Blooming into Flaming June

[Blackpuddingbertha]

Keeping the potting shed party going from the previous Rhubarb Society thread and all threads before it.

Please feel free to join in all gardeners, whether novice, professional or aspiring. Plenty of blackberry gin for all.

Humph your veg garden sounds beautiful.

Thanks Rhubarb, we have been trying really hard this year having not really got it right previously due to over planting or underplanting or stuff just not growing (that was last year). Things in rectangles are easier

Do post a photo, Humph!

Lovely weekend in the garden even though i was clearing more ground elder.
I have worked out it takes about 5 hours to do one square metre. Lifting the plants where possible, cleaning the roots, digging out the ground elder roots and sieving the soil back into the bed and still i know i wont have got every single bit. So far gone through 2 pairs of gloves, 2 garden towels one snapped and the other all bent and likely to snap soon and one roll of garden waste sack.
But i am winning the battle and just need to keep plucking out any new growth.

The good thing about clearing it is i how have fresh planting space and once it is all clear i am going to treat myself to a spend up in the garden centre.

That sounds like hard work Cantspel! But I think I'd find it strangely satisfying too.

Humphrey, I'd like to see a photo of the, 'concentric circles of rainbow chard, Russian kale, red cabbage and lettuce.' Sounds amazing.

Sorry, also meant to say that I'll seek out the Grazers stuff for the rabbits, thank you. I'd let the dog into the front garden more to help control them but she can cause more damage than the rabbits!

Thanks Maud, I will definitely use the logging to make a little edging. I don't have enough for all the way round but it's too pretty to waste. I forced DH to watch 'how to be a gardener' with me last night, so we should both now be experts on laying gravel now

I too am at the sound of your veg garden Humph. My raised beds are looking a bit crap. Never grow carrots in toilet rolls, despite what Mr Bloom says, they just die.

A fairly productive day here despite the chilly weather. I potted up my new rose (armswww.davidaustinroses.com/english/enlargedversion.asp?ProductId=3553&ProductName=Open%20Arms ), which I am hoping will grow up to the new trellis and make the very back of the garden look all inviting. I planted out my shirly poppies (is the frost really over? It's chilly in SE london tonight). I moved some lobelia which was looking a bit sad and split a primrose in 3 (probably killing it? I thought I'd experiment as I don't really like it). I also got 2 pumpkin or squash plants (we're not sure which) from my sister.

I've set up a mini greenhouse in anticipation of all the plugs I ordered from T&M, but there's no sign of them yet. THey seem a very strange outfit, do hey always leave it until the last moment to deliver?

T&M are unpredictable, I find, about how quickly (or not) they dispatch things. And their plugs are usually tiiiiiny - which, of course, explains why they are cheap.

That's interesting, Maud. I've been wondering about some of the seed too: Last year and this I sowed various T and M seed such as cornflower and poppies direct into the ground in a rectangular shape so I would know they were proper plants, and in the very same patches both years, rectangular patches of weeds have appeared. I dont want to damn the seed entirely because cerinthe was definitely cerinthe when I planted into seedling trays, and likewise sweetpeas. However at the garden show I've bought some seed from growers and organic farmers and I'm hoping the quality of plants will be better.

Round veg garden sounds brilliant. Especially concentric circles and also globe artichokes. When did you plant the artichokes and when do you think (important point coming up) you will eat them?

I have to say that I get results that are as good, if not better, from pound shop seeds (although of course they don't have the breadth of range that T&M do).

HELLLOOOOOO!!!! ahem.

After that bit of distraction, I am hoping you don't notice I'm only here to confess that I have barely kept up with watering my seedlings and a little bit of weeding. I've put up a couple of pictures and really enjoyed watching my poppies and alliums slowly burst, but otherwise I've been very passive. I have the ILs here on Sunday and am thinking about setting them to work on the front garden weeding that I just can't do without ending up totally seized up and aching. trouble is, where the weeds are worst also has iris, gladioli and acidanthera that are rather too easy to be snapped at the base by the slightest bit of clumsyness ... which goes for me too!!

I haven't bought anything this year from mail order. Just some herbaceous perennials from RHS HH, which I split just like Monty showed, and a couple of bargain shelf things from NT Knightshayes. I need to buy a bucket with a lid to make my comfrey juice, and perhaps after the weeding is done I could scatter night scented stocks and other cottagey stuff to compete. There are patches of grass I might try to beat with some yellow rattle - where could.I get seeds for that?

Hiya, FineTilth. Have you tried Wiggly Wigglers?. I am trying to psych myself up to go and finish my planting - I bought a few gems at Sunday's open gardens - but am finding it hard to get moving.

Hello. It IS hard to get moving. How long have you got to go Rake? It can't be that long now.

It is really still here today, very damp but nice and warm. Someone bought me some red roses from the supermarket and I have just cut a lot of catmint, lysimachia and some pale pink oriental poppies to put with them. They look lovely now.

Globe artichokes went in last year and had a terrible start. One seemed to die but is starting to recover, the others are massive. They have a few heads on them, I am really looking forward to eating those.

11 more weeks humph (which of course means anything between 8-13 weeks counts as "full term"...)

I want to do perma-veg ... globe artichokes are perennial aren't they? hmmm, and I might put an apple tree on baby's christening gift list (not that there will be a list, but you know what I mean...)

That's gone fast Rake , though I appreciate probably not for you ! DS came back from school yesterday after a Greek day with a grand announcement that he likes artichoke hearts so I'd like to get some planted at some point. My roses are opening now so I feel all is well in the world.

I just cracked. I went to the garden centre for play sand to top up the sand pit, and after nine months of plant-buying abstinence, which has practically killed me, I finally broke and bought... a Gunnera! I have wanted Gunnera for sooo many years but never had anywhere to put it. I'm going to plant it in the corner where the pond hole was, that I filled up with topsoil at the weekend. I know they should be next to a great big lake, but hey. I'm going to give it a whirl.

I am now worried that it's all over for my observation year though. Now I've cracked and bought one plant, this may well open the floodgates!

Yes, it's a magical moment when the roses start to open. I do regret the years when I didn't 'do' roses.

Hmm, Rhubarb. How strong is your willpower? Is this a one-off or a slide into compulsive plant-buying like mine?

There was lots of Gunnera by the side of the road in Cornwall with not a pond in sight, looked lovely. I hope your will power is better than mine, I'm rapidly entering a compulsive plant buying phase. Well I'm totally there if honest.

I've enough opening that I can forgive my Mme Carriere if she refuses to flower but I would REALLY like her to. Tranquility ( a David Austin one) is next by the look of it.

I just Googled Tranquility. That is truly lovely!

My willpower has been steelly for the past nine months. But now I've broken, I fear a full-on slide coming on. I need to get my drawing board out and do planting plans for both my friend's garden and my long north facing border where the Leylandii hedge used to be. Hopefully that may work as an alternative to actual plant buying for now. Aiming to do the planting in September so that really only gives me a couple of months before I need to get the orders in to the wholesalers. Yes. I need to pull my finger out actually.

Tranquillity looks really pretty.
I got it together to lurch into the car and visit a nearby very beautiful NGS garden. The cow parsley, hawthorn and campion on the way was great- that council wasn't into cutting verges, the cow parsley was a statement for summer.
Anyway one of the borders I saw had Nectaroscordum, poppy 'Pattys plum', Astrantia 'ruby wedding' and Ravenswing. Nice.
Of course I bought various plants there and on the way home stopped and bought 'Pattys plum' from a garden centre, since I've already got nectaroscordum and astrantia 'ruby wedding' growing together. This is in addition to the deutzia I bought last weekend. I arrived home to find the three cherry trees delivered from Gardens4u and realise why they were a bargain. They are bare root and practically leafless.
I am now exhausted.
I must not buy any more plants. I must plant the plants I have bought.
My Alfred Carriere is in full bloom nearly- practically time to make rose petal jam
charlottesplot.com/category/roses/
rakeabedoftynefilth wishing you well with the pregnancy andd thinking an apple tree is a great idea: what sort of apple tree were you thinking? I have a little cox. The garden I saw today had stepover apples (which is why I went)

Rhubarb do tell us your planting plans. I'm veering away from white borders, I used to think they looked peaceful but now I think they look a bit funereal. Likewise the deep maroon plants only really work for me if there is pink or plum or deep purple to balance and lift the colour. I'm really liking the deep cerise pink byzantine gladioli I saw and will order those bulbs in the autumn.

Does anyone have Hosta feeding advice?

I think I found an iris today. (photo on profile might be upside down)
amazing yellow and purple.
I have a few hostas but have no clue about feeding them.