Osteospermumsnet.com - flutter your foliage, pick your produce, shake your seed packets and bring your blooms to the Spring Show

[Lexilicious]

Welcome to the gardening quiche :)

Earlier malarkey was here

All welcome whether you are a Sackville-West or a Dimmock, an Oudolf or a Swift. Whether you dream of digging or dig for dreams.

Fair weather or foul, we've got disco lights in the potting shed and fairy lights on the terrace. Bring gin, wine just doesn't cut it round here.

Lexi - forgot to say - do you still want those tomatoes? They're pretty much ready to pot on now.

Yes please! Possibly coming to W this weekend, are you about?

We're around and about tomorrow but may not be able to get up to W. Will PM you possible plant hand-over points.

The winds are still strong here[near wales].Staked the alliums and Iris [in pots] in the morning.Left the Lupins and Foxgloves to fend for themselves.Most of the Wisteria flowers have fluttered onto the ground as have some of the clematis and solanum blossoms.But i still couldn't resist buying two dark red lupins and some nicotinia today from a local nursery.I hope the weather is better tomorrow as my 4 dc's have been going spare in this weather.This type of weather always seems to make the dog frisky and he managed to escape today for 30 mins[yesterday it was 3 hours!] and then he came home for tea!As fast as we fill in holes he manages to find/make new ones [aided and abetted by the fox next door].

wind still strong here in wales, we are right on the border. it has been terrible. Not too much damage apart from the flowers and the standard gooseberries.

It is going to look a wreck in the morning.

Lexi, how exciting!

Wind has been very strong in Dorset and all my tomatoes have got blown over. I'm hoping they'll magically recover.

We got our lovely dog this week and she's using my leeks as a toilet

I need to go out and hackat prune my lilacs today. Not sure how harsh to be...

I've just been out and done a bit of a 'chelsea chop' on some of the flowers that looked particularly vigorous, and gently pruned the caenothus -nudging it into cloud shapes. I haven't had much wind damage but I need more colour in the garden. I've realised most of the flowering plants at the moment are white/ivory. I'm not really sure waht goes. later on in the year, the darer red roses, clematis and deep purple/red dahlias will be out. I need to find plants which will go with the the ivory roses of June and the deep reds of late summer/autumn and help lead one into the other iyswim.
Enjoyed watching Monty in his kitchen garden.

sorry- darker red roses, purple clematis

hope you are safe, teta and humph - been thinking of you in the news about Wales rescues. And your gardens too. take care out there!

My garden's looking a bit battered today, I've been outside chopping stuff back.
The kiwi is rampant so DH is planning to build it its own pergola.

The weather is lovely today, complete contrast to the wind and rain of yesterday

We are on our way home. Haven't been able to buy any plants as we couldn't transport any :( although I did look at bidding on a couple of fruit trees in a silent auction at the country fair

Passed loads of garden centres too.some this morning weren't open though as we were too early

Looking forward to seeing what's grown , was warm when we left & there's been loads of rain , mum said its looking v green!

Yes I too hope all the Welsh and their gardens are OK. I suppose at least river silt is meant to be good for gardens.

Lovely day today. The garden is like a little bit of heaven. Couldnt help sitting in it for a while and just looking.

Monty is really good to watch because he makes planting and sowing and tying plants to sticks look so easy. Its impossible not to think that one can do the same. I turned out some patio pots and replanted them, and also sowed some seeds, reassured by him saying that it was fine if the plants went on a bit late into October.

I wonder what happened to all the flowers on the queens barge and to the plants they didn't use.

Tis me, Worzelswife, have nc. I visited Michelham priory in Sussex a few days ago, and there was masses of phacelia in the veg patch there (had to do lots of hunting online to identify it). It was really pretty and absolutely crawling with bees; never seen so many bees in one spot in my life, so I'm taking it for a name and plan to grow lots of the stuff in the garden next year. Do any of you grow it?

Michelham has the most beautiful veg patch, with a statue in the middle of it with apple trees growing on arches. Very inspiring. Their herbgarden and flowers were all lovely too - they had lots of wildflowers.

I have tried to persuade DH to grow phacelia as green manure, as it's do pretty!

I've just googled Phacelia - how pretty.

I caught a glimpse of a programme recently where an organic gardener had grown banks of forget-me-not around all the veg beds cos apparantly slugs won't crawl through it. I'm very tempted to try it in the borders around my veg garden next year as the bloody slugs have completely eaten 4 of my courgettes.
Luckily I had planted far too many several back up plants in the greenhouse but I am going to have to wage war on the slimy beasts

How interesting, never heard that. This veg garden had forget-me-not in between the phacelia, so maybe there's something in it!

We've just got back & had a wander in the garden. Few slug eaten plants and caterpillars seem to have been at the peas but otherwise it's looking good. One almost ripe strawberry being carefully monitored by dd2/3 who are in competition to who gets it,

Well, I posted earlier about the imminent arrival of the stump grinder men which meant I had to empty and entire bed of plants.

What a fool I was to think I'd have them all back in yesterday (Saturday). I've filled 30 30-litre bags with the sawdust, and there's STILL more to come out of the hole. I haven't even looked at the one much further down. Run out of bags now. Thank goodness the weather is cool, with a real English-style mizzle, so the abandoned plants are quite happy for the while. Today should do it, put in new layer of topsoil and conditioner, re-plant. And breathe.

Then I'm off to buy a plastic gold crown from the $2 shop as it's the Queen's birthday holiday on Monday, and we've been invited for a Queenie-related lunch by some Poms we know. :)

Maybe thats why I dont have slugs- I have (deliberately cos I and DC like them) loads of forgetmenots all round the garden in between the nettles and mint.
Only this year the nettles and mint have been replaced by 'proper' plants!

You all must be getting out of bed now. While I've been working.
I've done the side bed and it's fabulously jungly again, but I am knackered.

I got a plastic gold crown for $2.50, shite but bargainous.

Once I stop MNing, I'll get on with the mountain of marking I have to do. I know how to live.:o

We had some friends round yesterday to help with the demolition of our front room (very productive, but I did nothing in the garden!) and they asked how much time it took me to get the garden how it is. I realised I couldn't answer very well. I know that I probably need to spend about two half days a week keeping it ice in the summer, particularly because it's veggie-heavy, but the friend who asked said "I suppose maternity leave was the main time" which indicated how much timeit looked like the major works should have taken. But I have been back at work FT since we've been in this house, so actually I really don't know where I've found the time.

I saw this article though about the German approach to gardening which is interesting. When I get my next 'perpetual garden diary' and definitely next time I start a new garden from scratch, I think I will try to write down how much time things take as well as what I have done each day, what's flowering, fruiting, buzzing around pollinating etc. Especially if I do go into gardening as a job, which I'd like to, I would want to know what hours to charge!!!

Ice=nice. Do gardeners need to proof read?

Thanks for that interesting link. The garden is such a living dynamic weather dependent thing. The number of man hours will vary, for example, depending on whether it rains or not, and has to be spread over time to really create and nurture a garden. I don't really understand how creating a garden can be a one off cost in either time or money
Gardening for a living wont give you paid holidays or sick pay or a pension (even a much reduced one). Unless I suppose, like Beth Chatto, one combines it with a mail order plant business and open garden scheme. I think there is room for a specialist fruit and veg and herb garden business. Thats where a lot of people are becoming more interested and need advice and seeds and plants.
Anyway going back to the German article: it mentions creating gardens for the public.
Regents Park is one of my very favourite public gardens. Still free to visit thank goodness. I wish there were more.

Am really enjoying the Acanthus leaves today looking very WIlliam Morris.

In flower: cotoneaster, stachys lanata, hosta, alchimelia mollis, hellebores (still!), aquilegia nora barlow alba, pansies (still!), viola rothschild, rosa alberic barbiere, rosa new dawn, pink valerian, lilium regale, campanula, geraniums johnsons blue.

Buds on the rosa munstead. Robins cheerful as ever and drinking from the old bronze kneeling fairy who is holding a lily filled with rainwater.

Interesting article.

My garden is looking green! It's too wet to do anything out there today so I'm inside, baking and googling plants I want to buy!