Let's watch the flowers grow

"The stately Lady-Hollyhock
Has graced my garden-bed for years,
Sedately stiffened in a frock
All frills and ruffles to her ears."
— Sarah J. Day

Several times in the past I've tried to grow hollyhocks; they're high among my favourite cottage garden flowers, tall and stately and beautiful colours. But every time I've failed; they've either been eaten by slugs, or hit by frost before they were established, or didn't like the soil or succumbed to rust. However because they flourish in the village, even growing in cracks in the pavement, i knew the soil suited them, so two years ago we collected seed from the feral plants and sowed them. They dutifully germinated, were hardened off and planted out last year when we'd finished the new fence.

And they survived! They were sprayed against rust every so often but otherwise pretty much let alone. They coped with the harsh December with its sub-zero temperatures for weeks on end, and valiantly flourished in the warm spring. One even reached a height of at least eight feet.



Because they were random seeds we had no idea what colours they'd be; among the parent plants were yellows, whites, reds and many shades of pink; and of course being hybrids they could turn out any colour, which made planning the colour scheme a real gamble. But it paid off. The four plants made a very pleasing row of dark red, cerise, salmon pink and pink blush in order of density of hue.





The front garden's only tiny but I can't tell you how much pleasure the success of the hollyhocks has given me.

Although I hoped we weren't very far away from the end

A third weekend's work has seen the second and last of the variable vegetable beds (as opposed to the permanently-planted ones, with currants and raspberries) reconstructed, turf dug and relaid and even a few potatoes planted!




And done without needing to move the leeks and garlic.

The paths still need to be properly laid - there's another weekend's work there - and it'll look fab.

Cut not its earth-bound ties

Last spring our poor bay tree was looking very much the worse for wear, but struggled manfully and pulled through. A second hard winter of substantially sub-zero temperatures delivered the coup de grâce and there's no hope, despite the saying that a tree's only dead when it's been dead for a year. When the main branches have split as badly as this



there's only one thing to do.



It had to come down. It had got some mighty roots (which we were fascinated to discover smell like sandalwood, not bay), but it eventually gave up the struggle. I've planted our pot-bound plum tree in its place; it looks rather puny but with luck it'll feel happier there and might even have proper-sized fruit.

I'm like a bird, I'll only fly away

Last year, despite the apricot tree having several flowers, it only set one fruit (which turned out to be the most delicious apricot in the history of the world); we'd hoped for better things this year - one fruit each, perhaps, instead of having to share. It duly developed several flower buds which swelled promisingly, and in the last few days of mild weather and sunshine they started to open.

They are no more. Today they were all systematically removed by this little so-and-so:





Having stripped the tree he then spent the next seven hours of daylight battering at the window, fluttering from the top of the frame to the window-ledge at the bottom and up again, and getting into most undignified positions.





I wonder what roast bluetit tastes like.

Can you dig it

Almost as soon as the weather becomes tolerable - and this weekend has been lovely - everyone acknowledges their guilty consciences and starts tidying the garden ready for the summer. In our case this year it's rebuilding the deep beds for the third (and final!) time. Growing vegetables in deep beds is so much easier than on a traditional open plot; because the beds are narrow enough to never be trodden on the soil doesn't become so compacted and digging it over is a much quicker task. But it's worth taking the time (and spending the money) to construct them properly from the outset.

The first bed walls we made were of plywood from machinery packing Ned had at work; it cost nothing, but despite being timber-treated they fell apart after only four or five years. So the next lot were made of proper timber boards, 1" thick. They lasted a lot longer but were too narrow to support the growing weight of soil against them and despite various quick-fix supports collapsed sideways, making it almost impossible to get between them. To be honest, it all looks a bit tatty.





So this year we've invested in boards similar to scaffolding boards to run the full length of the beds, and hopefully these will see us out.



Spare paving slabs, with weed-suppressing membrane beneath them, laid between the beds will not only help to support the sides but also mean I won't have to try to squeeze the mower up the pathways and then strim the edges; it's going to look very much tidier. I'll let the dug-over soil in the currant bed settle for a day or two, then get the gooseberry bush out of its pot and planted out properly. There's a few weekends more hard graft to go (and I need space to put my potatoes!), but at least we've made a start.



*Wonders if it's time to start the guerilla-gardening in the village.

Put your head down to the ground and listen to your mind

Lemongrass, week 8 update, and it's still flourishing.



And lookit! I planted a piece of root ginger a few weeks ago, and it lives!

I see rainbows in the evening

Lemongrass update: after 6 weeks it needed potting on again.

Yes you did, ya told 'em once before

This week's update on the progress of the lemongrass:



Still growing!

Don't you tell it to the breeze

As well as trying to grow unusual plants I like Thai food, so my latest gardening experiment is to grow lemongrass. The idea was given to me when watching Gardeners' World (compulsory Friday night viewing for Oldies!) - it hadn't occurred to me before that it could be done. You can get packets of lemongrass seeds in garden centres, but googling showed me a far more interesting way of propogating it; simply buy some from the greengrocery section of the supermarket - yes, the pallid, naked sticklike things that have been trimmed to within an inch of their lives - and stand them in a jar of water on the windowsill. I tried it, and couldn't believe how fast the roots started to appear from what looked like a hopeless stump.

After one week in water



After two weeks in water; time to pot on



Transferred to pots



After one week in the pot; doing okay!



After two weeks in the pot the roots are still developing



Four weeks from when I bought them - starting to sprout out.


They're growing at a tremendous rate - about a centimetre a day at the moment! Soon they'll need potting on into bigger premises and hopefully by next year they'll be quite nice ornamental clumps for the patio.

In spring I'll be having a bash at ginger as well ...

Watching flowers in the rain

Some people like gladioli, some people like dahlias. I like lilies, and they've been quite successful this year. I bought a few cheap bulbs from a DIY shop, not expecting great results, so was pleasantly surprised by the size and quality of the flowers that were produced - and they're sweetly scented to boot. This white one bloomed a few weeks ago and we could enjoy the scent when we sat outdoors.



This pink one is flowering at the moment, so I've brought it indoors where it's scenting the sitting room, and not being rained on.



There's another one (of a totally different variety that has much smaller, unscented flowers) that's been living outdoors for donkey's years, and is still managing to bloom each year despite the onslaught of the horrid lily beetles (which at least have the courtesy of being bright red so you can pick them off and squish them), which has the curious habit of producing little bulbils on the stem, which produce leaves and roots while still attached to the parent plant.



These bulbils can be picked off carefully



and potted on to eventually reach flowering size. Not wanting to count chickens but with luck I'll have a lily-beetle banquet in a few years.

At a bar called O'Malley's

In the past I've often tried growing a pineapple plant from the tufty leaves at the top of a bought fruit, but never succeeded. However our latest attempt seems to have been successful!



As you can see it's already slipping baby plants, which we might try snapping off and growing on when they get large enough.

I know that they used to be grown in the 'big houses' but I assumed that you'd need a hothouse if they were to fruit. But then we came across this site where a chap from Surrey has catalogued his endeavours, which has given us hope that it might, just might, eventually bear fruit.

We're not holding our breath though!

"Whatever happened to my Transylvania twist?"

This year, as well as growing them in the ground, I've been experimenting with growing potatoes in containers. The reasons are numerous: you can grow more without having to dig, the compost is clean so the risk of blight is minimised, and because the containers are moveable they can be grown in otherwise idle corners. This year my containers have been of the cheap-and-cheerful variety; I bought some growbags, cut off one end and emptied the compost into a spare bag. I then turned the growbag inside out so that the black side was outside in order to let the compost warm up quicker (and it looks tidier). I rolled the open end of the bag down, punched a few drainage holes in the bag and added a small layer of stones for additional drainage. A six-inch layer of compost was replaced and a couple of sprouting potatoes placed on top and covered with compost.

As the potato plants grew they were earthed up and the top of the bag unrolled a bit to give more depth. They're very thirsty plants with all that top growth to maintain as well as growing tubers underground, but they don't like boggy conditions, hence the drainage at the bottom. Anyway one day after they'd flowered (and I needed some potatoes for supper) I thought the time had come to empty one bag and see how they were doing.

There was a lot of top growth



and a fair amount of success was evident.



Okay, so the local greengrocer isn't going to lose any sleep over the threat to his business, but they were fresh, organic and delicious.

I'll bet you think this song is about you

It must be ... ooh, two or three years ago I bought an apricot whip (that's a baby tree, by the way) that was guaranteed to fruit in the second year after purchase. Duly, in its first season it grew but didn't flower. Last year it flowered, but we had late frosts and no fruit resulted. This year it had plenty of blossom



but despite my best efforts with the pollinating brush and throwing bees at it only one fruit developed. This was nurtured; the tree, still in a pot, fed and watered copiously to encourage it to ripe fruition. This baby fruit was cherished and admired, and woe betide anyone who did anything to hinder its development. It swelled satisfyingly and the heat of the past few weeks blushed its cheeks to a delicate pink.



Then yesterday it fell from the tree in its ripe perfection. It was carried indoors in triumph and reventially halved and shared. The verdict? I have never sampled any fruit so sublime. Juicy and sweet and warm, like no other apricot can ever have tasted. Perfection. :)

Your sweet face seems to haunt my dreams

My 'lilium regale' has excelled itself this year; so many beautiful flowers and a fabulous scent.

To adorn and perfume those sweet meadows in June.

I love this time of year. The honeysuckle's in full bloom



and filling the air with its sweet scent; it's especially lovely in the cool of the late evening, round about ten o'clock when it's not yet quite dark. It's a shame that it's determined to flower at the back of the trees and not the side facing the house, but there you go. The roses are glorious, as well as the lavender, although the philadelphus (the variety we grow smells exactly like Juicy Fruit chewing gum) is dropping its petals, like confetti in a churchyard after a wedding.

Following the blackthorn blossom of early April and the hawthorn (mayflowers) of May, where the hedges looked as though someone had thrown muslin curtains over them now in the hedgerows there are the wild dog roses - some white, some palest pink and some really quite determinedly rosy. Not forgetting, of course, the foamy umbrella flowers of elder with their cool scent,



so many this year that we decided to seize the moment and have a bash at making elderflower cordial; grown-up squash which is a delicious long drink, with ice, on a hot summer day.

We decided to use a recipe from a blog I regularly follow, called the Cottage Smallholder; a real feel-good site.

So we gathered together all the ingredients



and put them all together.



Now we wait for 48 hours before straining and bottling it. Fingers crossed it will be as good as I hope!

Sitting on a fence is a man who drinks real ale

So we took the rickety old fence away and wondered what would be the best replacement. With it open the garden looked bigger, but it made it easier for the local foxes to poo on the grass which isn't pleasant.



A hedge was a possibility but would mean I couldn't grown many flowers that I'd be able to see from the house. So a new fence was the best compromise - one that allowed more light to get the garden yet still gave us a bit of privacy.

The posts were duly concreted in (using markedly less concrete than the ones we removed!) last weekend, which meant that this weekend, weather permitting, we hoped to be able to finish it. The weather did indeed permit, so in the morning the rails were added to the posts




then in the afternoon the pales were nailed in place, and a great improvement it is too. A good day's work; now, where's that beer?

Sittin' in the mornin' sun

An established bay tree is usually very hardy, and able to withstand cold weather without turning a ... I was going to say hair, but that's not right, and leaf doesn't really fit the bill ... anyhow, they can usually come through the winter unscathed. Last winter was particularly extreme, and our poor tree is rather the worse for wear.


The leaves should be a glossy dark green, not dry and desiccated. In places there are signs of life and regrowth



but despite waiting for months, others have clearly had it completely.


If we amputate all the dead bits I fear it's going to be very lopsided and unbalanced. The poor thing might have to come down completely.