Tag Archives: Peas

Spring must be here!

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Thanks to Mike G and his partner Julia for sending us some recent pictures of their garden from just outside Coventry and great pics they are! Top image features the great flowers of bleeding heart and also grape hyacinths.

Love the picture below, look at that clematis go! The clematis in our garden is nowhere as prolific. Ours has flowered poorly over the last couple of years so we used a tip heard on Gardeners Question Time a few years ago. Within earshot of the plant we said “If we don’t see any improvement in that clematis next year, we’re pulling it and sticking it on the compost heap as it’s the best thing for it”. It’s not a nice thing to do but sometimes you have to be cruel to be kind and funnily enough the GQT tip may be working. If it flowers as half as good as their one below we’ll be more than happy!Their peas look great especially so early in the season and we look forward to see how they get on. We don’t have much luck with peas, we know the trick may be all about keeping them well watered but these below look well healthy.

We had to look this plant below up on the web and used Plant.id here which is telling us it’s a spring starflower (Ipheion uniflorum). Whatever it is, it’s a striking flower!
So cheers Mike and Julia for sending in the pictures of your great garden and do let us know how things are going later this season!

 

There’s more on the way!

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A big thanks to our good gardening mate Gerry Hectic for sending us pictures of the story so far in his garden. Loving the runner beans in the pot with a trolley from Aldi at the bottom so it can be moved around to catch the maximum of sunlight. Our other good friend Phil Harmony in Berlin used to also use that idea on his balcony for his veg growing. As The Merton Parkas used to sing “You need wheels”.

The peas and tomatoes look great too! Just water them daily and add a weekly feed, all will hopefully be grand! More pics of your progress in a few weeks please Gerry!

We love the Gang of Four (herbs)

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Gardening is a funny old game, you could be doing it for a fair few years but that don’t stop you from messing up and/or not getting things right. We have our moments with peas and never get much joy growing coriander as it always bolts, never mind what variety.

We’re giving it another chance after having to succumb to buying (with heads hung down in shame) some coriander leaves from the local shop the other day. Straight after, we looked on ebay and got one of those mixed herb packs for a couple of quid, which had small amounts of parsley, basil, chives and coriander seeds. We received them through the post yesterday so in the afternoon some potting compost was procured, a few old pots which once had some stuff that failed were washed out, and seeds sown. The pots are now on the kitchen windowsill, finger’s crossed!

And do know what? We’ve actually found a cabbage in the garden that may be fit for eating (in a month or two). Now there’s a result!

This post was written whilst listening to:

#saveonthewire #athomehesagardener #lockdowngardening

This is a pepper

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We filled some of those raised beds a bit tight at the beginning of lockdown and it’s starting to look a bit like a jungle in some of them now. Perhaps it wasn’t the correct way of using them what with all the plants fighting for space, soil and water. In the raised bed (below) we’ve two tomato plants and a load of peas at the back, a lettuce and two cabbages in the middle row and in the front row either two chilli peppers or more than likely two peppers PLUS some spuds. Can we put anything else in there? Talk about square metre gardening!

With raised beds they do tend to dry out easily so we’re forever giving them a water during the morning. The great Joe Maiden would say never water at night as the slugs and snails would be attracted to the moisture and suggested always early in the day is best for watering and we’ve also started giving the raised beds a comfrey feed once a week too.

The peppers or chillies or whatever they are, are flowering (top and bottom pics) and there’s some mini-fruits too! We love those raised beds!

Do we still have to put our bins out during lockdown?

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The last couple of days have been cold but a few quick trips down the garden have been in order for a nice bit of sanity from a self-isolating worldview. A big shout to our good friend Nancy B who a short while back, suggested we get a Clematis Montana for the back fence. It’s now woken up and is starting to show a few flowers. The plant will be getting some of that comfrey feed when it’s ready!

Thanks to Thompson & Morgan (and Shannon’s and all the other plant and seed sellers of the world who are working flat out keeping gardeners supplied!) for sending us an order which included some Peas (Jumbo) and Lettuce (Little Gem) that have gone in one of our “Blue Peter” style, cut-price budget cold frames.

Earlier this year we mentioned we were going the “rest” the back bed and fill it with some wild flower mix. That idea’s gone out of the window now as we stuck in a row of peas behind the spuds we put in the other week. Best laid plans and all that!

But the question on everyone’s lips here is something we heard a passer-by the other day say into his mobile whilst on his daily exercise regime “Do we still have to put our bins out during lockdown?”

After the sun has gone

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Last weekend was a corker when it came to sunshine as on Sunday the temperature in London reached 20 odd degrees. The lawn was cut and a good load of jobs were completed and we even gave the seedlings (tomatoes, brussels sprouts, peppers and walking onion) that are on their way indoors a bit of a break in the sun.

Very much influenced by (episode 4 of) Jane Perrone’s On The Ledge podcast combined with the fact that in our seed tray were a few dealer bags with a tiny amount of seeds in them (cress, peas, beetroot, lettuce, coriander, basil and more) that needed to be sown, we filled a large pot full of multi-purpose compost and threw them all in. Come a couple of weeks time we’ve have some micro-greens to accompany our dinner!Traditionally this week (Good Friday) is the time for putting seed potatoes in (so the late great Joe Maiden used to say on his radio show with Tim Crowther). We aren’t too sure if we’ll be doing ours as it’s still cold out and as someone once told us at a potato fair, as soon as it’s warm enough to put your hand in the ground for ten seconds without it feeling cold that’s when you should put your spuds in. Sounds like good advice!

And while you’re waiting for your ground to heat up here’s a nice bit of mix-up business from one Mr Andrew Weatherall on Rinse FM the other week (8.04.2017).

Keeping the circle around

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Pass it on

A big thanks to our good friend Jane for passing on this great tray of vegetables which included three pea plants with forming fruits, a nice climbing french bean in flower and some well healthy cabbages.

As soon as I got in from work, the peas went into the sink nearest the house (a couple of leaves of Comfrey went in the hole first after the plant had a good soaking.) The others will go into the garden over the weekend when I get a spare minute and if the weathers okay, as I’ve heard it’ll be violent storms and hailstones over the weekend here in London.

I’m always up for giving away any excess plants when I’ve any left over, I mean why waste them. But let’s hope the slugs and snails here in SE23 don’t find out about this latest lot though or I’m knackered!

And finally…

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I finally got out yesterday and tidied up the family veg plot at the bottom of the garden, runner bean canes were cleaned up and stored away and the bottoms of the runner bean plants were left in the ground as they’ll add extra nitrogen to the soil. It was the first time for a while that I’d got out for a couple of hours in the garden with the fork. I was in bed until midday today, must have been the body going into a state of shock after that bit of hard work!

On a hex tipThe wormery has been covered with sacking over a layer of fleece for the winter (if it gets bad I will move it into the garage as those brandling worms hate the cold!) I also used the old fish tank I found in the street a few months ago as a cloche to overwinter some Peas and Garlic. It could have done with having a few holes drilled into it for ventilation but I still hadn’t got around to it. Also sowed the same combo under the old trusty window frame found last year in a cold frame stylee. God know what will happen what with all the cold weather that we’re supposed to be having next week!