What have you done in the garden today? Part 2

[ThreeRingCircus]

A continuation of the last thread.

Which type of Laurel is that mere? We have both a bay and a spotted. DH is noticeably always very keen on pruning the bay but never touches the spotted.

The last 2 days D's and I have gone out an lopped a broccoli head out of the allotment and harvested some (less abundant) peas to eat with dinner, delish! Ds had also been helping him self to a couple of strawberries daily as they ripen (I don't get a look in! Blueberries haven't done well this year unfortunately.

I've been deadheading roses and geraniums and keeping a close eye on the massive opium poppy pods for collecting to sow next year.

The tadpoles are starting to turn in to froglets too which is very enjoyable to watch.

Nothing because it pelted down until 6 o'clock. Also had to clean the house for the dog sitter who's coming at the weekend (off to Cambridge on Sunday). Frustrating. I need to make a new iris border - there's along narrow border of poor soil that faces south down by the veg garden. We really struggle with bearded irises but I want a Van Gogh border - all blue irises except for a single clump of white. We tried it close to the house, but they just weren't getting baked enough. It worked for a couple of years but this year was a dud. Really want to get on with it.

Non of my irises have flowered this year either, and God knows they've had enough sun... wonder why?

Due some decent rain tomorrow, am thrilled. Have pointed out to DH where he can mow now bluebells are done, and planning a good tidy up/tying up/cutting back weekend.

I’m very much hoping the promised rain comes overnight.

The bargain box from Hayloft arrived today, so I’ve planted another trough. As I squeezed the last two ipomoea into the border, I noticed to my chagrin that one of the heucheras has vanished completely. A victim of drought, perhaps. Found two froglets in the undergrowth, though, so that’s encouraging.

If it helps on the Bearded Iris front, we have taken out hundreds in our house, the lady who had the place before us used to love them. And we are in the South of France, and STILL didn't get them all to flower...we have to dig them all up every year, and seperate the new growth from the old to have any chance of flowers and I'm buggered if I can be arsed to do that with every bloody bearded Iris.

I'm pretty new to irises, and I did read they needed a certain amount of faffing...if that is indeed the case given your experience @AlisonDonut then I may have to re-think their inclusion in the garden!

I agree with all you say about bearded irises - the fussiness about conditions, the faff - but they’re just so pretty! Generally, though, I content myself with other types.

knowing that if it’s demanding or fails, you can get rid of it. Spotted laurel isn’t got rid of that easily! My neighbour cut his to the ground, literally, not a leaf nor a twig showing. Two years later it’s back.

Most of the leaves went black and crispy last year in the drought, and some of the new leaf edges look like they’re going to same way again. Do I need to be more diligent with watering? There is a faint possibility, if it’s really black and the ends of the shoots are black and wilting, and it does it every year, that there’s some sort of fungal infection in the soil, in which case I’d remove it and try something else in the spot.

Neither. The usual laurel, Cherry Laurel, Prunus laurocerasus . The leaves used to be used in killing bottles by old style butterfly collectors. Gave off cyanide fumes.

DH is noticeably always very keen on pruning the bay I find that overpowering if I’m doing a mega-prune. And the wood is very dense, takes a lot of sawing.

Could you do it with Siberian Irises? Not quite the same look as bearded irises but maybe more forgiving?

Forget that, hadn’t noticed it was you posting! You’ll need to do it properly, and you’ll have already considered alternatives

Yesterday I planted out my new two roses which made me very happy. I also pulled out lots of foxgloves which looked pretty and gave height while the rest of the bed was catching up but are now too big and overshadowing everything else.

I have a couple of new hyssop plants to put into a space and lots of chickweed to remove 😬.

I bought an ornamental cherry for my big pot, and planted it, then cleaned up and rearranged the other pots in that area. I moved a rose that wasn't getting enough sun and was also in a non matching pot! Not sure a cherry was the right choice, but the man at the nursery was so helpful and it was his 3rd suggestion and someone else was waiting. So many slugs and snails hiding in that corner, all living off the sacrificial hosta nearby. I hoicked it out, divided it cut off the naked leaves and put it in pots. Tomorrow, I must finish the rose bed.

I started trying to get the bindweed out of one border, my bl… neighbour has a ‘wild flower meadow’ small front lawn; it’s actually couch grass, bindweed and ragwort 🤬
Every seed gets blown into my garden and I’m getting really p…’d off.
At least it isn’t too difficult to dig out if I catch it early.
Anyway, it’s so dry here that the sparrows have made several dust baths in the borders (DH says it rained during the night but you would never have known)
We have hedgehog poo on the patio, so pleased they’re around, and diddly froglets everywhere so much care needs to be taken there.
My mini cucumbers are developing but the tomatoes are dreadful. The runner beans are going great guns in a large tub with homemade compost, as are the courgettes.
More rose deadheading in a bit…🌹

Some of my cherry tomatoes in the hanging baskets are taking on a distinctly orange hue😁. Just a week or so before the first of the season...

I’ve got my first bud on one of the “free with your order” dahlias. After all the effort of keeping the snails off them, I hope I like them!

Hope no one minds me jumping in, I’m currently in my first year of attempting to garden on the Canadian prairies having gardened in the UK for my entire life. Quite the learning curve! My “garden” looks like a train wreck, truly awful.

Today I shall be continuing my war against couch grass and some monstrous form of pigweed, then agonise over how I’m going to actually design and plant up the place. My new house was a student rental for many years before we came along so you can imagine the level of maintenance it has previously enjoyed!

@CanaHouse That sounds like quite a task. Do people grow prairie flowers if they happen to live in the prairies or do they hanker after more gardeny stuff? I mean since Piet Oudolf we've all be exhorted to access our inner prairie (doesn't work well in Scotland since they all grow 10 feet tall with all the rain, and then collapse in a wet heap).
@MereDintofPandiculation Yes that was my next thought. They do brilliantly here and I love them. They make vast floriferous mounds and never fail, a real mainstay. But our other passion is art and I really want that Van Gogh border. ...But then there's iris florentina in honour of my hero Lorenzo de Medici and then all those delicious Benton irises. Got to make the place fit the plant even though it goes against everything I know about gardening.

@Bideshi No I’m truth I have never seen anyone use a prairie planting scheme here! In this area people are rather conservative and you generally see heavily manicured lawns with shrub borders and blousy annuals up front. Considering how dry our summers are this seems like madness to me but it’s “the way”.

My own garden is too small and urban for that rangey prairie effect; something beyond a sad chokecherry, decrepit box elder and miserable brown lawn would be nice though.

Please keep us posted, CanaHouse! I love how varied the gardens mentioned here are, in size, aspect, location and even continent.

I like that the thread has international representation! @CanaHouse I'd be fascinated to know what the soil is like, and the weather. From your description, sounds like you're urban as opposed to 'throw open the front door and admire the mountains'?

We had a nice bit of rain yesterday, so I'll bob round the garden and make sure everything actually got a soaking. Then do a mental list of jobs for the weekend, mainly tidying. Am envious of those who can plant in the summer months, would be a death sentence here!

Thanks @NorthernChinchilla - summer planting is an unwise idea here too, I’ll be focusing mostly on tidying and hardscaping until late Summer.

We are in a small, isolated city in Saskatchewan. No mountains here, more rolling plains.
Weather wise we have only been here since last Summer but Winter was mid October til last week of April - we had consistent snow cover and temperatures around -10 to -35C. Summer is hot, hot, hot and dry. 28ish now but could hit 35 or higher. My soil is nice quality and loamy, I believe most of sask is the same.

There isn’t much cloud cover and we are one of the sunniest provinces even in winter so I’m hoping we can get some nice fruit/veg grown even with the short season as things should ripen quickly. Time will tell.

I shall be watching on with great jealousy while you lot plant all the things that won’t survive here!

OK, that puts my whinges about the SE weather in shade
Sounds beautiful but somewhat unforgiving for gardening, and whatever grows must be the very definition of hardy!