Found on a wall in Forest Hill this morning, a lovely collection of 5 plastic bell cloches. All they needed was a quick swill out and there you go, plants and seedlings protected from mild frosts and the wind!
Have you found anything gardening-wise on the street lately? Send us a pic of your gardening finds!
We were particularly excited last week when we acquired another White Foxtail Lily from Shannon’s. We were so enamoured by the plant that we even named one of Madtone’s new tracks after it (see last post).
It’s the bizarre starfish-shaped root crowns that do it for us, family members have gasped “Urghhhhh, keep THAT away from me” and have also remarked “they’re disgusting” when we’ve showed them the crowns. We here really appreciate the root crown’s oddness as you know we love something a bit “out there” here at Weeds! The tweet (at the top) from Shannon’s from a few years ago still makes us laugh.
We’ve lost a couple of plants over the years as we don’t think they like our heavy clay soil here in London. As the plant originates from the dry grasslands of western and central Asia it prefers a free draining soil and when awakening in the spring the early leaves don’t particularly tolerate the frost. We give the bed a good bit of preparation before putting it in, mixing in some organic matter to help with the drainage.
It’s a very bizarre sight when the plants starts to kick into life in the spring. Over a few weeks you can see the thing drilling up through the soil and reminds us of the film War Of The Worlds when the monsters from outer space start to wake up. Sadly, the plants don’t look like those monsters that have the hoover-like tentacles though. Now that would be interesting!
It’s brilliant when leaves explode out of the soil and then the fantastic flower head a couple of months later. No-one talks about how odd they are then do they? Leave the Eremurus alone! We love it here and will bring you updates when it pops up in the spring. #FoxtailLily #Itcamefromouterspace
In celebration of buying another Foxtail Lily from Shannon’s this weekend Madtone & The Eremurus All-stars have composed a short piece of music called Foxtail Lily Dub influenced by said plant. To say that the root crowns are out of this world is an understatement and the blooms are something to behold!
The flower spike:
The mad as anything root crown: (about 10 inches across!)
#FoxtailLilyDub #Itcamefromouterspace
You know we love a plant sale here at Weeds. Thanks to Lewisham Gardens for letting us know about the Charlton & Blackheath Amateur Horticultural Society‘s plant stall at The Horn Fair, Charlton House SE7 8RE on Sunday 14th October from 10am-6pm. There’s plants grown by members, free seeds and a talk with gardening tips and tricks at 11am, what more do you want! Fingers crossed the weather’s good. Remember do send us details of any plant sales, seed swaps etc and we’ll give them a plug.
Don’t think buying in tomato plants is in any way cheating. Earlier this year we sowed a few tomato seeds that failed miserably so we bought a couple of varieties from Shannon’s. The cherry ones (above) have done exceptionally well and they’re still going strong as we didn’t pinch out the tops. Big thanks to Shannon’s, we’ll be doing the same next year.
Monday afternoon was so nice we went out in the garden and tidied up one of the scrappy beds and then planted some garlic cloves to overwinter. It’s worth making the most of the weather at the moment as in a months or so’s time it may be dreadful. Here’s the before and after:
And finally a big shout to Steyvn Iron Feather Journal for letting us know about the latest Music’s not for everyone on NTS which features a ten inch vinyl special including One Deck & Popular’s Son of Stitt (Cafe del Bob’s mix) from many moons ago. Big thanks Mr Weatherall! #onedeckandpopular #sonofstitt
Big shout to a good gardening pal of ours who’s putting on an event in the Merton Art Space (at the Wimbledon Library) on Monday 22nd October 2018 from 7.30-10.30pm featuring the electronic duo Spray (featuring Ricardo Autobahn who sounds interesting by all accounts) and a John Peel inspired DJ set from Venice Hopper (tickets £12 plus £1.45 booking fee.) More about what looks like an interesting night here.
Gardening is such a massive subject it’s impossible to know everything. Even if you know a bit there’ll always be a bit more you can master. Why not get back into the classroom (or learn from home or in the great outdoors) and undertake a gardening course. As well as learning new stuff there’s a good chance you’ll meet like-minded people who may turn into future gardening friends (Hi Scarlett!)
There’s all sorts to choose from including the varying levels of the RHS certificates, gardening for beginners and seed saving workshops and then there’s the loosely gardening-related courses like foraging and bee-keeping. The courses go from the cheap to the expensive so there’s something to suit all pockets. If money is on the tight side there are free courses about or ones that are as cheap as chips, they just take that bit more effort to find. We’ve also seen courses at various community gardens that are free, all you have to do is help for an additional hour with some small gardening chore in exchange. A favour for a favour and all that!
A few years ago we did a couple of free courses at a local city farm. The first was making a herb garden in a window box type planter and the second was worm composting in the city for beginners which was well informative (above is our wormery made from a bucket cadged from the local butchers not long after the course). The herb course even came with a free planter with a great selection of free herbs to choose from too, talk about a bargain! Have a look online (tap in “free gardening courses” on google, facebook or twitter) or in the local press. Community groups, local allotments and gardening charities may be good to contact about free courses too.
Another free way of learning is on the web, the BBC has a series of great informative gardening guides available, from growing fruit and vegetables to the basics of soil here. Well worth having a look at!
If you hear of any good courses on the cheap or for free do pass them our way and we’ll blog them here. Best of lunch with your gardening studies!
Cheers to our good friend Marc B for letting us know about a feature which was up our street on BBC’s Gardeners’ World this week about a “seed guardian” in Wales called Adam Alexander. It’s excellent stuff to watch and it’s on i-player here episode 22 at about 25 minutes in. Have a look at Adam’s blog too (here) as he’s an interesting chap to say the least and has loads of advice on growing stuff, collecting seed and a lot more!
Talking of saving seeds and the like here’s news via @freedomseedbank of a great free event at the Skip Garden Harvest Festival on September 22nd at the Skip Garden, 1 Tapper Walk, London N1C 4AQ which includes a seed saving workshop explaining amongst other things “the theory and practice of saving seeds” which sounds great stuff. For more information and to book pop to their eventbrite page here.#saveyourownseeds
We were feeling sad at Weeds HQ earlier this week as we thought the forty odd quid solar fountain for the pond we bought a couple of years ago had died on us. There was no light on the control panel and it looked like that was it a goner.
Today we gave it one more chance and laid the solar panel directly in the sun for a few hours and the thing shot back into life later in the afternoon. The battery was as flat as a pancake. Salute to solar power! By the way the goldfish bought from Lewisham’s “premier” pet shop are still there but went a bit camera shy when this photo was taken (don’t worry that pesky Heron hasn’t had them!)
Just to let you know Weeds’ music arm 
Weeds up to me knees 