What are we doing in the garden 2025

I have piles of pots under the greenhouse bench. I do wash them to get our sticky clay soil off rather than for hygiene. I have a pile outside hoping that the rain will do first rinse before I bring them indoors for washing in the utility room. I do worry that I will block the drains. But it's too cold outside to use water - my fingers soon drop off then the toes join in in sympathy.

 

When I give away any plants I now ask for them to bring the pots back.
I find it surprising that people think every pot is just single use and thow them in the bin.
I gave someone some plants back in the spring and they even threw away the rigid plastic seed trays I put the pots in to make it easier to carry the plants.

Gave the neighbours a trachycarpus back in the spring as she asked if I had any, only had one about 2ft tall, she took it.

When I went round there later in the summer I spotted they had a fair sized one planted out.
Yes she said we wanted a bigger one, the one I gave her got binned, it's not the first time she has done that.

 

I have just started throwing pots away as soon as I decant the plant. My collection was getting out of hand. The local council is supposed to start accepting them in the recycling soon.

 

It was sopping weather all Sunday and most of yesterday so no gardening today as the soil is very wet and I don't want to walk on it to plant bulbs or try and weed. Today is sunny and it's supposed to be dry this week so Thursday will be weeding and planting day as I need to be clean for a tea dance tomorrow.

I shall confine myself to checking pots in the polytunnel and communing with the new chooks and our old one to make sure they're all getting on well. If the poorly one looks OK I'll let her out to explore the polytunnel.

I do clean our polytunnel but just with the hose to wash off the dust inside late winter/early spring when I can empty out all the overwintered pots long enough for a good spray and drip. I have been known to use the Karcher on the outside if we have a lot of algae after a soggy winter.

I keep a stash of small pots and seed trays in the polytunnel for sowing and potting on. I do rinse off excess compost after emptying them and then they dry out by themselves for next time. 4"/10cm pots and bigger are stacked outside by the fence at the back of the veg plot, more or less organised by size and shape.

 

Washed the outside of the greenhouse today and now I can see all the bits missed on the inside.

 

We gave some orchids to various people in our village garden club many years ago. We were very upset on one visit to see one of the orchids on the compost heap. To buy species orchids is not cheap but we were dismayed that they had been keen to have one of the divisions and then a few months later put it on the compost heap. We now only give divisions to a local orchid group.
And no we don't wash pots any more either.

 

At last got the garden 3/4 sorted for winter. Just spent 2 hrs with husband putting away at the garden ornaments fr around fish pond & seating area+ loads of other gardne jobs that we are so late doing. Stacked all the large terracota pots in greenhouse & checked whats surviving under the bubble wrap. Found mustard, red cabbage, parsley, mint,rosemary, artic lettuces, small pot of other winter lettuces seedling still alive, swish chard. The 6 metor pea l planted as experiment only 2 left & not looking good, looks as if mice eaten them. Still got 6 large containers( fr the 18 l manage to fit in there) to plant up.. so nk few days will plant them with the artic lettuce seedlings. But my most surprise was the kitchen back door large containiers l planted up few wks ago. They are doing really well..l think its becuase it's sheltered there. iv got really good large container of healthy looking herbs ie mint, oregano, parley, rosemary. In the other container iv got cabage growing with mizuna and red vein sorrel..all experiment to see what would grow over autumn/winter. iv still got about 15 red cabbage plants to plant somewhere though..im quite pleased with the experment so far. Just wish l had some colourful plants in the garden borders that l can see from bedroom windows on days l cant get out there.

 

Well ... the tree surgeons put in an appearance to finish the job they started about a month ago. A huge amount of debris has dropped onto my garden, but they cleared away the large pieces. It was almost dark by the time they finished, so I'll have to do any tidying up tomorrow. I hope nothing has been crushed beyond survival. On the bright side, there are now very few leaves left to fall and they have removed some low branches that were casting a fair amount of shade in summer. The squirrels will be well fed up as their usual routes are truncated.

 

I blame garden centres, some people just use plants in a similar way to cut flowers, just get some more when these have finished flowering. They dont understand some plants actually improve with age, or have any patience.
Its a throw away society.

 

I don't wash pots unless the one I want to use is particularly grotty. What I do do is to save the plastic caps from milk bottles and put one in each pot when I stack them - an easy thing to do which saves them sticking together and no end of naughty words!

@Peaceful Gardener , I still have roses in bloom in the back garden and just about, some lovely blue Michaelmas daisies 'Monch' which have lasted for weeks. Other winter flowerers are hellebores, witchhazel, winter flowering honeysuckle and there's a lovely winter flowering clematis called 'Freckles' - often in bloom before and during Xmas here. I would ask at your local GC what they might recommend for your area.

 

I told you not to do it.

 

I seem to be in the minority as I actually like washing pots .

One of the local churches has a big sale every Spring of gardening related stuff, ranging from unused balls of twine to lawnmowers that people have donated, and I give any spare ones to them.

 

@AnniD you carry on washing the pots and adding to the charities. Thank you

 

@AnniD , you’re not alone, I wash the pots too! Once they’ve been finished with they get a quick rinse out, doesn’t take a minute and they’re ready for next time.