The first rule of garden club is...!?!

[Lexilicious]

hoping Humph's Happy Osteospermumsnet chums will find this... la la la... I'm uite used to being betty no mates though...

Come on in and have a seat/kneeler/foam pad and a virtual , anyone who wants to idly chat about what they've been dreaming of planting, actually planting, buying without a care for having a place for it, propagating, harvesting, hacking and chopping...

Humphrey the orchard sounds amazing. DH's verdict was that someone must have planned it well because of the mixture of varieties and ripening times (he's learnt what he knows from hobnobbing with appley types like your expert). We have Tom Putt too and I really like the apples to cook with. When the tree bigger DH is hoping to use them for cider but its only 6ft high atm.

what a coincidence funny - I was at Hughenden just yesterday! Didn't have time to walk around the grounds, or indeed the walled garden, but it looks lovely. excellent restaurant too.

Family adventure day there this Saturday- your little fellow might enjoy it, if its not raining.

I knew I wanted to buy it the minute I walked through the orchard. I hadn't even seen inside the house at that point, I just didn't care what the house was like inside when there were all these lovely trees about It was a large apple/pear producing area historically, so it is quite possible the orchard has been here for a lot longer.

The wall is south facing, and to be honest we really need something to grow on it as it is where most of our windows look out on. The wisteria died, so we planted a new one, but I am not holding my breath! Still the bulb order for the pots should arrive soon so that may be some green to enliven the view.

That list of apples is enchanting funnyperson. The names are so evocative. Makes me want to rush out and plant the lot, just so I could say the names. And eat the apples.

The fun day at Hughenden sounds lovely - I've long wanted to go there - but too far for us, alas.

Chix - Are you also a member of the orchard-owning classes or is your dh's interest in apples his version of train-spotting?

We have one of those 3-in-1 grafted trees and I should have taken some of the apples to the RHS show, because I have forgotten what the third variety is.

DCs picked 2 bunches of sweet peas for me this morning! I thought they had gone over but its been so wet I've barely been down the garden to see that they have had another flush of flowers.
Also went to pick up some windfall apples to find that they were just empty skins, completely eaten out by slugs. Yuk.

I've had that same experience, Chix, when picking up windfalls. Many of them are just half an apple, as they have been eaten by slugs. Gross.

some of the windfalls here have rat teeth marks in them
VILE

Oh lawks. I hadn't really thought about rats. Perhaps it's wishful thinking when I say they've been eaten by slugs. ::horror::

I expect yours are slugs - sadly we know we have a rat problem because we have seen them

we are in the process of dealing with them atm.

I mean

Ugh. Poor you.

::Proffers the potting shed gin, to brace your spirits::

it could be worse, last year we had mice in the house and they climbed up my christmas tree and ATE MY DECORATIONS. Including my lovely aga dried orange and lemon slices.

Good grief!

::faints::

Could the teeth marks be squirrels?
The squirrels here dig up my newly planted bulbs. I see them do it. They are really stupid because bulbs aren't good to eat. They go for any newly dug hole in case its last years acorns (they wish: they ate last years acorns ages ago)

There is a green woodpecker in the garden at the moment. Here is a nice website which has birds likely to be found in an English garden. It is useful for ignorant folk like me: I thought all the little birds in my garden were blue tits but now discover they are chaffinches.

www.english-country-garden.com/birds.htm

That's how we found out we had mice Humphrey - I blamed the children for eating the chocolate decorations off their little tree in the playroom. I didn't believe their cries of, 'It wasn't me...' until I found one part eaten under the sofa. Complete with teeny tiny teeth marks. The mice are coming in again at the moment now it's getting colder; catching about 2 a week in the traps again.

I am determined to spend a few hours in the garden next weekend. The list of jobs to do is immense and it's starting to get to me. Waking in the middle of the night thinking about chopping back the asparagus. I did consider going out with a torch last night to do some night time gardening as I really wasn't sleeping!

Popped a present around to a house yesterday which has a standard wisteria out the front supported on it's own brick frame. It's so huge we were speculating about how old it must be. The trunk is about a foot in diameter. Anyone hazard a guess at how long a wisteria would take to get that big? The brick frame itself I'd say is at least a hundred years old.

I'm actually extremely thankful that our in-car discussion about this wisteria, and whether the strange weedy thing growing in front of our house is actually a wisteria, took place because the girls got out of the car and went to inspect said weedy thing rather than stand by the front door waiting to get in. At that moment a tile fell off the roof and landed in two pieces about 1m away from me right in front of the door. If not for the wisteria I dread to think what would have happened as I have no doubt that at least one of the children would have been hit. Made me shudder a bit. Been looking at roofing companies this evening...

its not it's

I'm tired

Bertha. Those near misses are grim.

I gave in today and decided that my pumpkins and squashes are not going to grow any more. So picked any that were bigger than a golf ball. Had quite a collection. It was like harvest festival in miniature . Had some of the mini squashes tonight for tea and they were very lovely.

I kniow a wisteria that is at least 58 years old but less than 107 years, and the trunk is between four and six inches thick (though there are several trunks of that size intertwined). It has been trained round the house and the furthest point was about 18 metres from the origin before part of it fell down and was cut back.

It put on an enormous growth spurt one year we had a water main leaking underground.

I know a wisteria that is trained around a bower with a little table and two chairs inside. The main trunk is very low on the ground so split into branches early, but it is about 8 inches across and the house in question is 1930's built.

Does anyone else have the most lovely michalemas daisies in their garden at the moment- we have pink and dark maroon sedums , daisies and japanese anemones, all looking stunning. The berries of the cotoneaster and pyracantha are beginning to go red and orange and the birds, still in their pairs, are sitting on the berried branches and daintily pecking, looking happy under the yellowing leaves of the oak.

::Clambers back onto the thread::

I despise Michaelmas daisies so don't have any. The Japanese anemones are gorgeous, though. My purple sedum is a big disappointment as the leaves haven't coloured up as they should. Clearly they haven't read the book.

What are all our gardening plans for the weekend?

I am actually going to get into the garden this weekend!! Have a massive list to get through.

Do I really need to lift gladioli corms ? I and of can't be arsed.

I "kind of", that should say.