On a bargain tip!

Posted on by
Reply

courgettes on a bargain tipBig shout to our good friend Paul W who on his way home from work tonight, bought four courgette plants for £2 (that’s 50p each!) from a plant sale outside Charlton Station. How good is that?

If you are buying plants now, do make sure they have been “hardened off” and can go straight out into the garden. The plants may have been started off indoors/under glass and won’t be used to the ever changing weather outside and there’s always a risk of frost that might knock them for six too!

So just to make sure, leave the plants outside during the nice days and take them in at night so that seedlings become accustomed to the strong sunlight and varying weather so toughening them up a bit. Then in a few days they can be planted outside and if you’re still in doubt that there may be frost about, wrap some horticultural fleece (net curtains or newspapers) around them at night.

Also watch out for those slugs and snails, as they love those young plants too!

So keep em peeled (for cheap plant sales and the slugs and snails) as Shaw Taylor (RIP) used to say!

Ideal Guest House (Part 2)

Posted on by
Reply

Flame vine

A big shout to our good friend Phil Harmony from Dubnight Radio Show, Berlin for alerting us to this great flower pic taken at the Prince Valley Guest House in the beautiful surroundings of the Blue Mountains, Jamaica.

A big thanks to the owners Jackie and Robert for getting in touch with the name of the plant which is the flame vine (Pyrostegia Venusta). Just how brilliant are those flowers? If you want to know more about this rampant climber have a look here. It says in some parts of the world it grows as a weed! Beats ground elder anyday!

jamaican jade

Last year we featured the Prince Valley Guest House and the great plants that are on-site. There’s some out of the ordinary stuff growing including (above) the Jade Vine (a member of the pea and bean family, can you believe?) The posts are here and here.

So if you’re travelling to the “the land of wood and water” (as Rodigan says,) spend a couple of nights at the guesthouse (with an adjoining coffee farm) as it looks a great place! More on the guest house here. Thanks to Phil, Jackie and Robert again! We love that tropical flower madness here!

On a gardening home-brew tip!

Posted on by
3

Today I popped out and did a few hours in the garden in glorious sunshine can you believe! One of the jobs I did was to make some plant food with some Comfrey leaves (Bocking 14 Comfrey is the best as it doesn’t set seed) which I steeped in water in an old fermenting bucket from my days of wine-making (which weren’t that successful.)

Bin_2Comfrey is a great plant to have in the garden, it spreads like wildfire, the bees go bonkers over it and if you rip off loads of leaves and stuck them in a bucket of water for a few weeks it makes a great plant feed. Stick in some nettle and borage leaves into the mix too and it’s even better.Bin_4

Bin_5For God’s sake don’t breathe in the stuff as it’s lethal! I repeat do not smell the liquid. Keep the lid on for a few weeks and when it’s done (It’ll turn into a sludgy black liquid) water it down and apply it to your plants. More on how to make it here.

A pre-gardening reggae apéritif

Posted on by
Reply

We’ve woken up to a bright and sunny day here in London and just before a day of pottering about in the garden (or more likely, before the clouds go in!) here’s a wonderful bit of music to get you going.

It’s Chronixx doing a live set over some classic Studio 1 rhythms from his first appearance at Miss Lilys in New York City in 2012. Miss Lily’s looks a brilliant place, a restaurant, record shop and radio station, all they need now is a little garden centre at the back and it would be an ideal place for us here at weeds! Also, here’s a set Chronixx did there from back in 2014.

Some tunes to get you in mood for weeding, watering and taking off that horticultural fleece from the cold night just has gone (which you’ll more than likely be putting back on come this evening!).

Woop-woop! That’s the sound of da fleece!

Posted on by
Reply

fleeceI popped into Shannon’s yesterday and grabbed a big roll of horticultural fleece for around £6, which will come in well handy over the next few weeks. Some of my tomato plants were started off well early (there’s even a couple with flowers on them!) so after a couple of weeks in the mini-plastic greenhouse I’ve recently put them outside. On the nights I now cover them over with fleece. If you want to do it cheaper you can always use old net curtains or as Joe said, some sheets of newspaper draped over the plants.

I was listening to a recent Gardening with Tim & Joe on BBC Leed’s and Mr Maiden was saying even though some shops have tomato plants for sale, it still doesn’t mean that it’s safe to stick them outside as there still could be a frost for a good few weeks yet. And also chatting at Shannon’s yesterday I was told it’s not just frost you need protection from but also damage from cold winds and rain.

I also treated myself to a couple of Courgette plants as the seeds I sown haven’t amounted to much. You really don’t need more than a couple of courgette plants as you’ll be overwhelmed with the bloody things come autumn!Courgette_2

Ducks Deluxe

Posted on by
Reply

Ducks deluxe We had a fleeting return visit of two of the South London urban ducks for about half an hour last night and it was great to see them back. Trouble is, our cats didn’t see it that way, and even now, one of them is patrolling the fish pond at the bottom of the garden.

Big up the urban duck! Come back soon as we have the fish food and the porridge oats ready on hand just in case!

There’s a box on my doorstep (what I’m a gonna do?)

Posted on by
Reply

Box on the doorstepA big thanks to the mystery person who left this excellent champagne box on my doorstep early this morning. It’s exactly like the one mentioned on the blog many moons ago here and it’ll make a great planter just like the last one. Please own up as it’s a top gift!

Grow wild seeds

Today I also received my free packet of seeds from BBC Countryfile. Guess what planter they’ll be sown in? Big up John Craven, champagne boxes and people who leave great gifts on your doorstep! Thank you!

They’re under starters orders

Posted on by
2

I’ve got a collection of leggy tomato plants waiting to go in the garden until after the risk of frost has gone, like I have every year. After starting them off on the kitchen windowsill a couple of months ago, I put them in the plastic mini-greenhouse outside with the front open during the day to harden them off. This weekend I stuck one of them under the terrarium outside and also sowed  a mixture of seeds beside it. There’s onions and garlic on their way in the bed behind and in the raised bed furthest away have seed potatoes under a good deal of earthed up soil. Seed bed of the weekThe bed at the bottom of the garden which I was going to keep veg-free this year has now a row of leek seedlings which I sowed indoors on xmas eve last year and a couple of courgette seeds which went in over the weekend under jam jars for extra protection. The rest is a mixture of flowers, a purple sprouting broccoli gone to flower, rocket and strawberries. It won’t be long now until “they’re off” and we can’t wait!back bed of the week