Friends beginning to bestow gluts - I returned from a fruitless (ha) search for a decent maternity swimsuit (no such thing?) yesterday to find two carrier bags full of under-ripe pears. Hmm, what to do? Hoping they will ripen in the greenhouse and I will be inspired..
DH at the cricket today - planning to pop over to the allotment and stock up for the week. Potatoes, last of the carrots, pointed cabbage (if c.whites haven't got under the netting) and maybe some courgettes, though they were looking a bit sad last time I looked.
Wisteria - we have a plant trained on the front of our house, though was strangles under ivy when we bought it 4 years ago. Now grows well but doesn't flower - despite best attempts at twice-yearly pruning. Is it just not old enough or are we missing something?

just found stacks of cooked and raw damsons in the freezer. Should have eaten more throughout the year.

Did a load of lavender cuttings this morning, and made lemon verbena and rose geranium sorbet. Mmmmm.