What have you done in the garden today? Part 8

[Jimmyneutronsforehead]

A continuation thread.

Thank you to MereDintOfPandiculation for threads 1 through 6. We wouldn't have built this lovely gardening community without you.

No gardening job is too small or too big to tell us about.

Spring is springing into action, let's get mucky.

Yesterday I had my patio and path cleaned, the patio was rather green up near the house as I face north at the back.

It looks lovely, the different coloured slabs now look very nice. Today they are sorting the slabs that have black spot and then resealing the whole lot. The path is being regrouted as well as some of the sand/cement mix has come quite loose or come out completely. It's been down since 2018 so it deserves a bit of pampering.

I can't do any gardening at all today as they will be here for most of it so it's off down to our beach hut and I can sit and read and watch the world sail by. 😁

Quick question. The one dahlia yet to sprout has a few roots showing but the corm is very near the surface (someone told me they like this). Is this true? The others are buried deeper and has been up for a couple of weeks.

I scraped the earth back a bit to expose some of the corm when I thought nothing was happening. I can't say for sure whether this started them off but they are definitely going well now so it's highly likely that they do like this.

Fussy blighters! 😆Must remember for next year now.

Went out to grab some onions, to use as spring onions because they're no where near ready but we needed some for salad, and noticed the bed was full of weeds.

I'd not seen these weeds before, and then I realised they're the seedlings of the millions of hollyhock seeds I accidentally scatterblasted across the garden last year.

There's so many of them. I fear hollyhocks are going to be my sycamore problem.

I’ve planted a couple of clematis (piilu) in a tiny bit that probably isn’t technically my garden - it depends whether the boundary follows the wall or the fence - but the neighbours have lived there 30+ years, if they were going to reclaim it they likely would have done so by now. And if they suddenly decide to, I shan’t argue. Anyway, this isn’t where I had planned to put the clematis, but I was so excited about having a garden, and was a little premature in purchasing plants - I bought four at Tesco, must be six weeks ago at least. They’re desperately trying to grow and flower, so they needed to get in the ground. So, that’s where they’re going now, and when they’re established I will take cuttings and put them where they were supposed to go. I still have two more to plant, I’ll put those further down, past the wallflowers. Beyond that there’s still ivy to pull out.

I wish I had a hollyhock problem

Instead it's just fucking green alkanet 😡 I dug out some more today.

Just had to Google what alkanet as we've never had any and it looks beautiful but I can see how it can easily become a pest in the borage family.

The lady who's bungalow garden I admire when I'm walking to and from school planted borage once and had these beautiful blue borders along with some nigella and now every year around this time of year I catch her and her husband both out pulling up seedlings. I haven't seen them doing it this year and their beds are completely empty, which is unusual for them, so I wonder if they've gone nuclear and are just resting the beds for now.

Their over the road neighbour also has the most beautiful passiflora on their fence and it's all just shrivelled vines, and I want to be nosy and ask what happened because they brought me so much joy, but I know that question won't land well so I won't but internally I'll be constantly wondering. They do still have their beautiful, almost weeping ornamental cherry tree though and I love slowing down my walk just to admire it.

They also had this really beautiful deep royal purple lavatera or some sort of mallow, I had the courage to ask them what it was a few years ago, and they said they had no idea it was there when they moved in but they cut it back and it comes back every year so I was going to ask them if I could have a cutting the next time I saw it but I suspect they've managed to get rid of it completely.

Whenever I Google dark purple mallows I only get hibiscus but I am certain it wasn't a hibiscus and it was more of a lavatera but it's been on my mind for a while. If I ever see one, I'm snatching it up.

I'd never heard of green alkanet either until I moved here! Self seeds massively, horrible prickly leaves that give me a rash, insanely long tap root (think dandelion) that you can rarely pull out completely so it just grows back again. My neighbour has a 'lawn' of 80-90% of it so I'll never be free unless we get a neighbour who gardens.

The wisteria is turning into pods - I'm sweeping the purple snow daily. I also poured some boiling water over the ants right by the back door otherwise they'll come inside, sorry anties.

We had Alkanet when we moved here almost 20 years ago, and had to chase roots almost a foot down to absolutely eradicate them. It took a few years but we haven’t had any for over a decade now.
Sedge is the menace in my garden, it sets off my hayfever when it flowers and there were a few huge clumps when we moved in.
Apparently sedge has very patient seeds, and even though we’ve been pulling up seedlings before they can flower for years, somehow there are still tens (down from hundreds) popping up each year.

Sedge is one of my annoyances here too. There was a huge clump that we pulled up years ago but neighbours have it and I’m always finding seedlings. Willowherb and couch grass are my other nuisances.
I enjoy weeding though.

Malope is a type of mallow with beautiful flowers. Not so purple though?
Malope triffida, malope vulcan, mostly reds pinks and white. Very easy to grow too.

I’m on ivy duty again. I found this though, I’m thinking blackberry / raspberry? I’ll leave it there and see what happens, I won’t mind if it fruits.

Thats a hazel

Well my hanging baskets of trailing pelargoniums have gone out so they will have to take their chances. I have simply run out of space in the greenhouse now the tomatoes are in there.

We have an overnight of 1c forecast for Monday morning but we have had a few of those forecast in the past 2 weeks and it hasn’t got below 4C so I’m chancing it.

Finally got the trailing verbenas I bought a couple of weeks ago into the shady border, planted 2 bare root roses, and had a general tidy up. Still plenty to do but the garden is getting there now. Still having to water everything as we have had no significant rain for a while and the butts are almost empty 😟

Oh 😕 Thanks. Not really a great place for a massive tree, so I’ll pull it out now, before it gets any bigger.

I did google, AI helpfully told me it’s a stinging nettle 🙄

Today I weeded the raised beds, very excited to see the first leaves of a cantaloupe. I covered the row of red raspberries with fleece in an attempt to protect them, as soon as the shoots are an inch or two tall they’re getting eaten/pulled out at the base. It’s not affecting the Fallgold ones in the same bed though, no idea what’s causing it.
I also emptied, moved (that was mostly DH’s effort to be fair) and then refilled the log store and made a space for a compost bin.
I’ve now come in as it’s raining, but it’s only a little drizzle. We could do with a good soak really.

Started to do some pots for my DMs little courtyard. She has a much bigger garden but can’t get out into it anymore. My brother keeps it mowed and I keep the brambles under control but I like to keep the little bit she can see from her sitting room looking pretty. Unfortunately it came to rain before I did much.

Lovely to see the flowers come to life. My Desdemona rose is looking fab.

What have I done in the garden today?

Absolutely nothing, I've been down the beach, it was absolutely glorious.

Tomorrow is not going to be as nice so I will feed everything again, move a few pots around and possibly pot up a small tub.

The patio has been cleaned to within an inch of it's life earlier this morning and next week will be sealed and the path regrouted. Can't wait ...

I cleared some crap out of the summerhouse then lit a fire and sat by it,pondering the future. I did put fresh water out for the birds and insects, and fed the tadpoles. No real gardening.

I got some Gazanias and Cosmos from a scout plant sale, so got those planted out.
I also put twine on the Hazel Obelisk I set up last week, and planted out my peas, courgettes and cucumbers to climb up it.
A busy garden day on the quiet, suddenly the garden is looking much more gardeny.

Got some new Dahlias today the ones we carefully stored all winter and planted back out so lovingly were dead as a dodo. Got some white snap dragons which we have planted in our raised beds and two new thyme (lemon scented) which have beautiful pink and white flowers.

My lilac tree £35 arrived on Friday and it was a huge disappointment really disappointed it’s 30 cm max high and the Cardoon is 15 cm (£25) I was a bit shocked to be honest. We are hoping they rally. I have put them in their tiny pots outside to harden up a bit before planting out.

2/3 of the wisterias have actually flowered this year which bodes well for when they get planted in the soil in September.

My boys (dogs not the children) keep peeing on the raised borders and the climbing hydrangeas look to be suffering so we have fenced them off for a week or so to discourage the boys from their constant drenching of it!

Its been a tricky few weeks here in terms of health and family so nice to get to a garden centre today and do some planting.

My hanging baskets are starting to grow and drop down a bit which is pleasing.

Thanks for clarifying the “boys” @Liquoricethyme 😂

I went garden centre-ing today, managed three! Didn’t buy anything at the posh one. I bought trailing lobelia, a ceanothus, and chocolate mint at the semi-posh one (thank you, whoever told me about that). Then stopped off at the not very posh one for compost and a nemesia “bananaberry”.

I’ve put the nemesia with the clematis, in the possibly-not-mine bit. Then I potted up loads of spider plant babies, and repotted a couple of other outside plants.

I have a contorted hazel in a pot, it’s only growing leaves around the bottom. Should I chop it right back to where the growth is?

Oh wow - my Desdemonas are no where near flowing (though I only planted them early last year, so perhaps they're still getting established?)

My Desdemona has got tons of buds and will bloom very soon.