"In the spring, at the end of the day, you should smell like dirt." This month's discussion in the potting shed.

[MyNightWithMaud]

Grateful thanks to the magnificent Margaret Atwood (via A Mighty Girl) for the quote.

I have just come indoors after a delightful couple of hours' pottering in the garden. It's far warmer than yesterday and everything feels optimistic and vernal again, after yesterday's Arctic blast.

High point: Realising that most of last year's cuttings have taken. Given that I am useless with seeds this, I think, is my propagating future.

Low point: Realising that my newest fairy lights have already failed.

I'm aiming to go to Hampton Court, but don't think I can face Chelsea.

GCSE's are in the way of Chelsea this year so I'm aiming for Hampton Court.

Might you come on the Sunday, SugarPlumTree? I'm hoping that funnyperson might eb going then, and then we could have a meet-up.

The plan was the Saturday but a meet up would be lovely. Will see what I can sort out.

Just been outside filling up the new raised bed. There's lots of compost in the compost bins and I've found a mound of top soil behind them - hard to reach but not impossible.

Sadly the fish in the Aquaponic system are no more. The clay pebbles from the system are making a good path around the greenhouse.

Staring at the back garden, there's a lot of work to do to make it more garden like rather than a small strip of muddy grass and big laurel trees. The back garden is an L and last year was the first year there were any kind of flower beds in the 12 years we have been here A quick gardener I am most definitely not.

Can I join in? Very much a beginner, but loving it. Biggish garden in our new house with quite a lot of established shrubs but not nearly enough flowers (for me).
Starting to plant a vege garden.

First question. What are the coffee grounds best for? Is it for good soil? Or to keep slugs away? So should I be picky where I put it in other words?

Also, had some raspberry canes that i planted back in November. They have a few leaves (summer fruiting). Should I be pruning them already?

Hello, Shells, and welcome. Coffee grounds are good generally because they add organic matter to the soil, but as molluscs don't like them they're particularly useful as mulch for hostas and anything else prone to attack.

I'm not totally sure where I will be in June but yes maud lets meet up on the Sunday at Hampton Court!

What?! Glyphosate might be banned?!

I'm going to Chelsea on the Saturday and HC on the Sunday, although I have yet to buy my HC ticket. It would be lovely to meet up with anyone who is also going.

I abandoned the trip to Dixter due to excessively wild weather. I'm not often put off things by the weather but today was a bit extreme, and I would have had two whinging dcs with me.

My post of the rhododendron varieties vanished, so I'll type it out again.

Hello Shells.

Sorry to hear about the fish, Sugar.

Rhodis: Silver Edge, Scintillation, Roseum Elegans, Percy Wiseman, Morning Cloud, Moerheim, Madame Masson, Gristede, impeditum, Golden Torch, Blue Steel, Azalea Mary Helen and Azalea Geisha Lilac.

I haven't heard any word of Roundup and the like being banned in the UK, Rhubarb, but my hunch is that if Oz are banning it, it might in time lose its EU licence and then it will be banned here too. We notice these things at the Hort Soc, when we have to take things off the shelves.

So, it looks as if we might have the beginnings of a HC meet-up on the Sunday. Hooray.

We've had a lot of wind and wuthering here, too. My lovely old pot full of bamboo has blown over and shattered into a hundred pieces ::sob:: so I'm off to Ebay to look for an old, weathered pot to replace it.

Thanks for the hello. Ok, out in the semi dark with the coffee grounds. Thanks!

Oh no Maud, that is sad. Thanks for the fish sympathy Rhubarb.

I clicked on my thread list earlier, saw this thread md got massive guilt feelings as I had planned to sow a few seeds and hadn't. So just went out to do it, because I can - this time change I like ! That's a few Zinnia and Cosmos seeds sown and a few Smapdragons pricked out.

Hello Shells and welcome. I think you leave the raspberry canes alone this year as pruning regime is prune the canes that have fruited in the Autumn. I think year 1 the canes grow and year 2 they fruit. I could be very wring though.

It's sad, but a blessing in (heavy) disguise, as it was a bulbous pot and the roots had grown to fill it completely, so the only way I was ever going to get the plant out was to break it.

I should have commiserated about the fish. Do you know what killed them? Did the chemistry go wrong?

I am looking at lovely pots on Ebay which are not what I need but just so beautiful.

Well I guess it is maybe better for nature to smash it than for you to have to then. Not sure with the fish to be honest, I think they might have got a disease. They aren't going to be replaced as they were for my old job and I don't need the system anymore, I can use the space it took up in the greenhouse now they are sadly gone.

Welcome Shells!

It certainly was wild here today too - I had toyed with going to Great Dixter too, but in the end had to do some work work, so didn't get into the garden to do any work at all. All I did was water my new seedlings! I also noticed that my autumn rasps have made a break out from their bed amongst the fruit and have popped up half way across one of the vege beds. I've heard of walking onions, but never walking rasps.

Anyone who grows things to eat, can I recommend corn salad? It's slug proof, grows steadily through winter, and is a great thing to have in the garden for greenery at this time of year. It also self seeds, and the seed is easy to collect and keep.

I've always fancied going to Hampton Court, so I'll see about tickets for the Sunday - when do they go on sale? It would be lovely to join in a meet.

We have GCSEs too this year Sugarplum. Such fun...

Corn salad - argh - it certainly does self seed; all over my gravel paths. It is one of my most annoying weeds actually. At least it pulls up easily.

Sorry about the pot Maud.

HC tickets have been on sale since the autumn.

Waaail! Just checked my diary and realised that I'm committed to being elsewhere on the weekend of the HC show, so no meet-up for me.

It bucketed down here today. I really wanted a potting shed so I could do stuff anyway.
The magnolias out here are flowering amazingly as are the camellias.
Sadly the ones I planted in mums garden last year are still a bit too young to do anything major as yet.

rhubarb thanks for the list: it sounds like a lovely mixture of tall and smaller plants in pastel colour am I right?

Welcome shells!

Oh no that's a shame Maud.

Yes funny, mix of sizes and a colour scheme of pinks, lilacs and white.

Welcome Shells

My autumn raspberries also have made a break for it BearI sunk some boards around their end of the bed last year but it hasn't stopped them. They have popped up 1.5m further up the bed!

Has anyone put in a wildlife pond? I've been wanting a pond for a while and it's bonus time so I think I've just talked DH into one just beside the veg plot. His only constriction was that I have to make sure I leave enough space around it for him to get the ride-on mower around. So, I've googled obviously, but does anyone know a really good resource when planning a pond? I'm intending to hit while the going's good and start digging next weekend before he changes his mind

Quick update snap of some of the egg shell pots.

loving the purple egg boxes!

Bertha monty's put in a wildlife pond on the current series of GW. I think he did a bit on how to choose a site in the last few weeks

sorry about the fish sugarplum