You are currently browsing the tag archive for the ‘primrose’ tag.
Spring had definitely arrived today with some glorious afternoon sunshine which made it a pleasure to be out in the garden. And I had two little helpers with me to make sure I was doing all the jobs properly!
The daffodils are out in full bloom and the tulips are coming through nicely both in the flower bed and in the pots. Around the garden there’s forsythia, primroses, hellebores, pansies, lungwort and heather all flowering. In the veg plot there is no sign of the parnsips germinating yet. I’ve also sown long carrots in pipes and stump carrots in a couple of old dustbins. Fingers crossed I’ll get some decent specimens in the summer.
The broad beans are doing well, as are the onions that were overwintered. I’m still digging up parsnips from last year but there’s no sign of the PSB yet, hopefully it will start to sprout in the next couple of weeks, it’s one of the great treats at this time of year.
Under cover all the brassicas are at pricking out stage – cauliflowers, cabbage, brussel sprouts, PSB, and calabrese. There’s a tray of Red Orache, mangetout and sunflowers germinated and I’ve just sown some Burpee’s Golden Beetroot in modules this afternoon. So much to do now for the next few weeks to keep up with everything.
And I’ll be even busier this year after meeting a chap in the next village who is happy to share his garden veg patch with me. I’ll be able to do the heavy digging work and we’ll share the crops so I should be self-sufficient in veg through the summer and autumn months this year.
It’s the Winterslow & District Horticultural Society’s Spring Show on Saturda 26th March. If you’re in the area pop into the Village Hall from 2pm to take a look at the exhibits. I may even enter a few myself this time!
It’s surprising just how much colour there is in the garden when you take a closer look. After finishing this morning’s chores I took a wander round and a few snaps. I also planted Chloe’s special spinning flower which she can see from living room window.
The Ranunculas is about to flower.
At the back of the rockery there’s a nice flowering shrub.
At the front of the rockery the primrose and saxifrage are in full bloom.
I think this one’s called Lungwort?
Inside the cucumbers seem to be enjoying the bathroom windowsill, they’re developing their 3rd/4th true leaves now.
It poured down for about 12 hours last night through this morning and the garden is like a bog so nothing done on the veg plot today. I would have planted some spuds as the tradition goes but no chance with all that rain.
I got a few indoor jobs done in the morning and by 2 the sun started to poke through so I grabbed a couple of hours out in the garden. The daffs are finally in full bloom and looked great in the afternoon sun (you can see the tulips in the background, they’re some way off yet).
The greenhouse is getting full so I set up the mini-greenhouse that I bought last weekend. I put it against the back fence which is south facing and gets full sun all day. It’s tied to the fence and I’ve also driven in two iron rods which I’ve hooked over one of the tiers so there’s no chance of it blowing away (famous last words!).
I potted on some Arabis, Erysimum, Gazania, Antirrhinum, Impatiens and Sweet Peas which pretty much filled it up. In the greenhouse there’s calabrese, cauliflowers, leeks, broad beans, red orach, nasturtium, french marigolds, more sweet peas, sunflowers, dahlias (from seed and tubers in pots), primroses, a blueberry, onions, little gem lettuce and carrots (Amsterdam Forcing) all coming on nicely.
On the plot I noticed that my long carrots have started to germinate. They’ll now grow on for a while before I thin out to the strongest seedling. The onions, shallots and garlic are all sprouting. The spring cabbages are showing signs of life and the salad veg has all germinated. Still nothing from the PSB, how much longer do I have to wait? The overwintered lettuce is starting to thicken up, I’m sure if I’d have deployed the plastic bottle cloches before the snow it would have been ready to pull up by now!
My chillies and peppers have germinated but it’s slow going, no true leaves yet. I paid a visit to B&Q last weekend to see what they had and bought a Scotch Bonnet plant marked up at 78p. When it went through the till it came out at 21p so I went back and bought another 10 plants, yellow bell pepper, Californian Wonder and Fresno Supreme. At that price I thought it was good value as they each have half a dozen leaves on them.
Indoors the plants are coming on well. Chillies, peppers, courgette, squash, tomatoes, cucumbers, pumpkins, pansies, asters, marigolds and sweet peas. Just waiting for Cerinthe to germinate. And last of all I love the flowers on this Fritillaria meleagris.
Hopefully the plot will dry out soon and I can get those spuds in!!
Well I felt a bit better today and just needed to get out of the house after two days stuck indoors. With all this greyness around at the moment I was in search of some colour to share with you. So I packed the family off to our local In-Excess and garden centre. Picked up some bargains in In-Excess, packs of summer bulbs (Dahlias and Gladioli) for 95p, seeds (Summer Squash, Autumn/Winter Cauliflower, Rudbekia) for 50p and some more marigold seeds for 25p. Well worth a visit, they have stores in Salisbury, Ringwood, Bournemouth and Christchurch.
The garden centre we went to was quite small but had some welcome colour.
Some nice Polyanthus.
Beautiful primroses and some daffs.
Back home just a bit of sowing and pricking out to do really as the plot is unworkable with this heavy rain. In the greenhouse growing on are onions, cauliflowers, calabrese, tomotoes, sunflowers and marigolds.
On the windowsill indoors are leeks, pepper, chillies and little gem lettuce. No real signs of life on the plot yet, the broad beans haven’t come up so I have some in pots as back up. Garlic, shallots and onions are still dormant and nothing off the PSB yet. Hopefully we’ll get some sun and warmer weather in the next couple of weeks.
A couple of bursts of colour in the garden. A nice clump of winter heather and some Crocus (I think) almost coming into bloom.
