Tag Archives: Debby H

Cosmos update

Posted on by
Reply

We’ve had an update from Debby H on her cosmos and some good advice. The seedlings are now starting to get their first “true” leaves, which are fern-like as you can see in the picture above. She said when they have 3 or 4 pairs of the true leaves, pinch out the next pair of leaves to make sure the plant grows bushy and not “leggy”. Good tip as we didn’t think of that, even though we use the same technique with sweet peas encouraging them to bush out more.

Also Debby’s germination method of using the cardboard insides of toilet rolls seems to be a sure fire method what with the plant’s long roots. She did say which is also important, “I think the cosmos will be ready to pot-on soon, but not ready to go outside yet. We learnt last year that these plants are very susceptible to slugs when they are tiny.” Good stuff Debby!

Super Cosmos

Posted on by
Reply

Cheers to Debby H for letting us know about how her cosmos seedlings are getting on in the last post. We took her lead this week and sowed some of the seeds on Tuesday afternoon and come today we are seeing some results. Wonderful stuff, it didn’t take long did it? Remember 2025 is the year of the cosmos!

And for this sunny Saturday morning here’s a track that was played on the great On The Wire (a radio show well worth listening to as we always say) the other week, a track previously unknown to us here at Weeds from Ijahman Levi called Chariot of Love from 1977 and it’s a great single and now re-released on 7″ with a great dub too!

This is the year of the cosmos

Posted on by
Reply

With the pictures Debby H kindly sent of her garden in the last post, she also sent us some pics of how her cosmos seeds were doing. “I planted some cosmos seeds on Thursday afternoon. By this morning (Sunday), they had germinated!” (pic above). How good is that?

Then on Monday she sent us pictures of how quick the seedlings have grown (taken about 25 hours later after the original photographs). As she said “I find the growth since yesterday to be quite amazing” and we agree!

She also sent some useful information about the seedlings that we didn’t know “…cosmos plants have long roots, even when they are small, so egg-boxes didn’t work well last year. This time, I have tried to use the cardboard insides of toilet rolls. I put these in a plastic trug planter thingy to keep them upright and stable.”

Now that is a great tip Debby and good luck with the seedlings. We sowed some yesterday (Tuesday) and hoping we get some quick germination results too. Thanks again.

 

STOP PRESS: A picture from today (Wednesday). They are looking great Debby and ta for the update!

News from north London

Posted on by
Reply

Cheers to Debby H for getting in touch after her time away in Tenerife (pictures of plants from there here) and coming back to a garden “that has sprung to life” in north London. “There are yellow primroses all over plus a few pink, red and white clumps. We had some last year, but nothing like this and the peonies (below) have sprouted and grown amazingly”. Ours are doing the same here too, which is great.

The below plant is called lamium aka dead nettle. “It’s really a weed but there’s only a small amount so far, so I am letting it stay.” We’re with you on that as it looks great.

She told us that her pear tree is starting to bloom after having some troubles. “This poor tree (below) suffered terribly last year from rust. I wasn’t sure if it would be okay this year, but it looks good so far.”

“The rhododendron (below) is Wine and Roses. I saw it in a garden centre last spring. I loved the colour and its name, and decided to break the habit of a lifetime and pay for a plant.” Brilliant stuff.

“When we moved into this house in 2023, none of the above was visibly growing, except for the pear tree. The plants had all suffered a long period of hot, dry weather. Everything in the garden borders looked dead, except for the trees. The following year, things started growing, and they haven’t stopped since!”

Now that is great to hear Debby. With gardening it’s really what you put in that gives you results, a bit of hard work, a regular water and adding nutrients to the soil etc. As we can see here, it’s all worth the effort. Cheers Debby, the garden is looking like it’s got off to a great start and let’s not forget the indoor plants either (below).

Wow it’s 23 degrees in March (not in the UK sadly!)

Posted on by
Reply

Thanks to Debby H who is away in Tenerife at the moment where it’s a lovely 23 degrees. She sent us some pictures of the garden of where she’s staying at and it looks fantastic. We love this view above.

The bird of paradise/crane flower (strelitza) there looks well established (above) and we did a plant search on the plant below using Plantnet and it came up with agave. If we’re wrong on that, please do let us know but it’s great to see all these brilliant plants on their home turf so to speak and in their full glory. Cheers again Debby!

It’s all starting!

Posted on by
Reply

Cheers to Mike and Julia from near Coventry for a picture of their new basil grown hydroponically and we must say the basil is looking far better than ours that we’ve started to grow on our kitchen windowsill.

Also thanks to Debby H for sending us some pictures of the first flowers in her garden. “Our snowdrops had their flowers eaten by something, which was disappointing. We have been more successful with the dwarf daffodils (tete-a-tetes?), which are now beginning to flower.”

“We have had primroses/primulas for quite a while. They are the conventional yellow colour but there are also a few red/purple ones. Lovely to have some colour in the garden.” Debby’s right

We here at Weeds hope everything is starting to pop up now in your gardens, if you’re not in those parts of the world that are covered in snow at the moment.

Indoor plants in north London

Posted on by
Reply
Thanks to Debby H for keeping us updated about her house plants and sending us a couple of pictures. She wrotes “Since we brought in the canna lily, the leaves have grown hugely. It’s now as tall as our orange tree. And at night, the leaves all point up to the ceiling, almost like a religious ceremony! It’s never done that before. It usually goes into a big sulk, and the leaves start turning brown. Not this year!” That’s great to hear.
Also “The orchid flowers have continued to open, which is attractive when there’s not many other flowering plants around.” Great stuff Debby, good to hear from you!

And the cosmos still keeps coming

Posted on by
2

We’re in Storm Bert at the moment here in SE23, it’s windy and very dour when you outside. It’s always good on days like this to have something to cheer us up so a big thanks to Debby H for sending us more cosmos pictures taken this week. We must rememember it is late November and as Debby wrote with the attached pictures “Come snow and frost, the cosmos plants struggle on valiantly!” and she’s right. Cheers for that Debby!

On the stereo we have this playing in the background to cheer us up despite the bad weather. It’s a bit of an off kilter bit of dub by the great Bjørn Torske called Dub Vendors (the B side to the single Disco Members from 2000.)

Indoor plants that stay indoors

Posted on by
3

Alongside the pictures of her outdoor plants that have been brought indoors, Debby H sent us a great photograph of her fern that lives permanently indoors and has grown lots since she was given it about 10 years ago. Ferns are something we don’t know a lot about here sadly.

We mentioned that we were thinking of getting some for the bottom of the garden, which is well shady and because we heard they need a lot of moisture were a bit unsure about it. Debby said “There are different sorts of ferns. I only know about indoor ferns. I read that it’s a common mistake to think that ferns need lots of water. Actually they don’t. They do like shade though. I suggest you try planting them at the bottom of your garden. You can tell if they need water as they start to droop. You may just need to give them a watering in the summer if it hasn’t rained for quite a while.” Now that sounds great to us and we may give it a go now.

She also noted “Did you notice the claw-like thing sticking out of the fern on the right hand side? I think this is the equivalent of its flowers, but it doesn’t make petals. You get small round green balls that are its seeds. The seeds turn brown and sometimes black eventually, and the claw sometimes goes orange. If you look in the centre of the plant towards the flower pot, and slightly to the right, you will see one that’s going orange but they can go much brighter orange than that though.” Brilliant stuff Debby!

Anyone else have any ferns?

STOP PRESS: Thanks to elradioescucha, for getting in touch telling us it’s the indoor palm tree Chamaedorea!