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...

Maud's Plant of the Week

Sarcococca confusa (winter box). In flower now, smelling gorgeous. Buy one. Now.

Here ends the commercial break.

i wonder if that is what I smelled in the garden of Gloucester Cathedral today?

Yes! You must be telepathic. It was lovely.

I have Gifts, Humphrey. I am reading your thoughts right now. ::wink::

I was reading an article about sarcococca last night and apparently it will put up with miserable, dark conditions, so I will be moving mine into the rather dark space I have just made by getting rid of the pots of hostas.

I have two near the house, which means they are in cool shade about ten months of the year. One of them got a bit abused last Easter when the neighbours (or rather the housing association) put up a new fence, I think it got a concrete fence post smashed to pieces on top of it, but it is still alive, just a bit yellow and not really thriving. The other is doing very well and covered in flowers. It's at the base of my thornless blackberry, alongside a bleeding heart which I assume is going to come up again from nothing this year? And a couple of lavenders.

It is my birthday this week and my lovely little boy brought me home a very small pitcher plant (as I briefed DH I would like) so hopefully it will deal with the little flies that are besieging the indoor plants. It is in a tiny tiny pot though so I need to get the right soil to pot it on, or perhaps get some other carnivorous varieties and pot up together?

Oh and does anyone else get Gardeners World magazine via the iPad app? My February issue is broken - missing 30 pages out of 70 total. No obvious fixes via the help page.

Oooh, I know nothing about carnivorous plants (apart from Little Shop of Horrors). I don't really do houseplants apart from amaryllis, but I would go for several small plants in one bigger pot for a mini-jungle effect.

I am feeling so happy after spending much of the day in the garden. I have planted up four pots of tulips - Passionale, Brown Sugar, Orange Lion and Orange Brilliant - one bulb was looking a bit mouldy so I have dusted it with sulphur and will hope for the best. And today is the first day that the solar fairy lights have come on. Confirmation that the days are getting longer.

smile, smile, smile

I think I will put in some winter box - the scent was amazing. We all noticed it as soon as we walked outside. So rare at this time of year.

Did a bit in the garden yesterday in the sunshine. Put my assai kiwi into a huge pot in a final attempt to get it to do something. If it fails again this year then I'm giving up. Also pulled the remaining beetroot up and did a bit of weeding in the veg plot.

Finally decided what to spend last year's birthday money on and have ordered one of [http://www.liveoutside.co.uk/arbours/milton-arbour.html these] to go where I currently have my little corner bed. The only really successful thing that grew there was the lupin which I shall move into the long bed. I shall then put gravel down in a square for the arbour and grow something (suggestions appreciated) up the sides. I can only grow in pots though as soil bad. I'd like something that smells nice as well as looking pretty obviously, it's quite a sunny spot but the pots themselves will be shaded by the fence.

It is delicious. Once I've moved mine, it will be next to the daphne odora aureomarginata, so it will be a wonderfully fragrant spot in early spring.

Link failed - second attempt with correct numbers of brackets!

One of these.

Just seen Bertha's arbour. How lovely. I would go for the fairly conventional choices of clematis - jasmine - honeysuckle, planted in very big pots. And I was thinking today about cobaea scandens - it's years since I grew it.

I have a large daphne growing in the middle of my lawn. It's lovely in the Spring, the flowers catch the light from the house at night and look like they're glowing.

My daphne has a virus which makes the leaves a bit wiggly, but it is gorgeous all the same. I was inspired to buy it by the winter display at Cambridge Botanical Garden.

No rain since the downpour of the 11th, and none in sight. 30+ each day, so I've decided I can't wait any longer and have been shifting plants round to better positions, painted a fence (dark green) and one plant pot (turquoise). When the pot's dry I'm putting red pelargoniums in it.

DH has pointed out how blue-flowered the garden is in late summer: salvia, agapanthus, buddleia, tibuchina, verbena bonariensis, hibiscus alogyne so I have to work on the warmer colours with pots - pelargonium and impatiens, though the latter isn't too happy in very hot sun. Some poorly gardenias I grubbed up and put into big pots to pamper them have cheered up and put out some flowers. Going to give thunbergia a chance in a half-shaded spot, and plant out a white buddleia for the back corner. With water crystals and soil-wetting granules, they should be OK. The felicia have been given a severe haircut and re-pot so are happy again, though winter is when they really bloom.

The unkillable crucifix orchids have done well, some purple, some coral, and I think an orange one is about to flower. They're exceptionally good as each bloom lasts about 5-6 months.

It's always fascinating to hear about your garden, echt. Feliciano and the like are tender bedding plants here .

As I pottered around yesterday, I realised that the plug plants I potted up last year and have been growing on are going to be enough (and more) to fill in the gaps caused by winter plant deaths. And I have one of T&M's cheap deals on the way. Where will I fit them in?

Oh dear, do I need to spend money again ?! I was sniffing a Daphne as you do in the garden center yesterday. Didn't know about Winter Box and now Bertha had upped the ante with corner thingys and there's Echt out in Oz giving me a severe dose of travel lust.

It's probably a good thing that I can't move very far or fast today as am very stiff, first serious gardening session of the year. I stripped out a bed in the front that I'd previously just shoved stuff in and looked a bit rubbish really. It's ready for my half price David Austin Harlow Carr and Tranquility. The poor cat's ashes will go next to Tranquility at DD's request. I've got Cosmos, white poppies and Nigella to fill the rest of the space.

Have split loads of primroses and planted around DS's pond along with some Aquilgia seedlings and sedum. A friend gave me a big wooden trough last year so shoved some Shasta Daisy, primroses, and other stuff I can't remember the names of in it for later this year.

Attacked the honeysuckle and climbing rose by front door, the two climbing roses and clematis on trellis at side plus th black current and clematis on a fence. Pruned every rose I have quite hard. Got good quote from tree man so they will be sorted after 10 years.

Am loving seeing the sun.

Hooray for the sun here too.

I have been quite timid pruning roses. Perhaps I should be bolder? And a couple look as if I planted them too shallowly as the graft is visible. Will digging up and replanting do more harm than good?

Not sure about the digging up, am not brilliant with roses and usually neglect them. However I was inspired by some outside where I park sometimes who have fabulous looking rose bushes in the summer.

I was looking at them the other day and they had been pruned back pretty hard and with a really good eye to a good shape so thought I'd give that a go this year. Well rotted manure is supposed to be very good for roses so I'm gong o get hod of some and spread that on them. Maybe instead of digging up a d disturbing the root, a hard prune and manure might be the way to go ?

Yes, I have plans to deepen the soil around them by the judicious addition of manure.

I had graft exposure issues with Dr Du Jamain last year due to pesky squirrels digging. I put loads of compost round and the rose has survived the winter. Manure might be a bit too strong, do you think?
Though now, as the rose is still young, I am wondering whether to dig up and plant into a deeper hole.......here is Monty and he says if too shallow, suckers are more likely
www.gardenersworld.com/how-to/projects/basics/how-to-plant-roses/286.html

How can I resist Monty's advice? I'll dig it up and replant it, once the soil is less sodden. I would be using manure compost, not straight manure.

Did anyone see his programme about Giverny and other gardens on Friday? It was lovely.

Maud I've dug up roses & replanted them, they are fairly slow the first year you do it & is best to do it when they are dormant, November/December but they should be fine.

Oh, so if I want to move my 'open arms' to my front garden I should do it ASAP? That's on the list for next weekend then.

I have been sitting on the sofa with my seed box and planning today. I am going to start off lots and lots of seeds in trays and modules then forget to pot them on, then get annoyed, and buy young plants from Marshalls and have fabulous successions of veggies all summer.

Exciting exciting exciting!
Have been out in the sunny but frrrrreeeeezing and windy garden all wknd - joy! Some lovely sun, but it's still quite low so by about 3pm it's gone over the house...
Dug out a border that was choked with couch grass, oxeye daisies and geraniums. Tried to divide and replant said perennials, but even after blasting all the dirt off, they were a solid block of couchgrass roots. In the end we dug the whole lot up, chucked them on my compost pile/messy corner, and refilled with leaves, grit and compost... Now I just have to wait for my T+M order to arrive, but also bought some sedum and saxifrige as they were on offer in B+Q .

Does anyone have any recommendations for a pretty alium? It's for said border at the front of the house. i'm going for a sort of cottagey garden type thing, very relaxed.

Is daphne a climber or a shrub? Would it grow up a trellis?