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.

Thanks. Ah, I look forward to that. I bet they sleep through, too...

I bought three geranium Johnson's Blue today to plant by the rhododendrons in the drive. I was going to get some trays of bedding plants too, to fill some gaps, but they don't seem to sell any trays, or indeed any small plants at all. Everything is large and expensive. They were even selling large pots with four marigolds in for six quid. Profit margin on that must be huge!

This is the local garden centre, I should add. I need to find somewhere else.

If you are making a trip over to the lawn mower man you are not far from ferring garden centre. It is just a another mile down the A259 but you have to go down to the next roundabout then come back again as it is the other side of the road. They have some lovely plants and cheaper than the Haskins which is also on that stretch of A259.

Yep they sleep but they are always looking for money out of me. Glares at number 2 son who has conned £160 worth of computer bits out of me this week.

£160-worth?

::Views Offspring's approaching teenagerdom with trepidation::

The good things in my back garden tonight are rosas Buff Beauty and Versicolor in bud, and geranium Brookside ::Lidl special:: and the scent of the honeysuckle. Oh and some Sweet William in the front garden.

It's raining, which is nice as I emptied the front water butt onto the long bed a couple of nights ago and was going to have to get the hose out tonight as baby plants are wilting fast.

Are there any gardens in the South that allow dogs in does anyone know? DH and I have a day out to plan tomorrow but have dog with us. Planning on a trip to the coast at the moment but a nice garden would be lovely.

Roses everywhere at the moment. No idea what as I've never planted one they are just 'here'. The giant rose dome is starting to bloom and the two unruly tea rose type things in my garden are coming out too. I will post some pics on FB over the weekend for you rose experts to ponder on.

Not Quite sure where you are Bertha and how far you want to go but it is lovely here plus close to the beach if you wanted to do that too (though dogs can only go on one bit of it this time of year.

Maud yes it is eye watering isn't it and when i think what i could have bought for the garden with it.

But on a more positive note the last of the ground elder has been cleared and now i start the weekly hunt for any fresh growth

Well done on clearing the ground elder. I need to check for regrowth on mine - the glyphosate did seem to kill it very quickly. Hurrah.

Bertha there is a lovely wild garden area, down to the lake, at Nymans that you can take dogs into. If you can leave pooch in the car you could also visit the manicured garden part.

Nymans is lovely.

glycosphate the yuccas tempted!

Nymans looks lovely as does Compton acres. I don't get off the Island much apart for work so can offer Ventnor Botanical Gardens. My favourite place and dog friendly. The ferry is extortionate though.

I have made a breakthrough with Dh he has agreed to let me get paid help to sort out the overgrown hedges and hebe Will wait till September though so the birds are all gone.

I'm quite pleased with the herb bed it looks really pretty.

glyphosate did a good job of killing the tops of the ground elder but i found the roots and were producing fresh shoots quicker than the glyphosate could do its job.

I think the ground elder had been left for years to run riot as there was just so much of it and the root system was like a pan of noodles. Over 20 black sacks of the stuff taken to the tip so far. I how have spaces in the beds to fill so it looks like a trip to the garden centre is called for.

Blimmey cantspell that's a lot of ground elder. I quite like it actually looks pretty in the nearby woods, obviously I wouldn't want it in my garden. Well done for clearing it though.

It does look pretty and if it wasn't so invasive there is a couple of spots i would have been happy to have kept it but as it has a nasty habit of spreading it all had to go.

For about every inch of it above ground there must have been another 12 inches below.
Whilst i was grubbing about under the brushes in the front garden i also found a rat hole. No sign of any rats but they had definitely been there at some stage. Hopefully they have moved on but i will keep an eye on the now filled hole.

That's pretty impressive Cantspel. I have a similar 'noodle ground' problem with snow berries. It's practically impossible to get my spade or fork in the ground. I'm not sure how I'm going to deal with it actually. I've been cutting it down as low as I can with vague notions of pulling up or glyphosating new shoots, but how to get the rock hard woody roots out?

Thank you for all the dog friendly garden suggestions. Only did the beach and a cafe breakfast and pub lunch today but will store those for another day

well done on the ground elder front. impressive achievement.
not much gardening got done this week except for a nightly strawberry round with the dc. the rain is welcome, the plants all look much happier.
the weekend we will not do much as there are a couple of birthday parties. next weekend might be better, but will have a visitor (fil is coming to stay 3 weeks ).
all tomatoes a flowering now, even the ones that were very measly as seedling. I had almost discarded them. the sunflowers are now taller than my 6y old.

I heaved a sigh of relief when I googled ground elder because I don't think I've got any: well done on clearing it! I generally weed out oak seedlings, nettles, brambles, ivy, spearmint and am unsure about an unidentified thing growing in a neat rectangle which looks like a weed. Then we have loads of valerian, corydalis and cyclamen hederifolium and winter jasmine which are all rampant everywhere.

I can't seem to get the balance. Plants are either rampant or they struggle. I can't seem to grow neat clumps in artistic arrangements with tall at the back and small at the front etc like you lot on the facebook page, esp humph
and olive bread with ricotta anyone? Fabulous pink roses in your gardens.

Olive bread and ricotta excepted with thanks, will go nicely with my . I also googled ground elder the other night as I have something that looks fairly invasive growing in the wood but after close examination it doesn't look like ground elder. Not sure what it is mind but I will be monitoring it. No beds near it but it does grow around my compost heap so need to be careful I don't spread it in the compost.

Can I see the Facebook page?

I am missing GW tonight, such a saddo [emb] instead I am watching The talented mr Ripley and admiring all the Mediterranean gardens.

I don't have ground elder but I might have mistakenly nurtured some elder in the past. Well done Cantspel on the elder attack.

DD2 continues to rampage through the garden, the latest casualties were two fat lily buds. I have to take a deep breath and tell myself she'll grow out of it.

Our strawberries have ripened and DD1 is so excited to eat them straight from the pant. Fab for a girl who describes herself as a vegetarian who only eats crisps & pudding! My potatoes are in flower, does this mean they are ready to harvest? I am looking forward to seeing what's really going on under the earth.

I moved all my babies (I.e. plugs and seedlings) into the greenhouse and they seem much happier.

I took the girls to a local Tudor garden on Tuesday. Huge tea roses and lavender seeming to thrive in London clay. It was gratifying to recognise lots of the plants (so much time on here!) but the most exciting thing was a turtle in the moat! It must have been an abandoned pet. It looked happy enough, I hope it stays.

Echt - PM Wynken for FB details; would love to see pictures of your garden.

No GW because of Wimbledon so you're not missing it Notanother

rampant plants in my garden.

• bindweed, one strang that comes up next to the honeysuckle, but not too problematic so far, I pull it every couple of weeks or so
• russian vine, grows over a big fence at the end of the garden. get's a 'fringe cut' every now and then.
• buttercups (I think that's what it is) spreading with arms like strawberries. I let dc1 loose on them, they like cutting and 'helping'

the thing that I thought was a bramble is actually a wild rose that comes out of one of the older roses. how can I get rid of it?

Yum thanks for the olive bread. I missed GW too. NANN I sympathise on the destructive child front. Ds was engrossed playing with our only allium yesterday. It was lovely to see him so fascinated, but... It was our only allium.

I talked to a surveyor today about getting a garden survey done. I really need one doing before I can properly redesign the borders and fiddle with the layout. I'm perfectly capable of doing one myself, but I've never done one on a garden this big or with so many level changes. Plus it would probably take me about ten years, going on how much gardening time I get these days! I hope I can persuade dh.

That buttercup sounds like creeping buttercup, MousyMouse. Beware, as it can be very invasive.

The best way to get rid of a rose sucker, I think, is to scrape away the soil from the base of the plant and then try to pull it off from where it emerges from the rootstock.