Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May: Alternative potting shed thread

[funnyperson]

On the grounds that potting sheds should admit those of all cultures here is an alternative potting shed thread. Probably makeshift and not as posh as the other one. Definitely subversive and open to gardeners of all capabilities.

Sorry just realised I rudely ignored your response to my HC ticket buying failure, Maud. I was trying to buy a member's ticket, and I bet you're right, I bet they've sold out. Dammit.

Driven by curiosity, I was poking around the website last night. I noticed that this year they were pricing tickets at 3 levels - earlybird, advance and on the gate - which I don't recall them doing before. But all of that seemed to be aimed at non-members. Hope you manage to get some sort of ticket, Rhubarb.

Well if there is going to be a meet up at BP I would love to join in, the garden tour looks great!

I'm going to Hampton Court on Wed after 3 pm as it will be too hot in the day imo and it will be cheaper anyway- Bearleigh I know you are going on Sat- sorry to miss you
Rhubarb-If you go to the RHS website and click on members tickets you can get them online still and print them off at home as etickets
I'm feeling quite strange about doing something leisurely midweek! In the past if I've been off midweek, I've been too ill to go out, but amazingly I think I will make it and get some exercise too! I'm going alone though as all my friends are working!

I felt a bit 'gardened out' after Powis the herbaceous borders are really magnificent and I felt a bit guilty I still have so many plants in pots not yet planted out, and I could see how the plants would do so much better in the ground rather than in pots. I need to source a lad.

That said, the Powis borders are 6 feet deep, and mine at home perhaps 3-4 feet deep, so it is impossible to give each plant the space they have at Powis to expand and thrive and make a splendid show. Their hollyhocks aren't out yet but are enormous. They have a magnificent Crambe Cordiflora spilling over the walls and so many other herbaceous plants each variety taking up perhaps 2-3 foot of space. They have 3 varieties of thalictrum! Their cornus trees were in flower - stunning. But the hedges were my favorite thing of all!

It is still lovely to come home. For me the delights of gardening are the simple tasks like watering and dead heading and weeding and repotting and general nurturing and even though my plants are not as magnificent as those at Powis they are still very nice and today my jasmine has clusters of sweet smelling star like flowers and the Acanthus Rue Ledan is in bloom!

Have a lovely time all of you going to HC. I hadn't even realised it was on!

rhubarb I'd be tempted to get cuttings of the philadelphus so you can change the location, and replace the one you have.

My first Dahlia is out and the Zinnias are looking better, though some are the wrong colour I can't bring myself to dig them up. Acanthus Rue Ledan in bloom here too. I'm hoping for seeds to produce lots more.

On a dog walk I saw the loveliest Dahlias -red flowers with dark leaves. I'll try and get a photo next time. The leaves on mine have been a bit slugged.

I will never have nice grass, like I'm never going to the gym 3 times a week. Or at all My grass is ok, full of clover flowers which the bees are enjoying, I don't think I'll even mow it this week! The thing I struggle with is edges. I have an edging tool but haven't got the knack!

Is nann about, I wondered if her Dahlias are up? Thinking ahead I'd like to leave mine in the ground. lazy

I don't know what has happened to our bees
They were around earlier on in the year loving the geranium phaeum but I haven't seen any for a week- damson flies and butterflies yes, but no bees. i am very concerned. In fact no bees no lady birds no blackfly or aphids and hardly any slugs. Birds are still around thank goodness but otherwise it is odd to have no buzzing.

I have noticed the bees have changed, earlier lots of bumbles and now honey bees. Maybe yours have found something tastier down the road funny?

Lots of bee plants are nearly over- foxgloves which dc's call bee hotels and Echium Pininana. The bees have mostly moved on to the ground cover campanula. Lavender isn't out yet which will be next to feed them.

Well I have finally got myself a ticket for Sunday - thank you Maud for your help! Though dcat tried to sabotage it by presenting me with a live grass snake while I was in the middle of ordering, so I got timed out and had to start all over again.

The snake was magnificent. I rescued him and took him down to the compost heap where he went about his business after a convincing performance playing dead. I am actually pretty ecstatic that we have a snake(s) here.

Phew for the ticket, Rhubarb (although I don't think I can take any credit for helping). Eww to the grass snake, though. I'd be happy to see one in the garden, but only at a great distance.

We still seem to have bumble bees bobbing around, and the occasional cabbage white butterfly. Apart from that, our most abundant minibeasts are the aforementioned blackfly.

We had a few bees on the Nigella this morning.

I've got a rather unappealing yellow jasmine that I bought at an NGS garden, whose only redeeming feature is that it is popular with bees. I am sitting in the garden trying to cool down and have just seen a solitary hoverfly.

Jill Archer was explaining the other day on The Archers that it's now the "June Gap" - she was feeding her bees sugar water. (What do you mean it's fiction?)

Our lavender is out and has happy bees buzzing around but you're right not many other bee friendly plants are out.

I'm so glad you are up to going to HC funny! I am going to Gravetye instead of HC on Saturday, but getting there early as we have guests later on. I hope to see you there though.

Wow to a grass snake, and what a clever cat. Did the DC see it?

Yes I showed it to ds. He was fascinated, and it was the first thing he told dd about when we picked her up from school.

Aww, bless RhubarbBoy, junior herpetologist!

And of course we should defer to Jill Archer. Ambridge is a real place, you know.

I am back from Hampton Court which was best described by the word 'hot'.
Those of you who didnt go didnt miss much and it was definitely unsuitable for children or the very elderly due to the heat. It got bearable about 5 pm and the marquees were all understandably emptyish.
It is nice seeing gardens on a small scale with planting schemes which one can easily imitate at home.
My favourite gardens were to do with mental health ( a wall with slits which you had to look into to see the garden and retirement (Anabelle Hydrangea Darcy Bussell rose and Salvia Cardonna in raised beds with a sweet potting shed) but none of the others were as pretty or as interesting as last year
I bought no plants as they all seemed bit scorched and I spent most of my money on cold water anyway.
It was fun sitting in the shade and watching the ladies in summer dress- every single type of flowery summer dress and top. Lots and lots of hats. Parasols too:Thai and African. Sandals, flip flops, birkenstocks, gellerts, painted toenails galore.
Genuine Panamas at £60 each were popular as well as floppy cloth hats for a tenner.
Actually it was best described by the words 'very hot'.

Glad you survived the heat Funny. I am hoping for rain tonight as didn't mange to water today. Some forecast for the morning which hopefully will actually happen.

I finally managed to catch up with GW. The lawn man was beyond obsessive.

First sweet peas picked.

Oh my - I have been out in gardens and schools this week and the heat is unbelievable...coupled with hayfever it is not nice!

I did watch GW last night [wanted to go to bed early but if I do that, when my OH comes in and wakes me I never get back to sleep properly and last night wasn't a night to be less sleepy than normal] and the lawn man - OMG!!! Even taking the dew off before mowing every single day.

I've not been to BP - but I was part of the festival at Clarence House the first time they opened the gardens to the public for several hundred years...and I've scrumped some of their mulberries whilst the staff weren't looking. I had to go on stage straight after Marcus Brigstock...which was more than a little petrifying.

I've got students today and tomorrow - I think we will be doing things in the shade...this week when I offer weeding or maths I think maths will win!

I'd rather weed ;)

Does anyone else rush to the garden first thing to check ? This morning I was rewarded with a calla lilly flower and it is a lovely creamy yellow colour!

Sweet peas have finally got going, I chose Sarah Ravens Venetion mix plus added in a purple. The purple ones got going first therefore got planted out first and are all on one obelisk. I should have sown white ones, oh well!

I bought red penstemons to go in my all purple border as it was the only thing the nursery had. I'll think about Geums for next year.

Yes I agree the lawn man was very OTT. However his technque was useful to watch: for example I thought he had a good scarifying machine.

I too rush to the garden in the mornings. In fact I rushed so much this morning I fell over and sprained my foot stupid me!

geoff Your sweet peas sound nice, I love sweet peas but this year has been a sweet pea fail for me.

However to my delight the Shirley Temple peonies are flowering! The astrantias are going strong. Mme Alfred Carriere has had her first flowering and is quiet now for a few days, but Dr Du Jamain and Rosa Mundi and American Pillar and the honeysuckles and Jasmine and Rue ledan and ferns are wonderful. There are also some nice flowering heads on the Anabelle hydrangea due to come out. I have to move the plum stick in front of it though,

None of the viticella clematis have buds on as yet though the foliage looks healthy. Do you think it is too early?

I totally got what Monty and Joe Swift were talking about when they said the planting at Hampton Court this year needed to be more adventurous. Compared to the Chelsea gardens or the planting last year there wasn't a lot to be inspired by.

My sweet peas have just started to flower which is particularly thrilling because I have failed with them in the past, and my cosmos is out too. The marigolds round the vegetable patch are very nearly there.

Sweet peas flowering here too. Ds helped me snip some for the kitchen table. They are not very scented though.

My new Woollerton Old Hall roses by the front door are in bloom too. I've underplanted with Geranium Johnson's Blue and I'm quite happy with the combo.

Promised rain didn't come today. About to head out to water again. Think I will pick some sweet peas for my bedroom today.

Going on holiday next week. Starting to panic about the watering, I cried when we came back last year so much had died

I've just been watering the pots in the front garden. The bamboo is in the sort of distress it usually only reaches after we've been away for weeks. They're a way off flowering, but the sweet peas do now have one bud.

And, yes, I have a quick tour of the garden before I go to work - it doesn't take long as it's so tiny - and another when I get home. It's my decompression. Luckily for me, DH's is cooking dinner.

It rained here all morning and weather warnings for tomorrow are for heavy thundery showers.

have you got anyone you can ask to water bertha ?

I spent the afternoon cutting out the out of control rootstock rose. I noticed that the purple Passion flower is out, and has been for a while but is so high up difficult to see.

I have a clematis that's also putting on an aerial display so high that you have to crane your neck to see it, the result of too timid pruning.

Lidl and Wyevale have both had deals on automated watering kits this week - my NDN has just bought one - but I'm guessing they'd be inadequate for a big garden.

One of my clematis is peeking out amongst some laurel I noticed yesterday.

My Neighbour has an automatic watering system and runs it all round their pots and hanging baskets plus the greenhouse. They ask me to water where needed but for the two weeks just gone I didn't need to do much at all even though quite dry. They have a third of an acre and go away a lot so has been well worth it for them.

I'm up at silly o'clock as just waved my PFB off to Airport, she's going to Japan for 2 weeks Lots of garden therapy for me needed.