First week in February

Time to make a start on clearing up all the dead debris in the greenhouse.  The greenhouse has been with us for over 20 years.  It was bought from a school in Newnham on Severn who were offering it for sale. It’s a large domeshaped greenhouse, trendy at the time.  It’s pros are that there is a larger groundfloor area than in a conventional rectangular greenhouse and rather than two beds on either side, or shelves depending on how a greenhouse is set out, there’s an elliptical bed for about one half of it. There’s some low shelving on the other side and two tables which serve as shelves.

I find it difficult to regulate the temperature, especially in early spring though.  When the suns rays are becoming stronger, before leaves have appeared, the suns rays sear through the glass and overheat seeds trying to germinate.  I know.  I should white wash it/shade it but I don’t.  Then in mid summer it becomes unbearably hot in there.  There is a difficult to reach window within the roof which flops open then I can’t shut easily. There are side vents which I presume offer some air circulation and then the door.  The door is like a stable door, in two halves.  I can open both but that becomes an invitation to the rabbits.  I need a better plan.

Back to the clearing up.  The main problem was brambles which had successfully colonised the area underneath the shelving and tables.  Brambles are notorious for refusing to budge.  If they are chopped off at ground level you can almost here them chuckle as their instant response is to sprout a rash of vigorous shoots just below the surface.  Digging them out becomes almost impossible.

Alys Fowler  A horticulturist / journalist is often an inspiration to me in her weekly newspaper magazine column.  Two weeks ago she urged us to sort out our boxes of seeds, discarding or putting to one side seed packets older than three years and then taking stock of what is left.  With the discarded packets I could try an initial germination test on some absorbent paper.

January 2019 – new resolve?

Sometimes you need a nudge to motivate and inspire for the next year’s cycle of gardening.  I think I found this last week, leafing through eldest son’s partner’s gardening magazines and literature.  The main inspiration came from Charles Dowding’s 2019 gardening calendar  

I first heard about him last year from a local contact.  Charles is  a no dig man who, I learned, is keen to share knowledge and help others become productive and successful veg growers. His calendar looked like a great help for me. What struck my eye the most was that sowing and planting times guidance was woven through each month, sowing under glass and outside.  I liked this idea of being prompted so much that I’ve ordered a copy.  Also his diary so that I can keep notes of what went in when and how it fared.

I’ll let you know how it goes!  Will I remain motivated by this diary or will it become less of a challenge as the months pass?

New Year – New Ideas for the Jungle

Alice Fowler writing in the Guardian Magazine last November urged me to plant my garlic bulbs early to ensure a fatter growth and become established before the winter set in.

Full of good intentions I tried to buy some Isle of Wight Garlic at our local garden Centre, Coinross at Taurus Crafts near Lydney.  They had sold out!  Too late so resolved to start looking earlier in 2018..

Eventually I sourced some from the internet and they arrived, cloves separate, in a small packet.  I left them in the utility room until I felt inclined to plant and more time passed.  By Christmas they were sprouting, desperately trying to escape from the package.  A glance outside at the snow suggested now was not the best time so armed with some toilet rolls I went into the greenhouse and planted them in some rich compost, covered the tray of bulbs to protect against hungry mice and..yes forgot about them.

Two weeks later they had gone bonkers, growing over 10cm a piece and brushing against their lids.  Now what do I do?  It is late January now – my cold frame is under construction. .so await until next week when warmer weather is promised.

 

All those flower seeds I never sowed….

I managed to germinate quite a few lupins – according to the press, lupins are ‘back in’ – not that I care – just like them but seems now, we should!

Germinated some thyme – saw a bed of it in a 93 year old’s garden on Thursday and that looked good, as a clump.  So planted those out..

They are a bit titchy – also scattered some nasturtium seeds and some alysum around the area.  we’ll see what happens – need to be on slug alert!

The bed opposite the side kitchen window is slowly progressing.  The dahlias shoots are out but so are the blink’ slugs – tried some organic slug barrier and some organic slug pellets – will put out some pots of black currant juice shortly.

 

Trying to sort the varying heights of the plants and seeds I sow.  At the front I scattered some californian poppies to accompany the small seedlings I planted there (struggled in the drought) also some candytuft, some cosmos at the back, some forget-me knot in the middle. Rains forcast later so perhaps a good time to sow.

Second mouse attack!

Sowed more sweetcorn – they’ve germinated successfully in the house – fingers crossed we have no mousey friends inside here…

But they’ve eaten all my butternut squash seeds!

and most of my sunflower seeds.

It’s not right …something needs to be done

 

Mouse attack

I thought my troubles were over with disappearing plants now that the slug traps are operational.  I was wrong!  My newly sown little pots of special sweetcorn were stolen in the night, pot by pot ransacked, by greedy mice.  Now I know why I only had about 10 plants last year!

Unscathed seeds are safely inside busy germinating.  I’ve bought some more seeds but forgot to buy a mouse trap!

Slugs

Each year I sow seeds then wonder why they don’t appear quite often.  Very slowly it has dawned on me…the veg garden is bordered by a wall on one side and a slugtastic lawn edge on the other. Slugs beat me too the seedlings before I have chance to set eyes on them!

 

Friend or Foe?

Seed sowing continues in earnest.  In the greenhouse, whilst sowing some seeds I spotted what looked like a small red spider.

 

Initial research suggested that it was a red spider mite, threatening to infest the greenhouse and ruin my plants.  I hadn’t killed it of course so was that the case?

red spider

Yet close up images didn’t quite match up and a bit more digging around on the web found this

Red Velvet Mites

So it isn’t a foe, it’s a friend!  http://www.cirrusimage.com/Arachnid_velvet_mite.htm

from this site it appears that they serve as an important link in the ecosystem web.

 

Next up on my greenhouse guest list was a millipede

I thought a millipede was a millipede but on research it seems that there is a whole family of differing types

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millipede

Final conclusion:  The sieved soil from the base of the cleared compost heap is teeming with useful wildlife 🙂

 

Spring Bulbs…

Are up!

So far worth the effort and wait

It’s quite interesting, the order in which the same variety of daffodils bloom – seems related to how much direct sunshine they receive. Waiting for the dahlias stored in a shed to start shooting, then I can plant those to carry on with a late summer display.  need to sow some annuals for the summer – will try directly into the soil but bet the slugs get ’em!

Sowing Day – Monday 12th March 2017

It’s got warmer.  Every year I do this – rush outside and sow lots of seeds then it cools down, rains/ lacks rain and things don’t appear. or else they do but the slugs get there first.

This year is going to be different!  I shall be more vigilant and monitor progress.  One row of beetroot (boltardy) and one row of carrots (Nantes) have been sown. I sowed some broad beans yesterday.  meanwhile in the greenhouse a variety of tomatoes, cucumber and courgette have gone in.

Of increasing nuisance is the rabbit factor. They seem to be multiplying – yes like rabbits – in the garden.  Sometimes when I drive the car into the drive after dark there is a flurry of furry activity as a whole herd of rabbits are busying themselves on the lawn and scamper off guiltily, having feasted on our winter veg.  So netting is in progress. We didn’t used to have this problem when we had cats…