Category Archives: speed gardening

Who would have thought it, in January too!

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We had no idea that the weather would be so nice today, the north of the UK have had power cuts and storms galore yet the sun was out in SE23.

We took advantage and cut down the dead wood on some rosemary, thyme, oregano and some mint in pots (the only way to grow mint unless you want to plant to take over your garden). Above is an example of some other dead wood in the sun.

We also moved some dormant plants about and gave them a little watering in. There’s a forecast of rain tomorrow but we had a nice “red sky at night” so we’re a bit confused. Not sure if we’ll be able to get out tomorrow but it was nice while it lasted today. Roll on the spring!

Rainbows over Lewisham

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Yesterday the weather forecast on the telly said it was officially the first day of spring even though we thought spring started around the (spring) solstice but what do we know? We’ve just looked online and here’s the official line: “The spring season associated with the vernal equinox, called astronomical spring, occurs on or around March 20, but meteorologists recognize March 1st as the first day of meteorological spring, which is based on annual temperature cycles and the Gregorian calendar.” Ah so now we know.

It’s been a weird mix of rain and sunshine here today and on the way back from an early morning jaunt to see if they had any gardening based centre-aisle specials in Lewisham Lidl, we caught a rainbow (above).

This afternoon between the showers we tidied up the bed next to the garage, trimmed off any dead wood and gave the soil a good hoe over. A couple of days previous we cut the lawn (giving it three quick cuts as it was so overgrown. We did the old council springtime trick of first cut of the mower on long and then two “shorts”, also a rake in-between every cut) it looks a bit better now and another cut in a week will have it looking great. For a maximum “crisp” look to a lawn, tinker around the edges with some clippers or a strimmer.

Whenever you think the season starts, watch the weather as it’s well cold tonight and for God’s sake don’t be fooled just because we have a couple of sunny afternoons of late that spring has finally sprung.

 

A couple for a Saturday night

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A tune for a winter’s Saturday night found while researching a shortwave mix. It’s called “Farewell” and is from Stereognosis® from a few year ago. It’s wonderful stuff!

And while we’re on the subject of Stereognosis® check the whole LP on Bandcamp as it’s well worth getting. Here’s another good one off it.

November spawned a chillie

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It’s not that far off mid-November and the garden should be getting ready for a kip until spring but you wouldn’t think so. We picked three cherry tomatoes yesterday and the couple of chillies we got off the plant below that is sadly nearing its end.

If you fancy growing some hot chillies get some 7 Pot Yellow (AKA Seven Pot Brain Strain Yellow) and see what you think. They are originally from Trinidad and Tobago and are 1,000,000+ SHU (Scoville Heat Units) as in super hot! We’ve always picked them when they’ve been green so they’ve never got to the yellow stage. We’ve just looked and there’s a red variety which is even hotter at 1,000,000 – 1,200,000 SHU. We’ve never done chillies seriously before, thinking they’d never work but we were wrong and going to grow more!

We’ve also got a big pot of carrots growing after chucking some old seeds found at the bottom of the seed tin into a pot we originally found in the street filled with Lldl’s finest potting compost. They need some thinning out but we wonder if we’ll actually get some carrots later this year? The foilage looks quite decorative!

Job done (finally)

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And we finally tidied up the front garden after much putting off and excuses (“We haven’t enough bin bags”, “It looks like rain later” and “We’ll do it next week”. We reckon it may have been a good year and a bit since it had a good tidy up and it was so bad we got a few business cards put through the front door from gardeners, the shame of it.

It took us about 3 hours, steaming through it pretending we’ve been given a “job and finish” task from the council. Now we have a clean slate to think about what can go in there. We’re alright with doing the work once we make a start but it’s making that start…

Where have all the flowers gone?

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On Saturday morning while we were out and about on our travels we were told of an interesting garden in development around the back of a charity shop.

When we got to the said plot we were greeted with some nice raised beds surrounded by walls with a wooden frame and wire mesh that were covered in numerous empty plant pots all connected up to a clever irrigation system. Even the gate to get in had pots on the back of it, talk about vertical veg and not wasting any space!

No idea what they may be growing but we wonder if it’s micro-greens on a commercial basis. We did see some fruit bushes ready to go in too. Whoever is taking over this garden is taking it very seriously.

Also this weekend we had a right of mixture of weather. It was gorgeous yesterday with the sun out most of the day but today it was a few degrees colder and we even had a bit of drizzle. As it’s still cold at night we have a variety of different kinds of plant protection from jam jars, the tops of propagators and plastic mini-cloches plonked over some tomato and pepper seedlings. (Above) the mini veg patch at the bottom of the garden with the frost protection and the plastic mushroom bought from a bric-a-brac stall at a summer festival which is placed over a cut off washing line pole. Keep an eye on the temperatures at night as we’re still not out of the doldrums yet!

But don’t worry there’s a heatwave coming…

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Waking up here in South London this morning there’s been a right mixture of weather. We’ve had lashing rain and now a lovely bit of sunshine and it looks like this cycle will be continuing for the next few days (until we get the predicted heatwave, yeah right!)

Well this weather is no good if you’ve got to get the washing out but it’s good for the garden. Hopefully there will be more of the nice spells later as there’s a few more inches to fill on the garden refuse bin and you have to get your money’s worth don’t you?

Well here’s a couple of tunes to hopefully cheer us all up.The first is a chilled tube train inspired number by Commodore 98 called Mind the Gap.

And another travel inspired one by the wonderful Big Youth and Dennis Brown called Ride on, ride on/Wild goose chase. Let’s hope this weather clears up and we all can enjoy actually going outside.

After the frost has gone

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We just may be out of the frost danger zone here in London what with the forecast for warmer nights of 5 ºC next week. We’ve still got those teepees made out of broken bamboo canes and chucked out fabric on hand just in case as you never can tell with the crazy weather we’ve been having.

At the time of writing (9 am on a Sunday morning) we can hear the sound of a lawnmower which will not win the hearts of anyone living next door to them.

We here prefer to listen to the sounds of the above, a garden related tune called Dahlias by Asta Hiroki. Far more mellow sounding on a Sunday morning than an engine of a Hayterette. Enjoy the lovely weather we’re supposed to be having this week!

The link between composting and lockdown lunacy

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It is a bit difficult to do it with a darlek type bin but we got a garden fork into the compost heap today to give it a good mix up and to get some air to the pile. We could feel a bit of heat in there while we were doing it so it looks like the heap is working.

Since the lockdown we’ve taken the composting a bit more seriously because we’ve got more time on our hands, anything suitable goes in pronto and a trip down there with a single tea bag is not unusual!

We think the neighbours may have noticed our passion for the heap too as we were asked did we want a weekly bag of straw procured from a guinea pig hutch. Turns out the straw and any guinea pig product is alright for composting as it’s classed as a “brown” and would be ideal if you recently had a load of grass clippings deposited as the straw would add a bit of dryness to the heap. We’ll keep you posted on our guinea pig hutch gifts and let you know if they are any help or not!Apart from the composting a good bit of gardening was done in the front, weeding and attacking the ivy on the garden wall and learning that some of it is in fact holding up the said wall. There may have to be a compromise tomorrow when it comes to finishing the job because of that. We’re clearing all of the two tier bed and when things get back to some sort of normality and garden centres are open again we’ll fill it with some shrubs and grasses but it’s good to see it so clear for once! #lockdowngardening

The day the sun came out…

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We haven’t been out the back for weeks and it showed (above). The side bed had all sorts of debris on top of the soil: rotting comfrey leaves, dead sunflower sticks, dried nasturtium stalks and the like. We wrapped ourselves in a few layers of clothing, got the kneeling mat out and within an hour it looked fairly respectable (below).

The veg bed at the bottom put us in mind of an abandoned allotment (below) but now looks like any other bed during the winter. It was a bit frozen down there so the garden fork was left in the garage, a rake was the tool of choice and we got as much rubbish up as possible using it. All that’s left in the bed now is the couple of cardoons and a broad bean or two (below lower)!

The best thing we done was pull up the dahlia tubers, getting as much of the soil off as we could without damaging the them before storing them somewhere dry until the spring. We should have pulled them up earlier but laziness and life kicked in towards the end of last year. Let’s hope we’re not too late!