Tune of the week here at Weeds HQ, the title track from Mark Pritchard’s new album on Warp records. One to listen to on headphones while waiting for this heatwave that’s supposedly soon coming.
Big shout to Graham Porter for giving the green light for those bedding plants and frost-hating vegetables to go in on Sunday’s Gardening with Tim Crowther on BBC Radio Leeds. But do keep that fleece handy as you never know!
The weather experts say it’s going to tip it down tomorrow after a nice few days of summery type vibes. But with tunes like this from Bob & Gene and The Inversions (produced by the great Victor Axelrod aka Ticklah out of New York ) who cares. Thanks to the Rt Hon David Rodigan for alerting us to this one. Below is where the vocals are from, cheers to Ticklah and The Inversions for giving it an overhaul. Tune!
A big shout to our good mate Jim N for this pic (above) of his egyptian walking onion (aka tree, topsetting, walking or winter onion) that’s now starting to “travel,” great stuff!
As you know we love a plant that’s a bit “out there,” and we do love the weird and wonderful world of the egyptian onion (below) and especially this website here. 
As it says on there “The ancient Egyptians worshipped onions. They believed that its spherical shape and concentric rings symbolized eternal life. Small onions were found in the eye sockets of Ramesses IV… The name “Walking Onion” was given to this plant because it literally walks to new locations. When the cluster of topsets becomes heavy enough, it will pull the plant over to the ground. These plants can walk between 1 and 3 feet per year!” An absolutely bonkers plant and as you know, bonkers is good!
Big thanks to Fliss C for letting us know of the Tools For Change campaign. A few years back they helped her community garden project with reconditioned tools repaired by Wandsworth prisoners. So if you have any unwanted blunted hand tools (“no power tools, workshop tools or secateurs please”) bring them in to a Wyevale garden centre between 9 May – 9 June 2016 and receive 10% off new ones! Cos’ it’s for a good cause!
Find out more at www.wyevalegardencentres.co.uk/toolsforchange
It was absolutely bonkers weatherise here in London today and we spent most of it indoors but when the clouds came over for half an hour in the afternoon, we transplanted some tomato plants out into the back. Come 4pm we chased an ace double-winged Dragonfly around the back garden in the extreme heat with a camera for ten minutes. Big up the tropical warmth!
A big shout to Zdenko Franjic (DJ Zdena) from Zagreb, Croatia for kindly sending us these pics of his great garden/orchard. Zdenko runs the Croatian alternative rock/blues/punk/indie label Slušaj Najglasnije! (Listen Loudest!) and distributes all sorts of books, comics and fanzines too.
A few words from Zdenko: “My mamma left me a garden with an orchard. Then I met Nina (Varga) and we now spent our weekends there. We’re beginners in gardening but we’ve started to plant and now they’re growing.
If that garden was good enough for my mamma, it’s good enough for us…”
We just want to say here at weeds it’s a fine garden/orchard and best of luck with it as it looks like a special space! There’s some nice raised beds there too!
More on the massive output of the Listen Loudest label here and here. Ta to Zdenko for words and the Clarence Reid tune and Nina Varga for the pics.
Thanks also to Zdenko for his mix of Madtone‘s Dark Dread off The Sound Robbers From Outer Space CD from 2007.
Here’s a very apt tune from Akcept out of Christchurch, New Zealand with a nice and chilled dub called Springtime Stepper. The weather isn’t that spring-like here at the moment, we’ve had cold winds, sleet, rain and frosts of late and it’s more like winter!
As it’s nearly the end of the month this is more like a guide of what to sow late april/early may and it all depends on this mad weather anyway. My spuds are coming through the ground now but still have fleece on the top of them and probably will have for a couple of weeks or so. If you are going to risk sowing outside, sow under protection with some fleece, jam jars or a cloches or wait until the weather heats up later this month.
So it’s nearly time to sow those french, runner and broad beans (do wait as beans hate sitting around in cold wet soil) and peas. Also carrots, beetroot, leeks, radishes, turnips can go in and you can start sticking in your parsley, coriander, swiss chard, salads, lettuce, rocket & leaf beet.
To be on the safe side sow indoors: brassicas, french, runner and broad beans, all types of pea, sweetcorn, courgettes, squashes, cucumbers and melons.
May the weather be with you!
A big thanks to Rob Da Bank for playing the latest tune from Jazzmin & Madtone called “Earth Citizen” 5 minutes into this imaginary soundtrack mix for Bestival Weekly on Soho Radio this week. The mix also includes Tim Hecker, The Kramford Look, Kidkanevil, Solar Bears, Ohal and Loose Meat and it’s great stuff!
If all goes to plan the tune will be released on a compilation on the Swedish label The Sublunar Society later this year. Crank it up!
It’s been a very emotional day today as a compost trench was dug earlier this morning. The reason was that over the last fortnight there’s been three sightings (while kitchen peelings were being deposited to our dalek type compost bin) of a very large rodent helping him/her self to the heap.It turns out it was getting in through the crudely cut flap at the front.
Today the bin was cleared out of it’s rotting vegetation and dug deep into a trench at the bottom of the garden which will benefit some squash/pumpkin plants in the forthcoming months. The plastic dalek bin will be sawn up next week and thrown into the recycling bin.
Big shout to our good mates Marc and Maz for standing by as emotional support and for holding the camera just in case said rodent showed his/her face and the footage of a grown man running up the garden in fear might get us all £250 on “You’ve been framed.” Needless to say no rodent was found and all nerves were left intact.
Also today we just found some daft gardening-related pieces in the Steroid Abuse Spring Fayre fanzine from 2003 (seems like yesterday). Big shout to all involved and Lord Anthony B for the collaboration on the fanzine – We salute you all!
No salutations to the Forest Hill Super Rat though.
What’s going on with that weather at the moment? One day you’re in the garden with your jumper off, the next indoors with the heating on. They’ve even talked about sleet and snow at the London Marathon tomorrow. Madness!
Well we aren’t taking any risks here at Weeds HQ (above) so there’s a array of tomato plants, a squash, a safflower plant and sweet peppers all being kept indoors until the risk of frost is passed. And look at that Mongolian Giant Sunflower in the centre go! Below: That will be us up that ladder in the summer if the advert for those giant sunflower seeds we bought on ebay for 80p is to be believed.
Out in the garden we’ve got some fleece over the spuds (after we earthed them up as extra protection) that are now coming through. Don’t be fooled by that bit of sunshine at the moment as it can still be nippy overnight but give it a few more weeks and all will be well! 
Soon we’ll be able to put out those Dahlia tubers that are sitting in the corner of the back room that are starting to sweat in their packaging. Talking of Dahlias, have a butchers at The National Dahlia Collection here for a comprehensive list of said plant, there’s even varieties called Punky and Abba but why no Charlie Harper or John Peel?
Soundtrack to this post is this classic Babylon from Johnny Clarke that’s being played on last week’s Ross Allen’s Mi-Soul show on Mixcloud as we write. Tune!
Weeds up to me knees 