Author: Flighty

The weather has continued to be mostly dry and sunny, but with a chilly wind at times, and looks set to continue through next week.

I’m not that fussed about rhubarb so only grow a small patch. It’s now big enough to pick, which is what I did with these three one foot long stems yesterday.

I replanted a very small English Daisy last year which I pleased to see has grown and just started flowering.

It nestles by the path near the shed where I hope that it will continue to thrive.

I left it too late to hard prune the rose Pretty Lady but this morning I made a start on cutting out all the dead wood, of which there is lots.  I did about half and will hopefully do the rest in the next few days.

At home the three sunflowers Holiday which I started off in small pots on the windowsill last Tuesday afternoon had all appeared yesterday morning.  These are the ones which grow four tall and the same wide, forming a rather stately plant with plenty of flowers. I did this post about these in  December.

Have a good week, and take care!

This week I’ve started planting on the plot and sowing seeds in pots at home on the windowsill.

Yesterday I planted out the first early potatoes Foremost. I dig individual holes with a hand trowel, put a potato in each with the chits upwards, cover with a handful or two of compost then backfill.  When I’ve done them I hoe round then water.  I’ll be doing the second early Charlottes (picture shows six of these) next week and the main crop Desiree the week after.

So far I’ve planted out eight rows of ten onion sets Sturon  so that  the tips are at just at ground level.  The rows are about a foot apart and the onions five inches.  I’ll be planting the rest over the next week.  The two onions shown here are the biggest and smallest of the dozen in store from those grown last year.

At home on Tuesday I sowed two each tomato Outdoor Girl and Yellow Perfection seeds in 3.5 in/9 cm pots.  Once they germinate and start growing I’ll sow another two of each.

It’s good to start planting and sowing again for this year.

Have a good weekend, and take care!

I was recently given a packet of potato fertiliser so yesterday I hoed the potato patch, scattered some granules over the area then watered.

This week I’ve also finished weeding the main flower patch, mostly pulling out unwanted collomia grandiflora seedlings but leaving a good size clump.

The wavy grass path edge was completely unintentional.

The other plants I left were some Forget-me-nots  at the top of the patch by the roadway.  It’s only in the past couple of years that these have started appearing on the plot.  Since I’ve not sown any seeds they must have been  airborne from plants on nearby plots.  I’m happy to see them and hope that they’ll freely self-seed.

The clocks change at the weekend and the forecast is looking dry, sunny and warm into next week so I’m looking forward to starting to plant out the onions and potatoes, along with sowing some of the annual flower seeds.

Have a good weekend and take care!

I was pleased to get the rough cutting of the grass path edges all round and across the plot done last weekend.  During the week I finally finished digging out and sieving the last of the compost from the heap.  Apart from that I weeded, then hoed, much of the flower patch where the unwanted self-seeded collomia grandiflora seedlings were growing.  Thankfully they were easy to pull up and discard.

I’ve decided to leave the sedums alone and not dig them up, split and replant.

Looking round it’s good to see new growth on the blackberry, raspberries (see below) and  strawberries.

With just about everything now done I’m all ready to commence planting and sowing in a week or so,  ground conditions and the weather permitting.

I’ll be planting  the onion sets Sturon and first early potatoes Foremost, and also direct sowing some flower seeds.

Meantime I’ll just be ticking over next week before I get busy again. Today  it’s damp and dull so I’m going to have a quiet, restful day drinking tea, eating biscuits and reading.

Have a good week and take care!

a regular post today for one reason and another, and the next one should be on Sunday.

The pot marigolds Flighty’s Favourites below are from August 2012.

Have a good weekend and take care!

Three annual flowers I really like and grow every year are the single white cosmos, bi-coloured sunflowers Musicbox and, of course, pot marigolds Flighty’s Favourites.

There are various single white cosmos varieties  and I grow one of the dwarf ones. This year I’ve bought a couple of packets of the less well known Royal Dwarf White, which only grows to around 18 in/ 45 cm, from  PlantGensis.  I’ll be mostly sowing and growing them on cosmos corner in front of the taller Apricotta and Double Click Snow Puff, which I wrote about last December in this post.

I mentioned the sunflowers MusicBox in the Cold and Gloomy post I did a couple of months ago and showed some I’d grown.

Here is another picture showing the  range of colours for this variety.

I mustn’t forget the pot marigolds Flighty’s favourites  which I wrote about, and showed, in the recent post Flighty’s Favourites  so here’s another picture of some.

Please note that none of these pictures are mine, so due thanks and acknowledgement for their use here.

Have a good week, and take care!

It’s chilly and damp this morning so it’ll be the first day this month I’ve not been to the plot.  I’ve now emptied the pallet compost bin, forked the ground over then added material which I’d put into a couple of old compost bags over the past month or two.  I’ve even made a start on rough cutting the grass path edges round and across the plot, which is generally the last item on my to do list.

I’ll now turn my attention to weeding and hoeing the main flower patch.  This picture shows it from the roadway down to the shed.

The bright green area are self-seeded poached egg plants (limnanthes douglasii) which should provide a yellow carpet of flowers in a few months time.  There are far too many self-seeded collomia grandiflora seedlings this year, some which I’ll transplant and pull the rest up.

Have a good weekend, and take care!

I like blackberries so when I took the plot on I kept one bramble bush, which is out of the way alongside the compost heap.  On Friday I cut out all the dead wood, which is one of the few plot jobs I do wearing heavy duty gloves as being a wild bramble it’s covered in thorns.  I also lightly prune it as and when required through the season to keep it from straying onto the two adjacent grass paths.  The ground around and under the bush is where I put any compost I dig out and sieve I don’t I don’t use elsewhere straight away.

It’s worth noting that the flowers are a good food source for bees, both bumble and honey, and I have seen butterflies as well.

Come July I’ll be picking plenty of ripe juicy berries to take home.  I usually eat them with just a sprinkling of demerara sugar, and occasionally some vanilla ice cream.  One of my favourite puddings was always apple and blackberry crumble, which mum used to make regularly.  The picture shows a dishful picked in July 2011.

Take care, and have a good week!

I’ve been to the plot and done some plotting every day this week.  Today I went this morning as there was no frost and it was already quite pleasant after breakfast.  I dug up the old rhubarb patch, which is where I’ll be growing one of the sunflowers Holiday and tidied the raspberries before before adding some compost round each plant.

During the week I finished hoeing and weeding the three vegetable patches (shown below),  removed the dead leaves and stems from the strawberries before hand forking/weeding then adding some compost round each plant. I also hoed and weeded where I’ll be growing the sunflowers MusicBox. 

Left of centre, just beyond the the end of the grass path,  are two primroses which I was given last week.  One has pale yellow flowers and the other white ones.

I’ve cleared the dead leaves from the crocosmia (bottom left corner in picture), and cut back all the old aster/Michaelmas daisy stems to ground.  In both cases this will allow air and light to reach the new growth that is just starting to appear.

This morning I was pleased to see a trio of Mallard ducks flying round low overhead before heading back towards the wetland area in the nearby park. Fluttering round the plot were two butterflies, one being a Small Tortoiseshell and the other possibly a Brimstone.

Have a good week, and take care!