What are we doing in the garden 2025

It rained! Collected about quarter of a bucket of snails off the grass and paths.

 

Rain, glorious rain
The garden is thoroughly soaked, the water butt is full, the mini pond is topped up and the plants are happy

I am also happy, as I mowed and fertilised the lawn yesterday in anticipation of the rain

Everything looks so much fresher.

 

I've been doing the Snail Dance in the garden, it's simple, you see a
snail and dance on it uttering a few choice words

 

Went to plant out some stuff. It's still dust under the surface. More rain, please.

 

Yes the rain is very welcome but we need more. At the Allotments, started to plant tomatoes , soil is still dry in places.

 

Only drizzle here ... and blowing an absolute gale, which is not helpful.

 

It's been raining today so i ordered my spring bulbs for next year, they should come sometime in September, i spent £200. after a discount of 15%

 

Yikes!

 

I've ordered 320 tulips, all different colours
20 hyacinths, 75 species crocus, 90 large yellow crocus and 20 fritillaries.

 

Crikey! That is gardening at scale!

 

Planned the pond and dug the area around it, mixing the clay with plenty of compost and manure. Much easier to do now than when there is a gaping hole waiting to amuse neighbours and AE with sprained ankles or soaked Children.

Rain is promised overnight so when things settle down, we'll start digging the actual pond.




The garden is starting to take shape but I must admit that some finishing touches here and there may still be needed

 

Getting there, @Selleri.

 

Yesterday was a day of rest for me.
I resowed a couple of marrow seeds and sweetcorn, I am wondering if the marrow seed is no longer viable. Realised I had forgotten to sow any Cornichons so must remedy that oversight. I am slightly overwhelmed with the rate of seedlings coming up. Where am I going to put them all! I have a couple of loofahs up, also 3 mini melons, no cucumbers so must resow.
I am mourning the loss of my Restoria. It grew into a lovely fountain but the last two wet winters have been the end of it. A big gap to fill when I remove the dead stems. My quince tree of 9 years is slowly dying as well, too shallow soil I think.
The Morning Glory seed came through in 3 days, I am going to try planting them amongst the sweetpeas when they are big enough, or maybe a column of just Ipomea on an obelisk. That could look quite spectacular.

 

Yesterday i decided to weed a newish border where i have planted what ,i hope in due course ,will become an informal hedge. I hadnt touched the border for a while so the annual weeds had established nicely and were covering the ground quite well. When i started clearing though , to my surprise, i found a number of tomato seedlings which had clearly arisen from the adjacent veg plot where i had grown open air cordon tomatoes last year. These seedlings were well camouflaged by the weeds which had clearly given them some protection as they were growing well.
So , waste not want not , i potted up 8 sturdy seedlings , i had a mixture of outdoor tomatoes last year and that is borne out by the different seedlings i have found.
Now , the soil in that bed is just my standard garden soil , Herefordshire clay , no added goodness apart from where i had put home grown mulch around the new plants that i planted several weeks ago.
When i compare the size and vigour of the tomato seedlings i carefully raised using first seed compost and then peat free compost which have been cossetted and nurtured in the potting shed, i find that the ones i discovered are twice the size of my pampered seedlings , those seedlings are nowhere near as sturdy nor as healthy as the ones i found in my garden soil .
i thought i would share my findings , i have been disappointed in peat free compost for some time and i know many have grumbled about peat free but this has been a very illuminating discovery.

 

Great work but be careful not to make the curves to the pond shape too small, it will make the pond liner difficult to fit into. There will be a lot of folds and creases, maybe try to make the curves bigger or have one instead of two if space is limited. Great work.