General Chat

well I just checked and these are all girls!!!!

these plants are now getting quite threatening - taking over the conservatory and drinking pints of water - I'm sure I can hear them guzzling it!!!

Hi All
Whilst it's not exactly gardening weather I managed to get out yesterday.
I was cutting the seed heads off my wallflowers when I noticed that the plants are beginning to flower again.
Also my neighbour's Virginia creeper is beginning to turn red, my Japanese anemones are in bloom and my grape hyacinths are coming through.
Me thinks the seasons are all to pot this year.
Take care
Von

The garden is as confused as we are.

My patio continues to be amazingly generous and everything is a mass of colour and chaos! I have giant poppies which are totally obliterating my lovely new rose bush but I haven't the heart to uproot them, they are so bold and beautiful. The rose hasn't complained yet :-)

Today's exciting discovery was finding lovely little green balls (please tell me they are future figs!) on my new fig tree which, up until now, was merely sitting there looking good but doing nothing.

Is there anything I should be doing apart from feeding and singing :-D <3

Ooh know nothing about fig trees BC, Hope somebody else can help you. surprisingly the garden continues to thrive despite being drwoned and bashed around by strong winds. The only flowers to suffer seem to be petunias, both in the ground and in baskets. The fuschias are beautiful especially the one in my avatar, and the geraniums and begonias don't seem to have minded the weather. The dahlias are blooming and look much healthier than previous years.

However the tomatoes are very late and the raspberries are slow to ripen.

ButtercupFields when figs first appear they look similar to pea.

Sounds like your going to be lucky this year :-D

WooooWooo! Lesley you have made my day....loads of peas!! :-D :-D

where I live in deepest Norfolk, most things are very late, hopefully the weather will change in the next few days, when the jet stream moves north...hope so,
Jan

Is that a helebore Jan in your avatar, lovely colour.

OH potted loads of plants a few days ago (shoots from existing ones)

Went out this morning to find most of them tipped over & chewed on!

Rotten possums again.

At least that is one problem we don't have Scozz.

I think we call them snails, Ann :-D

and slugs, not sure Possums are slimy though and maybe they are a bit bigger than snails, ooh don't fancy snails that big!!!

I found slugs on the gravel part of our garden yesterday yuk, thought they couldnt crawl on that.

my skyscreaper lillies look beautiful, i did order a mixed bag and mixed colours in it but there all about 5ft and pink, but its all nice and pretty looking.

I was wondering if my hysteria climber would flower this year its 2nd or 3rd year and nothing atm

my russuian vine aka as mile a minute is living up to its name xx

I spent an hour in the garden after lunch, it is such a nice day we thought it was a good opportunity. T was out there longer though. We cut back loads of the jungle that had sprung up in the rain, can actually see the borders now. Took out a very straggly tree heather and cut back a bush that I have no idea what it is, evergreen of some sort. Then pulled out a load of hardy geraniums that have grown like triffids and managed to uncover the ornamental grasses I put in last year. I also cut back some of the large Mahonia bush'tree 'ouch' that is sooo prickly. T cut back a huge rambling rose so it looks a lot better and the garden wheely bin is full in time for Monday. Which is good because we are away Sunday and Monday so won't be gardening then.

T has just dug up a couple of potato plants so we have new potatoes for tea tonight (Cold gammon (home cooked) and salad.

Are you there Fred? My Sugar Plum tomatoes are looking good and the flowers are just starting to set :-D so far I have kept them in the greenhouse but maybe next week I will try a couple outside.

As for Purple King dwarf French beans I don't think I will be growing them again as they haven't cropped very well :-( maybe it's the weather conditions aren't right for them or anything else :-(

My OH is pruning the climbing hydrangea.It has been beautiful this year loads of flowers, but is overgrowing its allotted space! Cant open a gate because it is in the way. Tomatoes are a washout this year. We werent going to grow any but were given some plants. There is no flower on the runner beans yet, we usually pick the first beans in August, cant see that happening this year.

Lesley - I think the problem with the beans is the weather.

Ours are only just flowering and they were sown in gutters in the greenhouse, prior to planting out, so they had a good start. We have grown the purple beans before and they were sucessful. At least you could find them beacause of the colour!!

Parsnips, carrots and onions doing well and brassicas liked the rain with no sign of Cabbage White butterflies laying their eggs, however the blight resistant Sarpho potatoes obviously needed warmer weather earlier in the year and are very short.

How are other peoples sweetcorn? Ours is about 2 ft+ and seems to be happier now with this warm spell. but I do wonder whether we will get much of a crop.

K, since we've had sunshine and HOT weather everthing is growing much better in my garden :-D

I've never grown sweetcorn but we do grow maize as a cover grop and that isn't doing very well yet.