View Full Version : Today in the Garden
tails4wagging
May 5th, 2005, 06:00 PM
Put my runner beans in today. Hope snails/slugs leave them alone. I have put sharp sand around them.
Also put my tom, plants in a grow bag.
cedarblue
May 7th, 2005, 01:54 PM
does sharp sand really work effectively, tails?
we have great problems with slugs & snails in our garden, there are loads of them and they have stripped a new planting of plants overnight.
today the weather is sunny & warm/windy/raining/hail/sunny again.... but managed to plant out my little yellow marigolds around the pond at the end of the garden - looks pretty and the rain is helping them settle in :)
loads of first early pots poking through now and the strawberries in our plastic greenhouse have trillions of buds/potential strawbs on them!
broad beans seem to be settling ok and the peas need help to train their spindles round the string to climb on. lettuces seem to be holding their own too. sunflowers are coming on well in greenhouse and the sweetcorn is all poking through.
rescued a mini stag beetle from pond too! ;)
Aurora
May 7th, 2005, 06:02 PM
Put my runner beans in today. Hope snails/slugs leave them alone. I have put sharp sand around them.
Also put my tom, plants in a grow bag.
Put our runner beans in this time last year and they all got wind burn and took ages to grow again, even though they did eventually. So not putting ours in until the end of the month.
Tidying the greenhouse out tomorrow and transferring the baby plants to the cold frame to harden off to put in the garden next week and the tomato plants, cucumber plants, aubergine and melon plants into bigger pots to grow in the greenhouse.
Bought one courgette plant from the garden centre today (not worth putting seed in for just one plant!) and 6 brussels sprout plants as our seeds didn't grow and it's too late to start again.
Sunny, rainy and hailing this afternoon (not all at the same time though) :rolleyes:
tails4wagging
May 7th, 2005, 08:31 PM
Yes, dam and blast they forecast a light frost tonight and my runner beans and lettuce are out!!.
Sharp sand is working so far, its too rough and sharp for snails and slugs and you can dig it into the earth as well as good drainage.
DianeVegan
May 13th, 2005, 01:07 AM
The chipmunks have a new favorite food! Green beans! They aren't even waiting for them to sprout.
eve
May 13th, 2005, 08:29 AM
I noticed that my strawberry plants already have 4 baby strawberries growing - of course they aren't red yet, but it was a pleasant surprise to see them. :)
tails4wagging
May 13th, 2005, 09:20 AM
My strawberry plants are in my greenhouse still and they have a few flowers on.
Yesterday I sat in the garden watching the baby sparrows being fed, blue tits in and out of the nest box busy feeding. Mrs Blackbird still sitting on eggs. Also have honey bees in a hole in the lawn ? hive in there.
Lovely to watch the busy activity of nature this time of year.
Bloomin cold though, we have a north east wind blowing!.
cedarblue
May 13th, 2005, 11:12 AM
last night in the garden....
about 10pm last night, i was just going to go up to bed when one of our cats darted to the french windows, ears up, all alert. now for a few days our seed markers have been found scattered all over the garden, it was a mystery :confused: well, when i looked out the windows last night there were two baby fox cubs playing and chasing each other around the garden, they then disappeared by the shed. our shed is falling down and needs to be dismantled, but maybe there is a little set in there??? :)
veganblue
May 13th, 2005, 11:31 AM
I can't wait till it rains!!! It is so dry here - the weather is beaut actually but no good for the garden. Trees are looking sick all over the place - native and exotic ones.
I am looking forward the the rain so I can put bean seeds in, as well as the shovel - the ground is rock hard too.
Roxy
May 13th, 2005, 08:37 PM
OK - Miss brown thumb here!
So far my lavender plants seem to be going well. They are growing a little taller and more bushy. But no flowers :(
Yesterday, I bought a small basil plant, which I am going to transfer into a pot and grow on my balcony. Does anyone have any hints or tips to help keep it alive?
DianeVegan
May 14th, 2005, 03:01 AM
Basil needs sun, and will thrive more in heat and sun than cool and wet (unlike, say, mint , which will grow in those conditions). It also doesn't like to be crowded as it will get moldy. So.... a really sunny window with the perfect amout of water will do it :)
Seaside
May 14th, 2005, 03:25 AM
Hi Roxy,
I just planted a few lavender plants myself a few months ago, and they are only just blooming now.
Make sure you keep the basil in the sun, as Dianecrna suggested, and make sure that whenever the tiny flower buds appear, you pinch them off with your fingernails while they are still small. This will keep the basil growing leaves, which is what you want. If you let it flower too soon, it will go to seed and die without getting very big. The tiny buds taste good too, so you don't have to waste them. :)
tails4wagging
May 14th, 2005, 04:59 AM
I can't seem to grow basil, always dies off with me!!
Seaside
May 14th, 2005, 05:13 AM
Do you call it "bayzil" or "bazzle"? I don't think it likes to grow for people who call it "bazzle"..... :D
If you can grow tomatoes, you should be able to grow basil. It is an annual, and so doesn't live on from season to season like other herbs. Maybe it just has a shorter growing season where you live?
Roxy
May 14th, 2005, 08:55 AM
Thanks Dianecrna and Seaside! The basil will get a good amount of sun for the most of the morning (as does the lavender).
So the basil will die off at the end of the summer? Hopefully the lavender won't and I guess I will have to bring it inside for the colder months.
Aurora
May 14th, 2005, 04:56 PM
Growing basil in the conservatory, it's too cold here for it outside yet. I have also grown some mixed leaves in a pot and they are now outside. It's lovely to make my salad for work each morning and pop out to put some fresh herbs and leaves in it. Can't wait for our own tomatoes and cucumbers to grow!
Got some fruits on our strawberries too (well the ones in the planter, the ones in the ground are much slower to grow) Hubby put some netting around them last week to stop the birds from eating them!
Hopefully will be putting some bedding plants in the garden tomorrow as they were hardened off in the cold frame all week.
DianeVegan
May 14th, 2005, 05:28 PM
Roxy, basil is an annual so it will die off in the cold and you will need to plant more next year. Some people are able to overwinter it indoors but I have never had any luck with this. I just make a bunch of pesto, freeze it in ice cube trays and use it all winter in place of fresh.
Lavender is a perennial so it might survive the winter. You need to have the correct pH for the soil and the correct type of lavender for your climate. I have had mixed results with lavender but mine did manage to partially survive this year. Again, some people have luck with overwintering inside.
Roxy
May 15th, 2005, 05:58 AM
Thanks so much for all of your advice!
I have a couple more pots to fill and hopefully will find something useful to grow, over the next couple of weeks.
Seaside
May 15th, 2005, 08:15 AM
What sort of climate do you have, Roxy? Lavender is used in landscaping where I live, and it is very hardy. We don't get any snow, though, except once in a blue moon! We do get some frost.
Roxy
May 16th, 2005, 06:14 AM
I am in Vancouver B.C. I have lived here for 3 years. When I lived back in Australia, I seemed to be a lot better at gardening, than I am here. I think the difference in climates is what really throws me off.
We get quite warm here in the summer (high 20's and sometimes low 30's - celcius that is lol).
In the winter, we don't get as cold as the rest of Canada, and may have a few days of snow in December or January.....but that's about it.
eve
May 16th, 2005, 07:08 AM
Today I read in my gardening book "container gardening" a quote from Francis Bacon that "gardening is the purest of human pleasures" - with which I concur. :)
kokopelli
May 16th, 2005, 10:43 AM
The purest and the most useful! :)
kokopelli
May 16th, 2005, 11:05 AM
I am in Vancouver B.C. I have lived here for 3 years. When I lived back in Australia, I seemed to be a lot better at gardening, than I am here. I think the difference in climates is what really throws me off.
We get quite warm here in the summer (high 20's and sometimes low 30's - celcius that is lol).
In the winter, we don't get as cold as the rest of Canada, and may have a few days of snow in December or January.....but that's about it.
Yeah, it definitely takes time to get used to new gardening conditions!
We used to live near London, where the climate is lots drier than in Wales, where we live now. Also, the soil was light and dry there, and it's very heavy, sticky clay here, which takes ages to be ready to work in the spring.
It was a real shock when all our potatoes and tomatoes got blight at first, because we'd never had it before, and now I grow mainly early potatoes because they're ready before the blight strikes. And we don't try to grow tomatoes outdoors at all any more.
Also, saved seeds take a few generations to adapt to the new conditions and grow as well as they did before. I've always thought BC might be a bit like Wales, I heard Margaret Atwood once say that Canada's like Wales, 'it's where the weather comes from'! But here, we can get frosts as late as June, which was also a big shock at first.
My partner's developed a way of making cloches and tunnels from woven willow frameworks covered in polythene, which are a big help. We grew the willows ourselves, they're 'salix viminalis' or 'superwillow' and they are really amazing! You just push a foot-long rod into the ground, so that a few buds are showing at the top, and in the first year these grow into shoots which you cut back. The next year, the stump grows 9ft long sturdy shoots which you can cut back and use to make the tunnel framework. And the stump will grow a new batch of shoots every year! And you can grow new plants just by cutting a fresh rod into sections and planting them! The tunnel framework will also sprout shoots under the polythene cover, and you can either cut these back, or leave them to create shaded areas.
One problem with all this is the polythene, though, which I recently discovered gives off poisonous hydrogen cyanide if it's burnt, and it isn't biodegradable. I think the government here is trying to implement a recycling scheme, though, so I hope that gets underway soon.
RockyRaccoon
May 16th, 2005, 01:19 PM
I mowed my lawn yesterday. I knew it needed doing when I could no longer see the dog when she was at the bottom of the garden! It was hard going mowing grass 2 foot high! Now I can see my garden again I can decide what I'm going to do with it. I love gardening but since I've lived in this house I've not touched it, it's all lawn at the moment, but I've got big plans :) .
I have some herbs in pots outside the backdoor and I potted them up this morning. Mmmm, the smell has put me in a really summery mood. I also sorted out my pots and hanging baskets, ready for planting and putting out the front in a couple of weeks.
tails4wagging
May 16th, 2005, 01:55 PM
Raining today, typical I watered my garden yesterday!!.
I have had to put netting around the edge of both my veg, plots due to some cat, pooing all over it!!.
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