It’s just turned up in the garden

There’s a tall old plant at the back of the bed that seems to have shot out of nowhere. We did a Plant.id on it and it turns out to be Fullers Teasel. It’s a plant that initially stuck out to us on a walk on the wildside (the river path from Sydenham to Catford) but not so sure we want it in that part of the garden.

We’ve just read up on it and it says it not that good for the plant to move it about, as it has a bit of a large taproot so perhaps we’ll leave it be. It’s good for the birds and bees anyway and the flower don’t look that bad. We are sure we either bought a plant last year or took some seed heads off a plant. Who knows, we just have to check on it that it don’t take over the garden.

Dub for a cloudy Saturday morning

A nice bit of dub from Madmax Hifi (ft Sir Jama and Couleur d’Opium) out of Peypin D’Aigues, France. As it says on their Bandcamp, “the track moves away from war, greed, and the chase for money, reminding us that true wealth lives in love, peace, freedom, and the heart.” Too right mate! Wishing a good weekend to all the dub gardeners out there! (Above: crazy shapes by the pond this morning)

Things are waking up

It’s been lovely over here since Monday and things are starting to wake up, especially these Marvel of Peru (AKA the Four O’clock Plant) seeds that have germinated that we got from Real Seeds. It’s a bit of a mad plant, as it says on wikipedia here, “The flowers usually open from late afternoon or at dusk (namely between 4 and 8 o’clock), giving rise to one of its common names. The flowers then produce a strong, sweet fragrance throughout the night, then close in the morning. New flowers open the following day.” We will keep you posted on developments.

As for the toads in the pond, it’s looking rather hectic there!

Toad you so

Today we had some good weather so had a couple of trips armed with the odd teabag and egg carton back and forth to the compost heap. On the way back we spotted these three on the pond. We’ve just found out that it’s toads that lay their spawn in lines. Well you learn something new every day.

Are you experienced?

We got out in the garden today and did just over an hour to warm up those “doing the gardening” muscles. We cleared the bed at the side, gave the ground a light forking which creates the illusion that a lot of work has been done on it when you look from afar. It is nice to see a tidy flowerbed.

And yes we know this is a dandelion (above) but for some reason earlier we didn’t want to dig it up as we thought it may be one of the plants we obtained at the plant stall in Crystal Palace last year. We were told about the plant “the inexperienced gardeners think it is a weed and dig it up” so of course we left it as we didn’t want to be caught out.

Oh, dear we’ve just checked the blog post from last year here. It was this plant (below) they were talking about which looked like a dock. The offending dandelion above will be pulled up first thing tomorrow!

And sick of buying spring onions on a weekly basis, we’ve taken to planting any left-over spring onions in a plant plot by the kitchen rather than throw them away! And why not, waste not, want not and all that.

Anyone else been out in the garden today?

The birds and the bees and a cup of green tea

Early yesterday morning we decided to clear the “wild” part of the garden (below) as yes it is wild but it just looked a bit of a mess. We cleared out all the weeds and now it’s a little bit bare but we can imagine that won’t last long. We’re expecting some rain later this week so that mixed with some sunny periods will be the right conditions for a mad growth spurt.

Whilst having a cup of tea admiring our good work, we were visited by a fox quickly passing through, two birds including the Robin (top pic) and then a neighbour’s cat came in either for the birds or the bit of catmint we are growing near the pond. We remember years at Shannon’s someone telling us it will bring all the locals cats in. Perhaps they were right?

Get much wildlife in your garden? Do let us know.

We’ve got a Barbara Hepworth in our garden (supposedly)

Cheers to our mate Nic G across the pond for letting us know that the thing we found in the skip the other night is more than likely an example of sand-casting leftovers.

We’ve now got it as a sculpture at the bottom of the garden (just by the part under fence that is used as a cat/fox run) and with the sunlight on it this morning looks like a fox looking up at the sky.

We are hoping to pass it off as a mini-Barbara Hepworth next time Antiques Roadshow visits Catford and give the “specialists” some spiel about “Dame Barbara gifted it to my late father after he tidied up some flower beds in St Ives.”

We do think it looks similiar to a fox today. Who knows what it may look like at 3pm, sand casting leftovers perhaps? We do hope not.

It looks like spring has sprung

Pic: The pond this morning.

A big thanks to our good mate Gerry Hectic for sending us a mix to celebrate this first day of spring called “A sunshine mix in spring”. It’s a brilliant garden/nature related mix and one to have on when you’re sowing those first vegetable/flower seeds indoors on the potting table (in our case the kitchen sink!)

Here’s the tracklisting:
Intro – Ursula Rucker (& Charles Webster) – Begin Anew (Acapella) Edit)
Alabaster DePlume – That Was My Garden (Edit)
Tunng – Snails
Oscar Jerome – Smell The Daisies feat. anaiis (Radio Edit)
THSA – In Bloom
Late Nite City – Higher Ground
United Freedom Collective – Moonshine
lovetempo – But I Do (Daisybelle Remix)
Gabril Gosse – Breeze ft. Emile Parisein
Shane Sato – Gardenia
Yahushi Ide – A Place In The Sun
Ebi Soda – Bamboo
Evren Furtuna – Little Flower
Ursula Rucker (& Charles Webster) – Begin Anew (Acapella) Edit)
Chaos In The CBD – Midnight In Peckham ft. Isaaz Aesilli
Ursula Rucker (& Charles Webster) – Begin Anew (Acapella) Edit)

So raise a toast to Jean-Michel Jarre if you’re that way inclined or just to the forthcoming season when one day soon you will wake up and not see a frost. Cheers Gerry!

We are not going to complain

We’ve just heard from our good friend Rich R in the Lake District about the weather tomorrow morning up there and it looks like it’s around minus 4. We will not complain about the supposed cold weather here in SE23!

Rich has just come back from a trip to Scotland around Oban and sent us some brilliant pictures from his highland adventure. The above makes of us think of what Mars would be like if it had water. Wonderful looking place.

And the above photographs too look like a special place even though we wouldn’t want to be doing any skinnydipping in the water there at this time of year. We’ve saved a great one until last, a majestic looking sheep from Kerrera. Wonderful stuff Rich and thanks again!

Scotland pics © Rich R 2024

Wild wild wild youth

The wild bit at the bottom of the garden is starting to colour up a bit. We originally put in some seed bombs a few years back, things got a bit messy the season after and then we bought some various wild flower seed for shade and woodland and just bunged them in, in a anarchic gardening style. We’ll buy some more off ebay next week and see what it brings to the (plant) party. Any good ideas when it comes to wild plants for the shade?

There’s also a few mini ponds in between the plants made out of all things including large margarine containers and even an old slow cooker pot and they’re well disguised now but still good for wildlife. We think all gardens need a wild bit somewhere. If you look closely you can see the bucket that keeps the comfrey liquid a brewing in with an old bathroom tile as its lid near the compost bin. For God’s sake, don’t lift off that lid!