Crazy Weather, Floods and a Broken Plum

What a couple of weeks it has been for weather. I hope everyone has avoided the serious weather we have been having and if not, that the damage is not too bad.

Over the past month, I have been kept busy with work and studying and the lack of light of an evening has meant my gardening has been restricted to the weekend. However, not even this has happened with the amount of rain that we have had recently. As previously mentioned, I have created a large pond in a natural run off area of the garden, and have designed an overflow which feeds the bog garden. Over the past week or so the pond has flooded almost on a daily basis, meaning that the bog garden is well and truly boggy, which is fine for the plants (although I am worried about the water freezing around their roots). 

This picture was taken last yesterday on a walk near my house. I have never seen the water so close to the top of the bridge and it had flooded the road. It floods often, but only normally onto the fields, not the road. In my last post, I finished talking about what I had already done within the garden, so from now on I will talk about what I am currently doing and what I want to do in the future.

Present

In the last post, I started to talk about a new border that I was extending to add a spring aspect to the winter border. Since then, I have added hundreds of bulbs including daffodils, crocus, fritillaria meleagris and chiondoxa fobesii and luciliae. These are planted within the winter border, which includes a range of Japanese Dogwoods "flaviramea, alba sibirica". These are planted in full sun, which means that the stems are able to be at their brightest. 

I have also been looking at increasing the number of plants and trees within the garden that provide winter berries. I have a number of different plants that were planted before I came to the garden so I do not know their species, but have always liked them due to the bright colours on frosty mornings. 

The Allotment

The wet weather seems to be affected this years winter crops, with my brassicas taking a battering and really struggling to survive. I have staked my sprouts, but the strong winds seem to have 'blown' the sprout heads. This wind was also responsible for snapping my 10 year old plum tree in half, which was upsetting as I remember planting the tree when it was a small sapling. However, the other half of the tree is still going strong, so hopefully the tree will just come back stronger than ever next year. I have harvested my first leeks grown this year, and I am very happy with the results. They may not be the same size as those in the shops, but like most things, they taste so much better. I would recommend anyone who doesn't grow their own to give it a go. For the cost of a packet of seeds, and a small amount of your time, you can get hundreds of plants. 

Apologies for the poor picture quality, but I dropped my camera so am using an old one until I get it fixed. They were sown in march, left to grow until a reasonable size, then pricked out into their growing place. I found that this method was most effective as I did not waste time potting on.

Recipe Idea

Leeks are one of my favourite vegetables and I miss them when they are out of season. They are great with a bit of cream and baked or even spiced with cinnamon, cumin, coriander and turmeric. These can then be made into patties and fried. They are great served with natural yoghurt and offer a healthy alternative to meat for burgers. 

I will leave it there this week and will speak soon. If you have any plants or trees which have good winter berries, then please get in touch and I would love to see some of your pictures. As always I look forward to hearing your thoughts and own gardening tales. Take care and happy gardening.

CG. 

September Rain and October Sun

It's been a while since I last posted, basically due to the amount of work that I have had on and the subsequent lack of time in the garden. At the end of August/beginning of September, I spent 2 weeks in London volunteering at the Olympic games, meaning lots of time away from the garden. However, I was able to use days off to visit gardens, in particular Kew and Hampton Court Palace. I find that visiting gardens and in particular plants across the different times of the year are ideal ways to see how they look and how other people use them.

Past
In my previous post, I introduced the pond and surrounding areas. In this blog I will expand on the bog area of the garden, which is located as a run off area behind the pond. The garden in the whole is flat, apart from the area where the pond is located. This area had a natural run off and so it felt the perfect area for a pond. The soil used from the pond, was used to landscape this area further, creating flat lawns, and dips, which is where the bog garden is now. This area of the garden is used to grow a range of plants, that primarily have one thing in common, they like wet or damp roots. 


The main feature plant is a Ligularia 'the rocket', which provides a mass of sharp yellow flowers which contrast well with the green fields in the background. Unfortunately I missed mine flowering this year, so have used a picture of the internet to show you.




Due to this area being a mix of garden compost and soil, and the fact that the garden had a previous life as a meadow means that the soil contained large amounts of wildflower seeds such as poppy. This led to a mass of flowers that had grown naturally in the bog area and created a mini wildlife haven. I think I may help this along again next year and see what happens.

This picture shows the naturally grown poppies, with the grass Calamagrostis x acutiflora 'Karl Foerster' which adds height and winter interest.














Present

In my last post I commented on the sweet peas that I had grown. I have decided that I will grow lots more next year, as there is such a wide range of colours that they will fit in pretty much anywhere in the garden. Plus, for the cost of a few packets of seeds, there is not much that will provide the amount and display of flowers. I am also working on a spring bulb area, which will be home to crocus, daffodils, fritillaria meleagris and chiondoxa fobesii and luciliae. I shall update this project next time, with pictures displaying what it looks like.

I will leave it there this time, but will hopefully post sooner than last time. As always, I am always grateful to receive your tips and if any of you have a particular flower or sweet pea variety that you feel I would like, then feel free to post. Take care and happy gardening.

CG.

The Olympics, Sweet Peas and a Giant Courgette

It is great to hear your comments about my blog and about your own personal gardening experiences. As ever, I will look to explain some of the work that has gone on in the garden over the past few years, whilst also highlighting what I have been up to recently.

Past

I have briefly mentioned my pond, and will look to go into more detail about it here. It was constructed in the space of one summer, three years ago as a summer project. We are fortunate to have around half an acre of garden, so it was decided that we would try and build the largest pond that felt right within the space. We have a natural sloping area where water runs away to and it was decided that this would be where the pond would be situated. It is located in full sun all day, which although not ideal from an algae point of view, due to the fact that we have very little shade. Currently we have 14 adult fish (Shubunkins and Goldfish) and at least 10 infant fish, produced from last summers spawning. There are 3 water lillies planted (pink, white & yellow), which once established will provide the pond with much needed shade. Last summer we had a variety of insect life visiting including damselflies and dragonflies, which use the tall stems of Equisetum & Schoenoplectus Scirpus Zebrinus

 to crawl down into the pond.

Present

Over the past few months, everywhere you turned was information about the London 2012 Olympics, whether it was on the radio, TV or internet. One particular aspect of this was repeated across most platforms: the meadow planting schemes that had been produced at the Olympic Park. I had always wanted to implement something similar at home, so took the opportunity to takes a few pictures and gather some ideas whilst I was down there. 

As you can see from this picture, there is a large variety of plants and flowers within the meadow with a lot of colour. I have read that they have used both native and non-native plants, but all plants are accessible to pollinators. 

I subscribe to Gardeners' World magazine and as such get free seeds every now and again. Last year they sent out some Sweet Pea seeds (20th Anniversary Mix & Royal Family), but I chose not to sow them as the garden was not ready. The time had come this summer to sow them, and as the pictures below show, they are definately worth the wait.

After a couple of days of rain and wind, I managed to get down the allotment area of the garden. As I inspected the courgette plants, I came across this thing. To be honest, I had not expected any growth from the courgettes as the weather has not been warm at all, just wet and windy. 

I will leave you there today as I have mentioned a lot, and will look to expand on the pond area of the garden in the next post. I will also expand on the bog garden, located at the back of the pond. Thanks for reading and as always, I appreciate any comments or suggestions that you may have.

CG.

Rain, Rain and more Rain

This is my third post, and I am finally beginning to get used to writing about my garden in an open and hopefully interesting way. Anyway, the recent weather has meant a change in my usual gardening pattern, as I have not been able to get out as much as normally. June was the wettest month in history apparently and July has not started much better. The increased water levels have helped save time by meaning that I have not had to water as much.

Past
Last time I left you having explained my plans for the part of the long border near the pond. Generally I do not draw plans and allow them to develop over a number of days and weeks in my mind, often meaning that changes emerge. Once I think I have what I want, I will mark the area out, and leave it for a few days as it has a tendency to change. This certainly happened when developing the allotment area, as I played around with various plans and positions. In the end, it was decided that this area would be located near to the orchard as the picture below shows.

This is taken from the path through the orchard. It looks back towards the compost area and three main raised beds. I have problems with moles causing lots of damage, so it made sense to grow in raised beds, with chicken wire across the bottom.

This is taken from the same location as above, but looks up towards the greenhouse, barn and raspberry beds. I have planted two rows of raspberry (both Summer and Autumn), with the intention that once established they will form an artificial hedge.







Present
As explained in the intro, the past few weeks have not been great for gardening, especially vegetable growing. I planted out courgettes, butternut squash and french beans in June, and these have not put on much growth due to the lack of heat. This week, I decided to lift a few potato plants (rocket) in order to see how they had grown. These were sown at the start of April, are quick growers (ready in 10 weeks with ideal weather), and are good boiling. From the two plants I lifted a reasonable 1.5kg, and hopefully will be lifting more in the coming weeks.

I shall leave it here, and look forward to the next post. I hope that none of you were too affected by the recent floods and that your gardens are in good order. As usual, any opinions and tips are welcome, and I look forward to these. Take care and happy gardening.

CG.

BBC Gardener's World Live and Paeonia's

BBC Gardener's World Live
After a busy few weeks, it was nice to be able to get away and visit BBC Gardener's World Live for the first time. I was brought tickets by my girlfriend, who decided that she would come with me (despite not being a fan of gardening yet). I was amazed by all the different varieties of plants on show, especially within the floral marquee. Some of my particular favourites are shown below.

This is Dahlia Onesta, a pink dahlia which I will be looking out for in the future to add to my garden.

This is part of the Gladiolus family, nanus gladiolus Robinetta. I feel as though despite being somewhat unpopular amongst gardeners, Gladioli are a plant that I want to have more of. They seem to come in a large variety of colours and are comfortable growing most places.





Past
So last week I introduced the orchard part of the garden, which leads from the vegetable growing area to the pond. The pond is a natural looking fish pond, which has been planted up with a variety of pond plants including water lillies, bog beans and marsh marigolds. The pond itself is around 6m by 6m to a depth of about 1m30. This allows the fish to survive the occasional harsh winters we get in the midlands. I have added a bog area at the back, which is at the lowest point allowing a different type of plants to grow.

Present
Continuing from the pond is one main border, which eventually will have large swathes of colour, ranging from pinks and reds to yellows and oranges, with all colours in between. This is where the paeonia's come in. I ordered four paeonia's from crocus a few weeks ago, and these will form a significant part of this border. the intention is to start with light pinks at the start, and move up through dark pinks to red. The varieties ordered were: Paeonia lactiflora 'Duchesse de Nemours', Paeonia lactiflora 'Bowl of Beauty', Paeonia lactiflora 'Jan van Leeuwen' and Paeonia lactiflora 'Monsieur Jules Elie'. I will look to add some different plants to these which flower later in the summer and into the autumn in order to prolong seasonal interest. 


I will leave you once again, and hope that my blog is interesting and starting to take shape. Again I appreciate any comments or feedback or any potential plants that you find interesting to grow or look at.


CG

The Start of a new chapter and Days away from the Garden

I have been meaning to begin a blog for a number of months, but just have not got down to actually starting it. I have been making regular scribbles in a note book though. Over the next few posts I will try to detail what I have done so far within the garden and what I am planning on doing next.

Past
My garden is just under half an acre in size, which in a previous life was home to cattle and sheep. This has meant that the ground is fairly fertile, although I do try to add compost whenever I plant new things to help get them established. The garden itself is a flat field, with few mature trees. Over the past year or so, I have added 4 apple trees and a pear to the orchard part of the garden, with the overall aim of creating a walk through the trees. There was already an apple, a cherry, a pear and a plum tree meaning that I now have 9 fruit trees. Below is a picture of what this area looks like at the moment.

This path leads to a pond that was put in 2 years ago and has established nicely. The plan is to add lots of spring bulbs to contrast with the winter border of japanese dogwoods that I have planted. 

Present
I decided that I would take my girlfriend away for a few days for her birthday, the only problem being that this meant leaving the garden and in particular the vegetables alone. No worries, the weather forecast looked poor meaning that my plants were not going to suffer drought (more like drown). Anyway I got home and went straight for the garden. The first thing that I noticed was the amount of growth that everything had put on (i was expecting little change due to a lack of heat), with all the winter veg starting to shoot skywards. The recent weather has meant that the lettuce sown a few weeks back has established nicely, however the damp has meant a lot of slugs. I have been reading Charles Dowding's books on the subject of No-Dig gardening, and have ordered his book on vegetable growing which hopefully will arrive soon. I have decided that I will try and garden this way as much as I can as I feel that everything is worth trying.

Anyway I shall leave you now, I hope my first entry is not boring and that over the next few months we will get to know each other. I appreciate any comments or feedback that you may want to give.

CG