Rain, rain...

...where are you?

No sign of rain at all.

Gardens could do with a bit of rain.   This evening there is moisture but you could hardly call it rain.   We need a really wet Welsh soak...preferably overnight and the sun coming up tomorrow...

As it is I am having to water the garden.   This seems ridiculous here in wet Wales.  At this time of year.   Where are the April showers?

This week I made a bit more progress in the garden.  It does tend to be one step forward and two back with Seren aided and abetted with children.   They all think they are being tremendously helpful.  Take the digging...

Jonah and Seren made wonderful progress with digging, but in the process very nearly dug up some precious plants.  As it was I had to replant some gladiola bulbs ...and you should have seen how dirty both child and puppy were....also, so very happy!

Craters or open cast mining
in the veg patch.  Luckily no veg
planted here yet.

Yes, you can see the craters.  The fence is a very new addition and hopefully the children and Seren will find it difficult to enter this patch now.   I put this little fence up this afternoon...maybe tomorrow I will have an opportunity to dig and prepare beds.  If you click on the photos they enlarge - you will see how dry it is.

I dream of it looking something like this in a couple of months....

I DID say DREAM!

Well, aim high ...I has to get better than it looks right now and I love the way this one above has been done by a clever gardener.

Potatoes are planted.   I still have loads left over I think I'll try to get a few more into somewhere - ground - more bags - somewhere - this coming week.

3 different varieties of potatoes planted

I need to work on The Mound - just out of the frame to the right.   I dug up loads of self-seeded Marguerites yesterday that were growing over the bottom slopes choking out the few strawberries I planted there in the autumn.   The Marguerites found a home in Geraldine's garden.   As did some Vinca (Periwinkle).   I stole a few Vinca roots from the roadside near Maudlam Church a few years ago, the first spring I was here...they have multiplied beyond belief so some of them went to live in Geraldine's garden too.   There are still hundreds of shoots, I shall have to thin out or they will completely choke out other things growing.  This is a plant that will do well regardless of conditions...pretty much - read the link, it is interesting.

You may remember I told you last week I had ordered some wire fencing in the wrong size?   said I would make it into plant props rather than return it.   Indeed it wasn't worth the cost of returning it.   I'm glad I didn't because it made no less than 8 new plant props...thank you D for snipping it to correct lengths.

Small wire hoop fence plant prop.
Will be just the job to support Lupin as it grows.

This has been the cheapest, and probably most cost effective way, I have found of making plant props...one 10 metre roll of 48 cm high wire border edge fence at £10...made 8 decent props.    One stupid mistake turned into a very worthwhile success.   I am feeling smug!  The prop won't be seen at all as plant grows.

Geraldine and I were shopping in Wilkos early in the week.   They are cheapest for much of the garden stuff.  On the plant stand there was a lone melon plant...Geraldine bought it on condition that I grow it in the greenhouse.   They like it very warm and moist.   Also, they like lots to eat.   So we will see if we get any melons this year.  I laced the compost with a huge helping of manure.

Melon experiment.
Doug says they don't like to go below 15C - EVER.
Hmm...we'll have to see if the poo keeps its feet warm enough.

The plants that have over-wintered in the greenhouse are all coming along well.   The fuchsias are big already.  I must re compost the hanging baskets and sort them out in the next week or two.  My Giant Pacific Delphinium seeds have germinated, so have the sweetpeas.   There just are not enough hours in the day at this time of year.   I have so many jobs on my 'to do' list...never mind the things that suddenly catch my eye or attention that take half an hour here or there quite unscheduled into the timetable.

Last year I had one or two apples on my tree - I don't know why.  I have two theories one is I didn't protect the tree against insects that can damage it as well as I should in the winter of 2013/14  - this syear I made sure the tree was well protected with a sticky band.  Or, and a more likely theory in my opinion, I did far more judicious pruning of the tree this last winter.  This spring the tree is absolutely loaded with blossom.   I'll be propping the branches and thinning out the weaker fruits if all this develops.

Apple blossom

Similarly the berry bushes, the black and red currant are dripping with berries.  I pruned those too.  As I did the grape vines which are looking much more tidy and controlled now.  Hopefully in due season they will produce grapes.  Its too early to tell yet!  The wind shelter we put around the one by the kitchen door has paid off as that vine is looking so much more healthy and is shooting away up the wires to the pergola.   Today I did an experimental prune of the climbing roses to train them up the wall rather than letting them have their own wild way hither and thither.   I'm not sure I have got it right but I do know they are so vigorous that they will forgive the odd rather severe snip.

Snowdrift Clematis

Unfortunately Seren has done her bit for pruning too and I rather fear she has killed my lovely passiflora, she bit it almost to the ground.

Geraldine and Dave have a wonderful scented clematis it is called Snowdrift.   I'd love to get one of them for the pergola.  The Virginia creeper is making headway up it at last but a clematis at this time of year would be very lovely.  The bluebells are

Bluebells and an unknown plant, front left,
Can anyone tell me what it is?

gradually colonising the borders under the pergola.   Juliet, I think of you every time I look at them.

Giant Poppy

We have had so much sunshine that the big poppies have started to bloom.   The peonies are in full bud too.  Did you know that once established peony plants can live for a hundred years?  The ones I have are from my Mum's garden in Darlington.   I moved a root or two to Dorset and then again when I moved here.  They aren't supposed to move well...or so I was told years ago.
I think these ones have disproved that theory.

The Rowan tree has unfurled its leaves - it is beginning to look more like a tree and less like a growing stick this year.   In fact, it looks to me as if it will have the signature Rowan berries on it this year too.   The Rowan was once traditionally grown at the entrance to Welsh gardens to ward off evil spirits entering.   Nice to have my own guardian tree!  Next to the Rowan is a bush that I think is supposed to be a lilac.   maybe that will flower this year and reveal its identity.  Both the Rowan and the supposedly Lilac came from Dorset those 3 and a half years ago - Andrew planted them so I am not sure of their identity.   Let me rephrase that.  Andrew, I don't doubt your word but you said you thought they were a Rowan and a Lilac....

The Hostas are doing well and no sign of slug damage so far.   I hope the nematodes are doing their job and I have to say where I have applied it...so far so good.   I shall order more for the veg garden too.  The Dicentra is in bloom now too...I love the little bleeding hearts.

Dicentra, or Bleeding Heart

Aquilegia are all over the garden, they self-seed freely and pop up all over the place as a nice surprise.  The little daffodils I planted in the autumn, the ones with multiheads and the little pale star shaped ones, are so beautifully scented that they perfume the garden in the evening wonderfully and I only have a few of them.   I must get more next autumn.  They give off a delicate lemony smell.

I have been feasting on early rhubarb for a few weeks now too.  It's lovely if you roast it with a sprinkle of sugar and then add to a little pot of Greek Yoghurt.  So good to be able to eat what you grow.  No pesticides, no travel miles, and tastes wonderful.

I think that is all the garden news this week...apart from pulling up a lavender plant and relocating it to a patch where I had lost one.  It is an experiment.   I dug it out from under the Cistus which was smothering it.   I'll see if it lives or dies...it would have died under the Cistus anyway.   That Cistus is getting huge.   I have cut it back a bit.   That's another experiment.   I do a lot of experimenting,  Some works, surprising a lot works and some doesn't.

"One of the truest of gardening sayings is that you have to be cruel to be kind. If things are left to go overgrow, they look out of shape, scale and control."
- Brian Davis

How does your garden grow...?

...Fast - in April!

Tulips in my garden

As much as I try to get on top of the gardening I seem to fail.   There is so much to do.   In truth, I should be digging not tapping this post.  However, digging in the middle of the day is probably unwise.  Well, that's my excuse.  Also the ground is pretty hard because we have not had any rain to speak of for ages.

It doesn't deter little Digger....

I have to fence this off from digger
 or it will all be pointless

Mmm, that patch is supposed to have potatoes, peas, courgettes and strawberries in it by now....oh dear.  I better get on with it.

I was going to plant strawberries in a planter under glass but the children commandeered the box I had in mind for an imaginary steam train.

Another plan foiled by those who more or less live here.

The meadow?   That should be doing well now...well, yes, it should...but...

Less meadow but hardly lawn!

...Seren needs space to play and poo.  I'll explain - I need to be able to see where she's 'been' so I can clear up.   Of course there is plenty of time to let the meadow grow later, we'll see how I feel about it in a month or so.

So there you are.   Three not-done jobs already.   I did buy fencing for the veg plot but I stupidly ordered the wrong height.   At the minimal cost I paid it is not worth returning, it can be adjusted and made into plant props to supplement the ones I've already made.  But it does mean I need to reorder the right size...bother.

But making up for the failed jobs are the tulips which, if I say so myself, are stunning.   Let me encourage you to plant tulip bulbs every autumn it really rewards you in spring.  They aren't difficult to plant and they are relatively cheap...and go on popping up every year for quite a few years.

Pale Pink Double

One of my favourites,  green as a pea pod.

Miniature pink, love the simplicity

Sunshine colours

Are they not worth planting every autumn?







Leah loves the almost black ones.

Darker than this in real life.

So those success have made my failures easier to live with - but that is no excuse for not getting out there and digging, planting weeding.

This is the month to pull up those pesky weeds.   While they are visible before other things hide them under new growth or, worse,  get so entangled with the roots that they are almost impossible to remove without hurting the plant they are strangling.

False widow spider

But I have tidied the sheds...and that is an energizing job.   I can't work when I can't find the things I want!  So I have found my tools and tidied up all the bits and pieces into sensible categorised groups. I found a few rather big spiders too.   Those were not tidied up.   One ran away and the other one I squashed.  Sorry spider but you did look as if you might deliver a bite - not all that poisonous, in fact, most unlikely you would bite anyone...but just in case little fingers probed where they shouldn't.

Kiddies' Corner

I plan to feed the roses today.   They are greedy little beauties and will repay you for a feed now with lovely flowers in June.   Fish, blood and bone will do them nicely.

When I tidied the sheds I took out the children's table and chairs.  I notice they love to play at the bottom of the garden where they think I can't see them (I can...I'm a granny - we have eyes in the back of our heads).   This is an unexpectedly sheltered from the wind corner. I found a cheap vivid pink geranium at B&Q and a little green recycled bamboo pot to hold it.  I hung the bird feeder I bought last summer in Windemere.   It is a little bit of fun.   I've seen very few birds use it but maybe in this new position they will feel safer using it.

This is placed right next to the pond and the little bird bath.  There are some white bells in flower just in front of Jonah.

White bell flowers, i don't know what they are

These flowers have all grown from one little plant I found growing by the kitchen door whe I first moved here.   It was not in the right place so I moved it...oh my goodness, it loves this spot!

The greenhouse is full too.   A lot of the plants that have over wintered there are coming back.  I pruned them and the pelagoniums have new shoots.   The fig tree must come out of there this week.  Tomatoes are doing fine.   Mostly.  Two of the six got eaten by a slug on their first night in the greenhouse - one will regrow but the other ...well, let's say, I'll hope.... Meantime I have reintroduced slug pellets but only in the greenhouse and it is safely barricaded from Seren AT ALL TIMES!

Full of overwintering plants
plus some seedlings

Tomato plants 

The slug also got all, every one of my germinated marigolds.   In the greenhouse  back right in white plastic bag are some pelagonium cuttings.   Various family members  have indicated they would like some if they 'work' - actually if they do work I rather think a few of them will be looking for homes.   I could probably successfully post them to you if you let me know....I'll ask again later...if they actually sprout roots and grow.

I have made JP's headstone (or head-driftwood as he loved the beach so much) One of my jobs this afternoon is to fix it into place.   In a manner that little Jaws cannot remove and chew.

Well, I cannot, nay, must not sit here any longer when the day is fine and there is so much to get on with.  I'll leave you with a few shots of the garden...successes not the failures.

Anemones 

Fennel

The silver birch is beginning to look like a real tree now.
Don't you love the way it shines and sparkles?

Chat to you again soon and hopefully I will have rectified some of my failures by then.

It's so exciting....

...squealed Leah as she ran in from the garden...

Seven spot Ladybird

...with two little ladybirds crawling along her fingers.   Seven spot ladybirds are one of the 'signs' of spring.  So yes, it is exciting!

Things are so busy in the garden.   I confess, I am way behind my own schedule.  I expect gardeners all over the country are saying the same thing.  We are like Alice in Wonderland's White Rabbit...always late....always rushing.  At this time of year there is an extraordinary amount to do.

Thank you to Alec who sent me a generous gift voucher recently for Mother's Day.   I spent it on the weekend on garden tools.  An edge spade - or edge iron - and a Dutch hoe.   These will save me bending double for hours on end.   At the moment most the digging in my garden is done by ...

...you guessed it...SEREN!   She, also in cahoots with Jonah, is good at nipping, or picking, off flower heads.  I told them both they would get into a great deal of trouble if I caught them -or saw evidence of them - doing this.

In spite of my tardiness and Seren's destructiveness, the garden is beginning to look pretty.   The pots and containers I planted up just after JP died in October were in full bloom over the Easter weekend.   The weather for the last week or more has been wonderful.

CLICK ON THE PHOTOS THEY WILL ENLARGE

Camillia

Tulips and little daffodils

Mainly blues and yellows,
the hyacinths smell divine

Nodding in the sunshine

Violas and pansies are always look good.

New bench resplendent in the spring sunshine

I honestly think if you want an easy show of spring colour the best way to do this is bulbs, bulbs and more bulbs planted in the autumn.   In pots where you can place them to their best advantage, but also in the ground too.

All the plants growing mean that they will get bigger and bigger quite quickly and then they flop over.   My big poppies, Papaver, and the Peonies are the worst culprits for falling over.  I needed some plant supports to put in now before they get big in order to manage their 'flop'.  I found a link on the internet on how to make supports inexpensively.  Good old Gardener's World Monty Don on You Tube.  To buy the equivalent is at least £6.00 each, usually more.

Here are mine, step by step.   The bendy iron I bought locally.   The very helpful guys were happy to cut the super-long lengths into the size I wanted - 2.5m long for each.  They even loaded them in the little Polo, being careful not to stab the children.

6mm mild steel rods, 2.5m long

Bend the rods into a nice 'U' shape.
I used this planter to bend round,
you could use a dustbin, anything you like,
the iron bends easily.

Nicely bent (like me!)

Place a board at a strategic point,
wherever you think best for purpose.
Bend the 'legs at right angles to the board,
which you are standing on to keep steady.
Look at my little helper!

It takes about 15 seconds only to make one! And the cost of each one is £3.00 - So easy.   Then just put them in place round the plants that will need the support later.   The iron rusts and blends in you won't notice it...and best thing of all...it is not something Seren will pull up and chew!

Round the peony - the reddish
plant just pushing through the ground.

Round the big poppies

I need to make another 6 or so of these. Next week...on the list!  You can adjust the size of the 'u' hoop and the height to suit the plants.

And yes, of course I have been planting both seeds and plug plants.

Chili planted from seed 

Tomato plug plants potted up,
they have since 'stood' up straight and are
looking wonderful.

This is how the tomato plug plants arrived in the post.
Efficient isn't it? They arrive in perfect condition.

Seeds too - here they are. Sweet pea, marigold and delphinium so far.   The vegetable seed mostly goes straight into the ground as I plant peas mostly ...and potatoes of course.   But first the ground intended needs fencing off from Deathly Jaws and Paws aka Seren.

Seeds planted, some for propagator and
some for greenhouse.

But, oh the long list of things to do!   A mound of bags to take to the tip...maybe Friday.   Many more seeds to plant.   Pelargonium propagating essentially has to be done.   The fencing of veg-plot.  Planting of spuds, peas and any other veg I want this year...probably courgettes.   I want kale again too and chard and oh,  AND cucumbers....

Today the delivery of pond plants arrived.   It was very exciting.   Leah and I planted them up before lunch.  The planting is pretty temporary until the plants get a little bigger.   I didn't have the right sort of compost but I'm hoping, that since these are such little pots, the leeching of nutrients into the pond won't be disastrous.  When I replant permanently I will use the proper pots/baskets and compost.

Pond marginals and oxygenaters planted 

The plants include Pennyroyal (or pond mint) Marsh marigold, both of these I had in my pond in Dorset and they are great once they get going.   Then there is Creeping Jenny and another one I just can't remember the name of it right now...and it is dark so I can't go out and look!   It is also a creeping plant.. The oxygenater is Horned Pondweed.  It just floats on the top.  So far so good.  Young Jonah has been warned about fiddling with the pond plants too....hmmm...better keep a close eye on him.   Two and a bit doesn't always remember long-term the careful instructions I give...usually the instructions start with 'DON'T...'   Hopefully he is not left with a negative feeling about gardening ever after as a result of my long list of 'don'ts'.

So, tomorrow is another glorious day.   I do hope we have lots of opportunity to work in the garden.   I can rely on Leah to help.   She is so responsible about putting on the sun-block and her little sun hat. That child is a born gardener.   I think Jonah has potential too when he learns to stop destroying the pretty flowers...I know he loves them but just hasn't got the hang of leaving them to grow yet!  Seren too.

I will leave you with this last picture of the Hibiscus flower that flowered especially for Easter Sunday.   Maybe a seasonal Easter garden symbol - blood red?  You decide, it is lovely whatever you believe.

Red as blood,
Hibiscus, this one originally
a rooted cutting from Sweden.

Chat to you again...hopefully soon but it is a busy time of year so might not be quite as soon as I plan if digging gets in the way.