Tag Archives: comfrey

This one goes out to all plant givers and seed swappers

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One thing’s for sure is that the whole idea of seed/plant swapping, finding stuff in the street and the idea of giving not to receive (but then someone gives you something out of the blue) is well up our street. It cheers up the garden for less pence and there’s a possibly that you’ll be growing stuff you’d never even think of growing. This morning we noticed some fruit on one of the chili peppers we were given the other week. We reckon the weekly dose of liquid plant feed helps and we were just thinking even the comfrey plant we made the feed out of was given to us by a mate earlier this year.

Sometimes you don’t have to look that far to find stuff. Once we awoke up to a lovely empty champagne box on our doorstep with no explanation here that is now looking a bit older with some mint in it by the pond.

Or the time when we found a silver birch seedling in a plastic bag in the street here when we were on the way to a mates. That was back in 2017 and it’s grown a fair bit since! And here’s the tree today.

A big shout to everyone who has swapped, given and received and all the tweeters that have put us in the direction of cheap seeds at the likes of Lldl and Ebay. We salute you and may your garden be abundant and we hope someone leaves a gardening gift on your doorstep, gives you a pot of something out of the blue or you walk past a garden wall that has something interesting with a “Take me” note on it. Big up the “Giving circle” or whatever it’s called.

We don’t give to receive but it’s nice to

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Earlier this year we were very kindly given some Comfrey roots by our gardening friend Ruth as the plants we did have went to pot when the new fence got put in. Before then we were regularly giving out Comfrey liquid as it’s super stuff but as we had no Comfrey we had nothing to give out.

Those roots have now grown into a nice plant and we’ve been constantly pulling off the leaves and letting them soak in a old bucket with a little water and now have some great plant feed ready. Here’s the first batch we gave out earlier today (below).

As if by magic this afternoon we were given two very healthy looking pepper plants which we’ll be putting in the ground tomorrow. We’re great believers in giving out stuff to people and you never know, you may receive something out of the blue. Keep the old circle a turning as they say!

Fast and bulbous. Got me?

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A couple of weeks after we featured them in a post here we can see that those shallots are coming on well. As we said last time, we haven’t had much success with them in the past in the raised beds but it looks like starting them under cover and sticking some organic matter in may have done the trick. We’ll keep you posted.

In the top right of this pic above you can just about make out the giant garlic. We stuck the sides of the raised bed (without the polythene on top) back on them as a bit of added protection as the wind seemed to give them a bit of knock last week. We’ll start feeding the garlic and the shallots soon with some comfrey/nettle liquid as soon as we can get some started and on the go. Hopefully that combined with some good weather to come may help them on their way.

Rotting and Tomatoes

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The sun has been beating down this week and working its magic on the tomatoes as they’re starting to ripen quick. We’re still feeding the plants once a week (even though we are fast running out of liquid feed as the comfrey plants are hardly growing this year) and giving them a good water in the morning. They’re a different shape than what we’re used to but they are great taste wise. We assume they’re the Costoluto Fiorentino variety grown from seed picked up from the seed swap at Glengall Wharf Garden earlier this year. The San Marzano we also obtained there are coming on great too.

And our daily turning of the compost heap and cutting up of the waste as small as possible (not all the time as there’s whole onions and a mouldy orange in there) is starting to pay off. We reckon it’s a combination of those factors plus the open compost bin and the heat as well. This stuff should be able to be used in no time as soon as it all rots down. Sunshine keep doing your job but can we have some rain please?

It can’t be June already!

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It’s all gone a bit bonkers in the garden here what with the good weather of late plus the combination of the rain we had a few weeks previous to that. The veg in the raised beds (above) are tearing away and the spuds are almost flowering.

We’ve let the grass go a bit wilder due to No Mow May and we’re beginning to like the idea. I think it’s the council gardening background made us a bit reticent to let the lawn grow more than a few inches. The only thing is now that we can’t see where our old cat leaves its “presents” so we have to go by smell and tread very carefully in the evening.

The pond is going great after the big pond liner change. The fish seem to like it and we’ve even got tadpoles in there now and we didn’t even spot any frogspawn beforehand. We were told many years ago by a workmate that down the Walworth Road one Sunday in the 1960’s “It rained frogs” (a report of raining frogs in Croydon here), perhaps it could’ve been raining tadpoles overnight in Forest Hill recently?

And the bed next to the new fence has come alive with new plants procured from the market, garden centre and seeds off ebay and friends. The comfrey plants that usually go mad have probably been checked when the fence went in so the comfrey feed has suffered so far but you never know as we’ve got a few months yet. But can you believe that it’s really June? We cant.

Whilst we’ve been writing this, the below was the musical background. One of the best music shows on the shortwaves!

https://soundcloud.com/thisisamusicshow/this-is-a-music-show-118

There’s good jobs and bad jobs!

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Well we finished the big job of clearing the ivy off the front garden wall (there’s still a little bit on the top right hand-side but that’s covering part of the wall that’s fallen down) and getting rid of the weeds so we can start again from afresh. There’s still the odd bit of ivy root in the ground that when it starts to grow again will need knocking off with a hoe. Some parts of the ground were so hard we couldn’t get the garden fork in deep enough but on those bits we just ruffled the surface a bit. Once we have that bit of rain we’ve been promised this week it will hopefully look like it’s all been forked over well!

And a job we do hate is draining off the liquid from the bucket which houses the brewing comfrey liquid. To say it smells is an understatement. And for God’s sake don’t even get any of the stuff (even if it’s been diluted) on your gardening gloves or clothes.

More on making your own excellent (but stinky) comfrey plant feed here. Comfrey is a must-have in the garden as it’s great for the bees and for plant food! You’ll have to be careful though, as the plant has a tendency to take over if you don’t regularly check it.

We’ve got that “side of the pond plants” blues

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Another row of spuds went in on Saturday in the bed we were going to “rest” for this year and beside the pond we started on a mammoth task.A few years ago a friend of ours passed on some plants. A root of Comfrey and a thug of a thing (we never did find the name of but we know the plant oh so well now!) that looks like a low-growing privet that has purple flowers and spreads like wildfire! It’s taken over the bottom corner of the garden now (pic below) and it’s our new “work in progress” during the lockdown.

We did a little bit of hand weeding on Saturday and above is the result. It’s hard work and you know it’ll keep coming back so we’ll have to be on our guard for the next few months but it’s a darn sight better. We will keep a little bit of it about though as we do need a bit of wildness by the pond for the frogs and wildlife to hide but not too much like it is now! #lockdowngardening #there’sneveranendtogardening

We’ve all been told to garden from home

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There’s been a lot of keenness in the garden today what with the sun coming out and we’ve spent a good few hours since 10 am tipping around, sowing, tidying and mowed the grass. Some suntan lotion was even applied!

You know for a fact it’ll probably snow all next week but that’s a risk we’ve got to take, it’ll only be the cost of a packet of seeds and a few seed potatoes. You never know what’ll happen and it’s worth giving it a go.

We even used the last of the comfrey feed we had left over from last year so started a new batch. Comfrey leaves are now springing up and we used them combined with some fresh nettles and some borage leaves for added goodness. It’ll be stinking up the place in a few weeks time but the jazzy Boots home brew bucket is way down the garden and the liquid is worth its weight in gold when it’s ready!

A knife, a fork, some comfrey and a brick

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It was a lovely sunny (Good) Friday yesterday so it was all hands on deck in the Weeds garden. The seed spuds from Shannon’s have now been put in. The great Joe Maiden used to say Good Friday was traditionally the day for planting your potatoes but Marie Thunn (who knew a bit about gardening as well) didn’t think yesterday was the best day according to the 2019 edition of her book (below).

Using a tip passed onto us by an old gardening friend we put some ripped up leaves of comfrey in the hole first before putting the seed spuds in which is supposedly good for helping them on their way.

Talking about knitbone (another name for comfrey as is bruisewort) we started a new batch of comfrey liquid in a lovely 1980’s Boots fermenting bin (above top). Don’t it look great?

To the handfuls of leaves and a small amount of water we added some borage and nettles for good measure and finally a brick to weigh it all down with. Now all we have to do is let the rotting (and ponging) begin! It may niff a bit it’s a damn good feed, cheap and easy to make! More on the David “Don’t call me Dave” Blaine-type-magic of comfrey here. #keepitcomfrey!

And after a good day’s work in the garden it was nice to unwind with some well downtempo business below, an aural equivalent of a Radox* bath. * Other bath salts are available as they say.

A post-christmas tip around in the garden

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We managed a couple of hours out in the garden today. The sun was shining and it was still a bit nippy but it was good to get out there after a good few months of watching the back getting untidy. Even that hour or two made a difference, the side bed was cleaned up and a half a Lewisham Council brown bin was filled with slimy rotting comfrey, weeds and prunings. It was nice to see actual plants (not bindweed) and the garden path again!

At the end of the session it was good to sit down with a cup of tea then a rum and coke in front of the new addition to the Weeds garden (above) and watch the flames as the sun went down and contemplate on when the next trip in the garden will be.

If you don’t hear from us before, have a great new year and see you in 2019!