What have you done in the garden today? Part 2

[ThreeRingCircus]

A continuation of the last thread.

Had to cut down my cosmos which had been going great guns but snapped off during the wind and rain yesterday

Yesterday DH finished clearly the new bed under the cherry tree. Today I've put some garlic chives around the trunk in the hope they'll deter the aphids we always get. Also planted a a perennial I was given in exchange for another plant a few years ago. Used the plant app to finally identify it & it's a common bistort? Has pretty pink flowers that the bees like & the leaf cutter bees like the leaves.
Found two tiny ferns that has self-set themselves in the garden & been throwing around the dried poppy heads of the random red poppy that popped up this year.

My pond is large and nearly half the surface is covered by waterlilies. It also has two bales of barley straw. Despite this it is usually the colour of Birds Eye frozen peas.
A few visitors today so interacted with them. One (who is a gilder) tried to persuade me to gild various things in the garden a la Roy Strong. She suggested the dolphins😳Another said 'Tell me, when is the best time to see the garden?' implying that now isn't that time.
Pulled out a lot of rosebay willow herb this evening. Scowled at some newly planted herbaceous which have been completely munched. I thought rabbits but then saw that argyranthemums in tall pots had also been eaten, so it must be deer. We do get them from time to time though they don't usually cross the stream. The resident Jack Russell pest control officer is getting old and slowing down. We should be training up a youngster.
The garden entrance is festooned with giant yellow 'garden open this Sunday signs.' The weather forecast is not good. Oh well......

Arf at ‘best time’ to see the garden! I hope you gave them a withering look.

Gosh people can be so rude. Although if there is a garden in the U.K. that looks perfect right now, I would be surprised. weeds and slugs are thriving in mine. Someone came to day and obviously would have liked a poke about. But I kept them in the kitchen. It looks great from there. It’s the oh but I thought you were a gardener comments. Hello hip replacement, and no other help.

My garden looks an overgrown mess most of the time. I love it, it’s so full of interesting things if you take your time round it. Thankfully people are always polite. Worst I had was a tradesman who commented it was “err…interesting”.

I’m a complete novice and very new to gardening, so I’m loving the depth in this thread. I planted out nine replacement agapanthus from Crocus, as I’d complained earlier in the year when they sent me plants with a few mm of growth/no growth above the soil. They said to see how they did, and turns out that they’ve done nothing, so they sent replacements with plenty of growth (no buds but I’m in this for the longer term). They’re now in front of the south facing bay.

Love your new pond @Pottedpalm 😍

We had planned to recreate the lovely large, rectangular raised pond we had at our previous house, but now we're hoping to sell, we are just going to go with something more portable.

We've a vacant area where it could go and have been looking for a suitable container, but everything we're coming across is a bit too small for the space. What size is yours, if you don't mind me asking please?

Got some great bargains at the garden centre:
Nepata Walker's Low
Verbena Hastata Rosea
Salvia Nemerosa Caradonna Pink
Verbena Bonariensis
Eryngium Planum
Geranium Rozanne
Night-scented phlox
All for under £25 - got two new beds to fill.

Here's some pics

Surely the tried and tested answer is “ Oh, you should have been here last week!” accompanied by a patronising smile.

Wow, those are good sized pots as well.Congratulations. I am sulking today because the bargain peony I bought half price a while back has been jumped on/ sat on by a cat or a fox and both stems broken. I have now surrounded it with little sticks and am hoping the roots will do their stuff. On a better note the agapanthus I thought I had lost overwinter has decided it was only resting after all and is at last making growth. About blumming time too,I have been very patient and encouraging to it, giving its apparently empty pot pole position all summer!

Oh ... I hope the big lifeless agapanthus I binned wasn't only resting... one of its progeny from seed collected in 2019 has produced a small flower this year though. Hopefully more next year though from seed they may be a bit random.

Some good bargains there @APurpleSquirrel! I'm also cross with our retriever puppy who loves to romp through the beds where I've just planted something new or where a plant has just come into flower 😩. He's only 6 months but causes so much chaos (as well as being adorable 😂).

We've had a busy day today as the weather is lovely. We've planted a new Victoria plum tree in the orchard and a magnolia called Black Tulip in the paddock. A new dahlia has also gone in and an alstroemeria both of which were presents from my sister in law. I've pulled out loads of chickweed and Willowherb from the rose and perennial beds.

I love a productive day!

@LibertyLily
Thank you, I love it. Currently sitting on the patio admiring it.
It’s 80 cm diameter by 38 cm high. Holds about 75 litres 🙂.

Un-netted the broccoli and cabbages. I'll probably regret that when the caterpillars get munching, but under the netting the snails had free rein. Hacked back the vine that was making it impossible to get to the far end of the garden. Rescued the butternut squash seedlings that were growing in the compost - probably too late for them to do anything, but they have more of a chance in the ground than in a tumbling compost bin. Strimmed some of the grass to get it to mowable length. Hoiked out masses of weeds. Going away in July is always a garden disaster.

Cute puppy! We had a retriever years ago. She was such a sweet girl. Unlike one of the current lot who I can hear barking his head off at neighbour who has the temerity to be in his own garden (mowing lawn in the rain!).

Not done much this week as it’s been drizzly all week. A bit of dead heading and picking tomatoes has been the limit.

I was just admiring our everlasting sweet pea. It’s doing really well. Unlike the scented annuals - one lot have just about gone over and the others are yet to bloom. Still hoping though.

Today is the only day this week it hasn't rained or is predicted to rain so I made the most of it and did some gardening on my lunch break.

I've harvested (yet another) courgette and we've just had that in some pasta for dinner.

Trimmed back some of the leaves on the tomato and pumpkin plants to try and get the sun to ripen the fruit (whenever the sun actually makes an appearance!)

I harvested some poppy seeds and have put half in an envelope for next year and just scattered half on the flower bed in the hope they make an appearance.

The first container of dwarf french beans have now run out of steam so I've moved that container to behind the shed to create a bit more space for my cosmos in pots that's just starting to flower.

@BestIsWest any advice on the everlasting sweet pea? I have one - bought it last year (reduced) it survived the winter (in a pot on sheltered patio), put on new growth, even had some flowers but the stems & lower leaves are all brown & dry - it if anything can be said it's not been dry here! Ive got it against a trellis (willow one) but it's not really grasping it, so I'm sort of tucking it in & it just generally looks a bit unhappy. Any advice on how to get it going & in better shape?
It's on a west-facing fence, but in summer gets sun from about midday till sunset.

@APurpleSquirrel mine’s in the ground and I’ve done nothing to it, just deadheaded. It’s been there for three years now. It did go brown and straw like last year eventually but so far so good. It did seem late to get started this year. It’s against a trellis so I just tie bits in and it seems to just grasp with the tendrils but it’s making a take over bid for the rose obelisk too.

Thanks @BestIsWest

@ComeIntoTheGardenMaud See also 'Oh dear..you've got a big job on here' and 'It must be lovely in (insert month other than the one you're in)'. Yes I have perfected the glare of a dowager duchess who has just spotted a dog turd on the Aubusson. I am old enough to pull that one off.
I hoed quite a bit to day and drenched a lot of roses with liquid seaweed. DH did topiary and painted the chorten which is a sort of little Buddhist monument we have. The Jack Russell roused himself and killed a rabbit in the bog garden.

Parts of the garden are a bit messy but the borders are looking good and the lilies are on the cusp of flowering in the white border. Tiger lilies just coming out in the cottage garden. It's not perfect but it's worth a fiver of anybody's money.

@@@catwithflowers Lovely puppy. Probably not conducive to an orderly garden though.

We should all channel our inner dowager duchess at all times, @Bideshi!

My only gardening today was having lunch with a friend and bouncing around some ideas for revamping her garden.

@Bideshi But very conducive to craters in the lawn 🙈. This one's a digger!!!