Please don’t tell us “summer” has ended

We’ve heard today in true British Bank Holiday style, that the current lovely weather we’re having is coming to an abrupt end this weekend. Typical! But to cheer us up here’s a couple of great photographs.

The first (above) is Rich in the Lake District’s back garden. Doesn’t it look great! As he said, “The bluebells are really high now”. That’s one chilled out view there Rich, we bet it’s a nice calm place to relax in!

And above is Debby H‘s garden in north London, more specifically the cosmos bed. Debby told us “I can’t believe the number of flowers that we have already on our cosmos plants. They’re only small, about 30 cm high. We planted them out about 3 weeks ago and most of the flowers have come since then. In previous years we haven’t had these many flowers till late summer.”

“I planted the seeds in mid-February, whereas I have done it in March previously. I kept half indoors on a windowsill, and the other half were moved to our plastic greenhouse. It doesn’t seem to have made any difference to how they are growing.” It’s always good to experiment and see what happens. Thanks for the report Debby, we scattered our cosmos seed all over the garden this year and not sure if any have come up or those damned slugs have had them. We will keep you all posted.

And thanks to the great blog from Penny Golightly here’s news of some free herbs seeds here. Cheers Penny!

Coming to the end of the road

It’s cold and miserable out there and the garden is in a right state even though it looked a lot better earlier this year. The butternut squash (above) that was making a late start has fallen by the wayside and now looks a right mess.

In the forthcoming weeks there may be a day where it may be dry enough to give the lawn a cut and even give the beds a tidy over. Remember the more work you do now means less work come the spring and the garden will look a lot easier on the eye over the winter. Trouble is when the garden looks a bit ropey you have less chance of putting on those gardening boots but we will try as the wild bit at the bottom (above) does look a bit wild and look at the pond (below). The word neglect comes to our guilty gardening minds.

Got any ideas of what you’ll be growing next year? We’re now on the lookout for any seed swaps, seed bargains or plants on the cheap. If you know of anything as in cheap seeds or events do let us know and we’ll blog them up.

International gardening round-up

pumpkins in australiaThanks to a couple of good mates of ours for sending in some great gardening pics this week. First is from our good friend and musical collaborator Paul Greenstein formally of the East Dulwich parish now based in Melbourne, Australia of his (Jap or Kent) pumpkin harvest from only two plants, how good is that? Brilliant stuff Paul, hope you’ve got some good recipes to use them in!

phil H seedlingsAnd also to our fellow dub gardener Phil Harmony in Berlin for sending us pics of his tomato (from the free Heinz seed offer earlier this year) and peppers seedlings that he has on the go at the moment. Great stuff Phil, they’re looking good!

Free seeds, ferrero rocher and protoje

Back bedIt was an afternoon of good weather today so I tipped around in the garden and finished off clearing the back bed and it was nice to see it clear of weeds for once.

CornflowerI’m giving the bed a bit of a rest of veg this year so unusually it’s going be full of flowers if all goes to plan. This afternoon I sowed a load of cornflowers called ‘blue boy’ in the first quarter of the bed (600 seeds off ebay for £1.50 including p+p, cheap or what?)

Talking of seeds and good value, earlier this morning I picked up a copy of “Grow your own” magazine for £4.99 for the free packets of veg seeds (little gem lettuce, basil, courgette, kale, carrot and celeriac) from the WH Smiths in Lewisham. They were also selling cut-price Terry’s Chocolate Oranges and Ferrero Rocher on a special make-shift stall outside the store because of Mother’s day tomorrow. Aaahhhhh!

Grow your own

And to end on, a lovely tune in a hip-hop/reggae style from the great Protoje called Criminal. A tune to play whacked up loud while searching magazine emporiums for gardening mags with free vegetable seeds as it’s “that time of year”. Big up Rodigan for playing this the other week. More of the instrumental version please.

And thanks to youtube, a nice live version of the tune.

There’s no such thing as free seeds

Thanks to Lewisham Gardens for letting us know about more free seeds! These are available from M&G to celebrate their sponsorship of the RHS Chelsea Flower Show. The kindly people there are giving away a collection of 11 different herb seed varieties, how good is that?

Fill in the form here and you’ll get your ‘erb selection within 10 days they promise. Get your application in while stocks last etc.

Never had nothing

Sunny jim

Anyone else lucky with the Evening Standard Sunflower seeds giveaway the other week?

I forgot all about it until Friday when a posh padded envelope arrived through me door with the free pack of seeds. If you didn’t, don’t worry there will be more free seed offers hopefully coming soon and we’ll be keeping an eye out and post them up as soon as. If you hear of any before we do, do let us know. Every little helps!

Heinz are giving you a chance to win a pack of tomato seeds when you “like” their Facebook page (taking a note of your profile and “friends” into the bargain.) You can have a try but I’ve just had a go but was “unsuccessful this time, please keep trying.” I’ve now “unliked” Heinz.

Free seeds with Kitchen Garden magazine!

Free seeds kitchen gardenPopped into our local Co-Op on Friday evening and saw a gardening magazine with free seeds on the front so I had to get it, anything free me! The July 2013 issue of Kitchen Garden costs £3.99 but it’s got two packs of seeds on the front (Beetroot-Bolthardy and Beet, Leaf – Bright Lights) and there’s some good articles in it (Bob Flowerdew has a spread in it, tips on how to grow Basil, perfect Peas and growing Oca, the New Zealand yam) so, it’s a bargain!

Short Newz!

Big shout to Will for passing on that the breakfast cereal Shredded Wheat are giving away free packs of seeds with each box and they are currently on offer at Tesco’s for £1.09!

Hornimans Museum in Forest Hill have their Horniman Friends annual plant sale on Sunday 19th May and Guerrilla Gardener and author Richard Reynolds is doing a talk there on Sunday 26th May. Great stuff for nowt!

A long time ago I sent Kid Strange, the singer from the Doctors of Madness a copy of my fanzine thinking it’ll be up his street after seeing them live. Ten years later I saw him in Brixton on my way home from the council. “Oi mate, years ago I sent you my fanzine, Ded Yampy. Do you remember it?” A suprised Kid Strange who was probably on his way home from a day job too, paused thinking for what seemed like a age and said “Ahhh, I remember that one, it was from Coventry weren’t it, all about beer…” (another pause) “…terrible!” Oh dear, me and blokes from old punk bands, I just don’t get it right sometimes!