I popped into Shannon’s this morning whilst the sun was out and on the way round deciding what to treat myself with, I noticed this delightfully named passion flower.
While we were there, we bought a bag of coarse grit for my daughter’s cactus collection. On the way out we noticed a few people doing a double take at the bag my daughter was carrying. And this is why…
In the background while writing this, we’re listening to this week’s fitting tribute to the late Joe Maiden “the godfather of soil,” by Tim Crowther and friends on BBC Radio Leeds. It’s a mixture of happy and sad and a show worth listening to on play again here. R.I.P Joe Maiden.
Now here’s something well interesting heard on the Tom Ravenscroft show over the last few weeks. It’s by Commodo, Gantz, Kahn. It’s a bit eastern, a bit bassy and well grimy. Whatever the genre is, we at weeds love it and will be playing it over and over again!
Sad news as another great gardener goes to that big greenhouse in the sky.
This week the great Joe Maiden from Gardening with Tim and Joe on BBC Radio Leeds passed away with prostate cancer. Very sad news indeed, as he was a man who knew his onions… (and carrots, and brassicas, and beetroots, and chrysanthemums, and dahlias, and roses, and agapanthus, and foxgloves, etc, etc.) He’ll be sorely missed. R.I.P Joe Maiden.
An oldie but goodie from the great Chronixx over a minimal 1990’s-like rhythm track that’s just been played over the soundsystem at the annual party and barbecue on the estate behind us tonight. It’s been said it’s good to talk to plants, well I hope the vegetables at the bottom of the garden are listening to the other good tunes being played at the party. Especially the seed onions and the spuds that I put in after an early morning visit to Shannon’s today.
The onions (Troy) will overwinter and should be ready to harvest early summer and if all goes well weather permitting, the spuds will be ready for christmas, (but I am pushing it with the timescale!) The Iris’s went in the front garden and will be forgotten about until the spring, you bet come April I’ll say, “when did I put those bulbs in?”
Thanks very much to Vic Godard for getting in touch and picking this week’s Greenhouse Classic. It’s a great number with a gardening theme called “And roses and roses” by Astrud Gilberto. Short, sweet and on a floribunda tip!
Also a big thanks to G. (Mrs Godard) for sending a few words and some pics from their garden.“It’s been a funny year weather wise, the early heat and sun meant many annuals and perennials flowered early and have now gone to seed, whereas the dismal August means some, like the Mirabilis Jalapas (aka four o’clock flower) are only now coming into their own.The bumper tomato yield is still ongoing and it looks like there will be enough beans to freeze and last throughout the winter, and it’s the first year we’ve seen pink flowers on the beans.I planted some old gladioli bulbs that Vic’s dad Harry found all dried up and papery in a drawer and surprisingly as you can see they all took!” Mrs Godard
If you remember from last years post, Vic’s dad Harry grows everything from seed; vegetables, annuals and even palms, how great is that! Thanks to Vic, G and Harry too!
Thanks to our mate John F again for passing on another greenhouse classic; “a song to bring us some sunshine” but as he says, “is one tinged with sadness; the late, great Rico Rodriguez playing with the Special AKA who sadly passed away yesterday.” And he’s rightR.I.P. Rico Rodriguez, a true reggae legend.
John sent us this link of a great video funnily enough shot at a legendary Coventry late-night eatery called “Noel’s Cafe,” features a few Coventry music-related celebs and doing a nice bit of dancing, our good friend The Rhythm Doctor who I either forgot or never knew was featured in this. Well I never!
Looks like I’ll be having another tooth pulled next week.This morning at just gone 8 am I ventured up to Guy’s Hospital Dental Department with a dull pain in one of my back teeth.
Three hours later after one long wait, a couple of examinations and an X-ray, I’ve now got an appointment on Wednesday to have an extraction. To keep my mind off the intermittent pain for the rest of the day this mix from Andrew Weatherall has been on repeat. Nice vibe, and very soothing for my teeth.
Heard on Tom Ravenscroft’s show this week, a tune from Deerhunter called Snakeskin out on 4AD (home to the US Girls we featured a while back here). Loving the instrumental section three quarters of the way in. The tune takes a little while to sink in, but it will! One to play loud while you realise it’s near enough autumn.
They must be firing chemicals into the atmosphere again (see post here for explanation) as it was lovely this morning, now the weather’s taken a turn for the worst.Before it did rain I harvested the first of the (two so far) butternut squashes on one of the plants grown from seed. It might have the odd mark on it and a light slash down the side, but who cares!
It didn’t take much effort either, I sowed the seeds in May and popped a couple of them in each pot (of seed sowing compost) just in case only one germinated, as they were part of a job-lot of seed packets on e-bay where some had passed their “use by date” and pulled out the weaker of the two seedlings when they appeared. I waited until the first proper leaves appeared and put them in various parts of the garden after “hardening them off” first. Apart from weeding around the young seedlings and giving them a semi-regular feed of comfrey liquid (beware, it pongs a bit!) that was it. The plant that really took off was in one of the side beds which stalled for a couple of weeks then went absolutely mad, covering all the area and now trying to climb up the small plum tree and travel across the lawn. It’s an ideal plant if you’ve got a sunny corner or plot you want to cover for a season, just watch it though, as it will takeover!
The moral of this post is, butternut squash, it was easy, it was cheap (well cheap in fact!) GO AND DO IT (next year)!
Rakim – It’s Been A Long Time [DJ Premier – Original Version]
It was sunny yesterday morning so I went out early in the back to tidy up the bottom bed, weeds were beginning to sprout there and bindweed was finding it’s way in too. I do like a bit of clearing and weeding as it also gives my headspace a chance of a clear-out too (man)!Funnily enough I was going to “rest” that bed this year, but in February I obtained a great selection of stuff from the seed swap organised by Lewisham Gardens and Golightly Gardens (post here.) Then there was that bargain seed job-lot I won on ebay too (post here) and that’s apart from packets bought from the garden centre, so those seeds had to go somewhere!It started with some poppies, then it was beetroots, carrots and a couple of salad crops. Then I added a couple of different varieties of sunflower, parsnips, rocket, cornflowers and not forgetting there were some strawberry plants in already. It looked like a garden designer’s nightmare (below pic: the plot in the summer). So much for a “resting” bed with nothing in it!It’s like gardening itself though, once you start it’s difficult to stop. You go out for ten minute’s “tipping around with a hoe” and you return a few hours later after finding “another job I just had to do”.One thing though, a row of leeks that I started off from seed (above, in the seed tray in the “found in the street” terrarium taken around late February) are just about ready if I wanted to use them small. How long do they take to grow?