What have you done in the garden today?

[ThreeRingCircus]

I thought it would be a nice idea to share what we've been up to in our gardens.

Today I planted potatoes in buckets (with drainage holes drilled into them.) Six buckets in total, three second earlies and three main crops. I have fond memories of digging up potatoes with my dad when I was a child.... I still get excited rummaging around in the buckets when my potatoes are ready!

I also made up a herb planter from an old plant pot that had been hiding behind the shed. Mint, parsley and thyme planted in that so I'll see how that does.

I fed my pot plants with blood, fish and bone and gave them a water.

What have you been up to?

Our main glut problem is apples - they can be frozen, dried or made into jam, but any of those require significant prep. They can just be kept in boxes in a cool place, for anything from a fortnight to 5months.

Or put whole into df and squash at leisure into juice.

Hello DS!

Planted up 4 tubs of broad beans and three of peas. Emptied compost bin, and turned over the top unrotted stuff from the next heap into it, to get to the new supply of compost. Always a highlight of the year!

Compost is getting better and better. I think it accumulates the right selection of invertebrates, fungi and bacteria. After 30 years it’s pretty good!

Hope it goes well. I had a few goes with the fixings before I started putting the strips into place, to make sure I had the hang of it. The key is getting them aligned properly - otherwise you're just pressing metal against metal. I found having a board behind the edge to press against made a difference too. Hard to explain - let me know if more info would be helpful.

Those sound like great tips. Thank you!

I feel like I am failing this year! Potatoes, raspberries and rhubarb seem to be coming up well, but in the greenhouse, everything is a disaster! In previous years I had loads of lovely salad leaves at this time of year - this year nothing has come up! I was using seed from previous years so I have bought a whole lot of new ones and sewed them direct into the raised beds in there today.

We have a good crop of asparagus in one of the outside raised beds so have had that for dinner three or four times.

Also re-sewed courgettes, sunflowers, French beans, and tomatoes as the last seeds all got eaten by mice 🐁

No gardening today because it’s piddling here 🙄
Yesterday DH tackled the edges of the borders and dug out clumps of a pretty blue vetch-like flowering thug that I should never have bought from the garden centre; it’s got horrible tenacious roots and seeds everywhere (nettle-like leaves, bright green). Brazen Hussy celandine is being evicted too - it’s another thug and reverts to plain green after a few years 🤬
I dug out hundreds of Spanish bluebells and put them in the compost bins, hoping they’ll rot down, and blasted Birds-eye weeds that came from a mulch of bagged compost from the garden centre last year.
The borders look much better and I will plant up the empty one tomorrow if it stops raining!

@ilovesushi thanks. I did dig down a lot and added loads of rotten manure (luckily I have friends with horses so a pretty much endless supply). I never thought to hire a machine!

The biggest tree is a Sunset. Productive but a very poor keeper - 3 weeks tops. If frozen whole, the average annual harvest would completely fill the freezer part of the fridge-freezer at least twice over.

We're pretty new to gardening despite living in this house for over 30 years (left it mainly to lawn so as to not have to keep on at the kids to be careful of the plants when they were playing) so taking things quite slowly. We only grow in containers (more chance of not pulling up a prized plant thinking it's a weed that way).

We have divided and re-potted two lambs ears plants (Stachy Byzantina) into seven new plants. Put those out the front of the house, along with two re-potted lavender plants. Hopefully they will like it there as it gets a lot of sun, and fingers crossed they will attract the butterflies and bees.

Planted 12 new strawberry plants in troughs, looked at the two clematis, sighed and walked away, resolving to google to see how the hell you're meant to get them growing around the trellises. Ours are now just poking out of the top of the frame thing, although there's lots of buds on them, so I don't want to try training them and end up losing them.

Planted two geraniums, and two African Phlox (I have no idea what they are - they just caught my eye at the garden centre!) I'm hoping they're scented.

Tomorrow we will clear out the old ceramic strawberry planter and plant some violas in there and think about where to put the rest of the violas, which also just caught my eye at the garden centre and bought with no real plan of where to put them 😂We will also try and rescue the blueberry plant which is looking a bit choked in its pot.

You only have to freeze for 24hours for them to be soft enough to squash

Green house up , raised beds in ( not in a day , I I hasten to add ! Closer to a month ) , I’m going to plant one with wild flower seeds as I think 3 beds is stretching it a bit for this year ! My seeds have failed , I think I overwatered, so going to try again tomorrow . Tomatoes in pots and direct sow anything else that I can find .

Emptying the freezer, freezing, thawing, squashing, filtering, bottling, pasturising ... that sounds as if we're back to significant amounts of processing.

@BinturongsSmellOfPopcorn that's gluts for you. Could you donate any unwanted produce instead?

Up as early as possible and out to plant the Photinia Pink Marble that will fill the unexplained gap in the hedge. Had to dig up large amounts of ground elder first, but it was such a satisfying start to the day!

Find out if you have a scheme like this

https://leedsurbanharvest.org.uk/

Got some floating pond plants for my container pond, and put them in!

Ooh, what did you get Imicola? My container pond has gone rather green and I think I need a better selection of plants.

@ComeIntoTheGardenMaud hmmm, good question, I am not totally sure! Basically tiny floating leaves...I think they may be Salvia something.

Sat in the sun.

Collected dandelions,nettles,chickweed and cleavers for food and herbal remedies.
Also repotted a lemon balm and planted out some sweet peas

I put salad and herb seeds in new raised bed , 3 types of climbing beans , beetroot and spinach in another. Did tomatoes again as first lot didn’t take . Iv tried artichoke , as they’re such beautiful plants , if they take , I’ll put them in the boarder rather than veg bed . I’m thinking I may put a tiny patch of pollinators at the end of each bed ?!?

Bought some plants for the new border. We need to paint the shed before planting though so hope the weather stays nice this week.

Earthed up potatoes and thinned out some of my cosmos seedlings. I was planning on mowing the lawn (not all of it as I'm going to do no mow May) but I'm going to mow the edges and a path through it so it looks more intentional. It started raining though so I've put it off til tomorrow.

Drowned the wooden furniture in teak oil (or something like it).