What are we doing in the garden 2025

Looks like another sunny day here in Nottinghamshire, so going to try and get in garden. Nice surprise, when l checked last night on my 'wheeler 'cab and' tokyo' turnips in the raised bed, l found a tray of diff seedlings. l had forgotten id sown last month, and pushed the tray under the garden bench. There's a rooted cutting of a clematis, no idea which one as l never label anything :( A rooted chamomile, some more cabb ( does have a label but just says Red cab lol, and a lovely pot of healthy mizuna seedling. Mizuna are very frost hardy, as grown them a few year ago So now making a plan to pot up a 'stir fry' winter greens container. l want make 2 large containers to put by kitchen back door that lead to front garden. Its very sheltered there. l will experiment with mizuna, baby kale, japanese onion, red vein sorrel, corn salad , the Winter tokyo turnips (as says to harvest when radish size), and few swiss chards...All these iv found dotted around the garden, so l plan to just transplant them up. As only the 2 of us, if l can get to be able to pick a few leaves of each to put into stir fries, l'll be so pleased. We have 4 large containers left to empty off patio into the 2nd raised bed, The large containers we are emptying had all our summer salads in. The soil is so rich and dark, full of garden worms .We use the 'lasagna ' method of composting. it works really well, and by Autumn/Winter it has rotted down to lovely rich soil. We just plant our salads right into it as each container fills up. It has saved us ££s instead of buying bags of compost.

 

Long day in the garden yesterday. Having noticed a squirrel looking down on us from the roof of the house on Monday I thought I'd better cut the high branches of the Hawthorn tree next to the house from where he's gaining access. I can do this safely using my tripod ladder and long-reach trimmer but it's a bit of a fiddle repeatedly getting it into place and then adjusted for the uneven ground. I shredded it all down ready for the compost heap. Finished the day by mowing the lawns so the heap will be heating up nicely now having gone 'cold' whilst we were away on holiday.

 

BBc weather forecast is useless :( said it was going to be dry and sunny all day so pegged line full of washing out..and now pouring down !! managed to get it all in. Plus managed to sow some more seeds before it rained. Found a really old pk of cab seeds ( exp date missing ) called 'Offenham 2' says can be sown out doors sept, oct and november..was free with kitchen garden mag..must be as least 10 y old pk as not had that mag since we moved ..l.ll sow anything l find in my seed box lol. Sowed few of cab 'April' says sow april/ may or August..well as seasons all over the place ll take a chance and see what happens lol. If all these germinate i'm in trouble as only got one raised bed left 4ft x 4ft lol.

 

Back to pruning shrubs today. This job is going to take longer than I thought.

 

Hi,

Just a bit of heavy work over the last few days. A pathway in the garden is lower than the height of the garden above it; this has always been a difficult patch of grass to cut; tilting the petrol mower at 45 degrees usually scalped the top edge of the grass as I struggled to balance the mower; strimming was no better because there's nowhere level on the site apart from inside the bungalow; put something down and it heads to the valley bottom.

First job was to dig out for the new wall.



It kept bucketing down with rain then a few minutes later the path dried out so I was rushing between heavy showers; here's the result due to rushing; I'm using stones I have to hand which are all shapes and sizes; the idea was to build a dry stone wall but this annoyed me; it's ugly.


The solution; start from scratch and do the job right; the weather has put me off once but now I'm wrapped up wearing my "site" coat; I have leggings and wellies if the rain tormented me.

Amazingly after days of torrential rain the rain quit a few mornings ago so I got stuck in. The path slopes and the garden is far from level; at the highest point the garden is over 12" higher than the pathway but the garden slopes in three directions adding to the fun so I built following the garden height.


A mixture of slopes and to try to level the garden would involve moving a great deal of soil so I worked with what I had hoping I had enough stones. Here the wall is almost completed and I've backfilled it with concrete; the mower wheels can now easily run over the concrete.


Work still in progress; today's job was dig out to accept a new step; apart from visiting Wickes to buy more materials and dinnertime it's taken all day today to install the step; the flagstone is 2" thick and 2' x 2' it's fully bedded in mortar so it's solid and safe. The mortar used is two parts sharp sand; two parts building sand and one part cement; not the easiest mix to work with but it's strong. The concrete is 20mm ballast & cement; 6/1 mix. The mortar & concrete were mixed down in the workshop then carried up in a plastic bowl; it's hard graft working on the valley side but at 78 it keeps me out of mischief. More work for tomorrow. I'll drop into a coma again tonight.

Kind regards, Col.

 

It's coming on well @Retired.

 

Volunteer day at Capel Manor today. More Nandina planting at the front boundary of the Japanese garden.
Went to a GC "round the corner " to buy some more MPC. I also picked up more Perlite and a box of Vitax Q4, I don't really need either at the moment but they were both reduced in price, so they will keep till I need them.

 

Always pays to take your time doesn't it @Retired, but I can understand how frustrating it can be waiting for weather to be suitable for that sort of job. Hope today is decent for you to get on.
I'll hopefully get on with my table thing today, but I have to get the barnet trimmed this morning so will go for my walk soon and get myself cleaned up for that. I don't know how people can stand sitting in a hairdresser for hours. A quick dry cut for me.
Yesterday was quite cool and cloudy in the afternoon after the frosty, sunny start, but I got table legs painted and the lid PVA'd and will hopefully get the roofing felt on later. It's not great, but I've taped up [underneath] the two splits it has, and will use the waterproof paint on it once it's on. It should last a wee while with that belt and braces approach, and I can easily get more roofing felt if it starts to fail too much. I'm trying to avoid buying new wood for the top, so I'm hoping the bit I have will last well enough - it's the remaining half of what was the storage box top, and is a little damaged, but should be ok for a while with the treatments I'm giving it.
I lifted a hemerocallis which isn't performing much, and replaced it with a large bit of Iris chrysographes. I also did more of the little odd jobs that get ignored, but are good to get done, and that will probably be the same today, assuming I get the table done. I'll have to see what I have in the way of trim to go round the edges once the felt's on too, but I think I have something in the shed. I want to add a shelf underneath too, so I'll se what I have for that. It's not for my lounge, so it doesn't have to be fancy

 

Taking more cuttings to prepare for winter - sphaeralcea, mitraria etc.
Tidying up the secondary insulation in the greenhouse. I had 3d printed some little brackets to hold the polycarb sheets in place, but this summer has shown up some problems, so I modified, reprinted, and replaced. We'll see if they're better!
It's getting much cooler, so I need it done before I bring my cymbidium orchids back in, and set up the heater.

 

Brought my cymbidium orchids back inside into an unheated room. I gave the leaves a wipe and was surprised how much dust and dirt was on them. There are some small buff coloured spiders living in them, but I have left them. Also wiped the leaves on all my other inside orchids and they look a lot happier now.

Also taking lots of pelargonium cuttings and potting up the best as whole plants to store in the greenhouse.

 

Husband moved 2 v large containers for me to kitchen back door just before tea last night. Filled them with our hm lovely rich dark compost . Already for me now today to sow and plant up my 'stir fry' collection. l did a google search and they are called 'winter greens' that are collection that are Winter hardy and picked as baby greens for stir fries. So plan this morning is to transplant first what l have dotted around garden ie sorrel, mustard, mizuna and swiss chard and one of the 'wheeler imperial cab' that is growing so well in raised bed. Then to direct sow seeds that iv got already , rocket, pak choi matador spinach, komatsuna. l want order today some siberian kale seeds if l can find it at reasonable price. Never made this sort of container collection before, so l'm really hoping it works for over the Winter season cooking.

 

@Retired your wall is looking good and i hope that you have finished it now.


Nothing today, the weather was great but i had to wash my hair instead of tomorrow because River has a appointment at the vets for his booster, so nothing tomorrow also.

 

I planted the last of my bulbs (unless I buy some more) and started to make a winter cover for my new alpine mini garden. Probably finish it off tomorrow but I don't think it's needed yet. Also cleaned out the cold frame in readiness for putting a few less hardy plants in there.

 

Picked the last tomatoes ripe and non ripe. Then removed the cucumber and tomato plants and emptied soil from the containers. Discovered why some tomato plants had done poorly, they'd got Chafer beetle grubs eating the roots; beetle grubs now in a tray awaiting ingestion and digestion by which ever hungry beast wanders past.
Planted up 4 large pots of freesia bulbs for flowers next spring.

 

The only time I get help in the garden is for the annual trim of the side of the 12 foot laurel hedge in my neighbour’s garden which grows into my garden. The helpers, a husband and wife team, arrived at 9.30, finished by 11.00, all cleared up, £80. Not bad by today’s standards . (I have resisted the temptation to put the bags of trimmings on my neighbour’s driveway with a bill .)