Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower.

[SugarPlumTree]

Potting shed thread for those who enjoy talking about gardens and plants. Plenty of garden chairs and the wood burner lit now there is a chill in the air, please join us !

ooh ooh I did some weeding! ToddlerCobbler was very good and only ate a few weeds/bits of dirt etc. It was great! I did the downy birch triangle, one side of the crab apple border, around the lilac and around the magnolia. This could be the start of my old life back.

The thing is I need to see a garden that is not finished otherwise I will get too depressed at the difference between it and mine iyswim. ( I like iyswim. it is a good word in its own right I think, like lol, and should be included in the oxford dictionary) But not just any unfinished garden; it has to be the garden of a suburban garden lover like you, maud. Rhubarb's garden is almost certain to be very large and nice and in any case it is the clay soil that we have in common as well. Oh well I probably havent got the energy to visit anyhow.
You could come round and laugh at mine if you like. There are no holes in the fence, but a lot is (still) not planted. I would really appreciate your clematis advice and (ahem) design thoughts.

Humphrey are you going to be in the yellow book again?

Not this year funnyperson, but we will do it in the future. My lack of gardening time made it such a lot of work for DH, when the boy is at preschool for a few mornings a week we will go for it again.

Making our garden 'finished' in the sense that it was all tidy was a herculean task! It is not natural

The best memory of that day was talking to you in our garden! My friend says that she has never seen me so animated when discussing the garden whilst we were walking round it.

Getting Rhubarbboy and Toddlercobbler together is a terrifying thought!

funny my garden is indeed fairly large and clay, but it is barely begun let alone close to being finished. In fact I intend to go backwards before going forwards by ripping out most of what's in the borders currently. Anyone is welcome to visit though at any time!

Just watched the first episode of the new series of Great Garden Revival. Roses and climbers - divine. I now need to visit Mottisfont and Heale gardens.

hello garden ladies - I wondered if I might seek some mulching advice! ? am I too late? and what mulch would you go for (london clay)?

I don't know about when to mulch other than spring ad autumn, as I am ignorant, but I think an ideal mulch might be a combination of rotted (royal) horse poo, last year's home composted oak leaf mould and composted bark. This would provide structure and nutrition for the soil. I know this as I dreamed about it last night. I dreamed I had three great big wheelbarrows of the stuff delivered and I made my own mixture, as in all the best gardening books. I share this with you simply to provide a delphian alternative to expert advice likely to be more helpful.

Ferguson on another thread mentions apparently cheap stuff called humix which i have never heard of.

Freddie - what would you like the mulch to do? Nourish the soul and break down the clay? Protect tender plants in the ground? I'd go for a bit of well rotted horse manure and loads of chipped bark.

I have been I indulging in some serious porn today. I am, of course, talking about my Sarah Raven catalogue. The cardinal dahlia collection has got me very hot under the collar! It's so tempting... but I'll wait to see what doesn't shift and buy that in sales. I can't ever imagine paying full price for SR and its all so gorgeous. I bought the hot dahlia collection 70% off last year, I really hope they come back this year.

Rhubarb - If I can ever get the DDs to sleep I will watch garden revival. I love roses but never have any luck with them , either black spot or aphids kills them off.

Today was very exciting as the builders have laid the first course of bricks for our extension. They are trashing the lawn, there are bricks piled up and mud patches everywhere, but it's so lovely to think I'll have a new house and my garden back for spring. I don't think my garden will ever be finished either and it is always definitely gong to be better next year ;-)

Lol @ funny.

I put down a layer of lawn cutting in october all over the beds and a few (fresh) piles of horse shit riot police in the veg bed.

I love the variety of horse poo we are using. Royal, riot police and here it's Dave the pony.

Freddie as NANN asks, what are your reasons for mulching? And which plants do you want to mulch around? Eg whilst manure is excellent for adding nutrients and improving drainage in clay soil, if you put it around lavender and rosemary it will do them no favours. Such plants should be mulched with gravel, which helps avoid rotting roots in wet soil and keeps down weeds.

Bark chips are useful mulch around mature shrubs and fruit trees for keeping down weeds, but shouldn't be used in a perennial border as the decomposition process actually removes nutrients from the soil.

My favourite mulch is actually Strulch, which is mineralised straw. It's a delight to use being light and fragrant and effective at weed suppression for two years (manure needs doing every year).

Then there's home made compost, which is uniquely satisfying in being free and allows you to say smugly "I made that".

funny is not ignorant. She is too modest.

You have made me resolve to dig out the hideous dalek full of compost and actually use it (generally, I just use the thing as a giant waste disposal unit).

I'm intrigued by the idea of riot police horse poo and wonder whether it's particularly effective (takes no prisoners).

I once ran put after the rag & bone man to scoop up a bit if fresh nag poo... But I couldn't do it! It was covered in flies and I was worried the neighbours might see

Just caught up on the thread, thank-you for my Birthday wishes.

It's lovely to hear everyone's news, nann I've been reading the SR catalogue too and contemplating the metal stakes she sells for Perenial supports but they are expensive. I'm a bit crap at the staking part and these might make it easier.

Has baby castle appeared yet?

Am I too late to sow sweet peas and class them as winter sown or should I wait? It's really warm here too, the Pelargoniums are still flowering very happily in the porch.

Love the idea of mulching for the soul NANN!

Have seen a daffodil in bloom spring must be here right?

Will definitely be mulching at some point as tired of weeding the borders that no one sees in the front.

Need to buy lots of seeds for my new seed tin!

I am officially giving up on nearly all seeds, as we are often away from home at just the time that seedlings need most attention and the high attrition rate means that (for me) it's cheaper to buy plug plants.

I have got far too many to list, but if anyone would like a free lucky dip of random (possibly out of date but unopened) seed packets, let me know via PM. I've got lots of veg and probably lots of annuals.

Squeaky - lol, sometimes a typo reads better than what you intended to write! We all need a nice mulch to nourish our soul at this time of year

Chris Beardshaw on blossom on Garden Revival tonight yum

Whatever purpose the mulch is used, for, keep it away from the plants stems to avoid collar rot, and ensure the rain can get through.

This, while written in the Australian context where mulching to retard water loss is widespread, still makes valuable points.

www.landscapegardeningplants.com/articles/mulch.html

My Gran used to collect the horse poo from the coal man to go on their veg beds. Used to be a bit of a scrap to get there first apparently as it was precious stuff!

I mulched half the beds a while ago in a brief moment of near fitness; far from being up to finishing it now though. I need to somehow persuade DH that he really wants to spend a couple of hours digging out the compost bins and spreading it around for me. I'm going to order a job lot of manure for the veg plot this year as well to supplement the home produced stuff as I have lost my local well-rotted source.

The 'garden revival' is on every day at 7pm: a whole hour!
Chris Beardshaw was good on fruit trees and planting a magnolia, and there was a hilarious man in red on ceanothus. There wasn't enough detail in his section to be totally satisfying though: I thought Carol Klein won hands down with daffodils!
My iplayer only gives me a quarter of a screen so I have to leave work on time this week!

Ooh. I'll have to start watching that. I have a girlie crush on Carol.

Me too. She's fabulous. She was great on daffs.

Interesting on mulching echt On GQS it said that to inhibit weeds it needs to be something like 6 inches thick which would also prevent much rain getting through!

As I refuse to spray chemicals about I'm always interested in keeping weeds down. My ground cover of choice is ivy (actually I just give it it's head ) It does work sort of. But I'm not a perfectionist and I love the self seeded plants, some would call weeds, like the valerian and salvias, when I check them out I find that particular beneficial insects need them so I'm happy.

I think 6 inches is a little excessive. I usually pile it 3 to 4 inches and that works. Rain percolates down no problem. It's never a good idea to mulch bone dry soil though, as that could hamper moisture getting in. That's why the advice is always to mulch in spring and autumn.

Biblical style deluge here today.