Tag Archives: shannons garden centre

Pictures of Lily?

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We could be totally wrong here but the other day we found this shoot coming up (above) and would like to think it was the beginnings of a long dissapeared Foxtail Lilly. We had one of the plants in the area a few years ago but after a late frost it was never seen again.

It may be more likely a dahlia that we forgot to take out in the autumn but then again we hope it’s not, as those Foxtail Lilies (aka Eremurus) are something else! The pic below is the crown of said plant next to a 50p to show how mad the plant is even before it grows, thanks to Shannon’s for sending us this pic years ago.

Well whatever it is, it and all of the potato shoots that have come up early have now jam jars and cloches over them as we’re due another couple of frosty mornings so we’ll be told. We will keep you posted!

The death of a cob

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We’ve just come back from a visit from Shannon’s today and this is the first thing that greeted us when we came back. We’re now thinking of starting up in nature photography and jacking in this gardening lark what with our brushes with nature this weekend.

We are even really considering a scarecrow (as suggested by Stevyn of Iron Feather Journal fanzine) as there was a cat sleeping possibly 3 metres away which didn’t deter the pesky squirrel consuming one of the many corn cobs that had formed on our plants we purchased from Shannon’ early this year. There’s two cobs left and they’ve been taken off. The really hot pepper plant beside it hasn’t been touched, we wonder why?

And on a good note here’s what we bought in Shannon’s earlier this morning, some Garlic bulbs and Shallots to overwinter, even though we didn’t have much luck with them last year. We will do as we always do, try again! Gardening eh why do we do it?

What month is it?

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We were complaining a few weeks ago about that there weren’t enough rain as we’ve had to go out and manually water all the new additions to the garden.

In the past few days we’ve bought some lupins and stuck them together in a group in a bed near to the house, acquired some strawberry plants (cheers Dylan!) and as reported previously the tree lilies we were given (cheers Marc!) are also starting to come up. The giving and exchanging, the swap-shop value of gardening is what we love here, we also love the local garden centre (Shannon’s) for plants and advice and it’s nice to see the re-emergence of local plants sales (plant pots stuck on a wall outside someone’s house at cheap as chips prices) or have they never gone away?

What we don’t love is the current weather. For the past few days it’s been warm one minute, cold the next and then you see on twitter someone’s had a frost or a light dusting of snow. Well it’s back on with the protection in the evenings on top of the raised beds here even though the potatoes are coming on well and the plants that have been outside hardening off (above) will have to come in for the night. We won’t get too discouraged as it’ll be summer soon. Or will it?

Coir baby that’s really free!

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The above looks more like a construction project especially with the wood saw and the B&Q 99p bucket but we were trying out the coco grow+. It’s that coir stuff that when you add water it becomes potting/seed compost. Not bad if you’ve had sciatica and your carrying skills ain’t as good as they were last year. We didn’t want to use all of it so took the hint from Shannon’s who told us to use a saw to cut it. A good tip if you don’t want to use it all at once. We’ll keep you updated on how it goes and if the plants like the medium.

We also couldn’t get to the garden fork today to turn over the compost heap for the first time this year so grabbed a spade that had it’s uses to cut in half some old cabbage stalks and gone off sweet potatoes. It’s hard trying to turn the compost in those dalek bins but as long as you don’t mind the odd scraping of the knuckles it sort of works. Well sort of.

And here’s a tune you may hear on a forthcoming mix, it’s from Khotin and the track’s called Heavy Ball.

Do(ing) it properly

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And as we said in the last missive, we’re going to post up stuff to remind ourselves where and when we’ve put plants & seeds in as it’s handy for us to know that sort of thing (as we usually forget!)

When the sun was out yesterday a couple of cloves of the garlic (Marco) we got at Shannon’s were popped into the South Suburban planter we found in a skip which has a couple of Egyptian onions seedlings in there already.

The onions sets we got too were put in today (when it didn’t rain) by the silver birch and the lone lettuce from the Thomson and Morgan seed trials. On the left is the Autumn Champion and Electric Red on the right. Apart from putting those in, it was just a little bit of tipping around and the odd bit of weeding. At least we know where we’ve put stuff now!

By the way, Happy Autumn Equiknoxx to all for tomorrow!

Awakening of the beast

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It seems like it was only the other week we were planting the strange looking root crown of the Foxtail Lily (AKA Eremurus). In fact it was at the start of October (post here) that we purchased another crown from Shannon’s and this afternoon whilst tipping around in the garden we noticed it peeking its head through the ground. Fingers crossed the forthcoming cold weather won’t knock it for six (in the morning we’ll probably stick a cloche or a bit of fleece over the top for added protection).

We’ve just found a clip from an old Gardeners’ World featuring Monty Don on the Eremurus and how you plant the root crown here.

And here’s another plug for the Weeds related musical project Madtone with their tribute to the said plant “Foxtail Lily Dub (Beaming to the Caribbean)” which has been getting some super support from the likes of Andrew Weatherall, Dr Strangedub from The Echo Chamber on KFAI, the dread gardener Don Letts, Justin Robertson and more. A big cheers to them! Watch out for a vocal version of the tune in the next few months!  #FoxtailLily #shortwavesnotdead

 

Sometimes you need some Eremurus in your life

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We were particularly excited last week when we acquired another White Foxtail Lily from Shannon’s. We were so enamoured by the plant that we even named one of Madtone’s new tracks after it (see last post).

It’s the bizarre starfish-shaped root crowns that do it for us, family members have gasped “Urghhhhh, keep THAT away from me” and have also remarked “they’re disgusting” when we’ve showed them the crowns. We here really appreciate the root crown’s oddness as you know we love something a bit “out there” here at Weeds! The tweet (at the top) from Shannon’s from a few years ago still makes us laugh.

We’ve lost a couple of plants over the years as we don’t think they like our heavy clay soil here in London. As the plant originates from the dry grasslands of western and central Asia it prefers a free draining soil and when awakening in the spring the early leaves don’t particularly tolerate the frost. We give the bed a good bit of preparation before putting it in, mixing in some organic matter to help with the drainage.

It’s a very bizarre sight when the plants starts to kick into life in the spring. Over a few weeks you can see the thing drilling up through the soil and reminds us of the film War Of The Worlds when the monsters from outer space start to wake up. Sadly, the plants don’t look like those monsters that have the hoover-like tentacles though. Now that would be interesting!

It’s brilliant when leaves explode out of the soil and then the fantastic flower head a couple of months later. No-one talks about how odd they are then do they? Leave the Eremurus alone! We love it here and will bring you updates when it pops up in the spring. #FoxtailLily #Itcamefromouterspace

What a difference the sun makes

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Don’t think buying in tomato plants is in any way cheating. Earlier this year we sowed a few tomato seeds that failed miserably so we bought a couple of varieties from Shannon’s. The cherry ones (above) have done exceptionally well and they’re still going strong as we didn’t pinch out the tops. Big thanks to Shannon’s, we’ll be doing the same next year.

Monday afternoon was so nice we went out in the garden and tidied up one of the scrappy beds and then planted some garlic cloves to overwinter. It’s worth making the most of the weather at the moment as in a months or so’s time it may be dreadful. Here’s the before and after:

And finally a big shout to Steyvn Iron Feather Journal for letting us know about the latest Music’s not for everyone on NTS which features a ten inch vinyl special including One Deck & Popular’s Son of Stitt (Cafe del Bob’s mix) from many moons ago. Big thanks Mr Weatherall! #onedeckandpopular #sonofstitt

Tuber, tuber, tuber

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We usually lift our Dahlia tubers in the autumn and stick them under the stairs in a paper bag to dry out and then return them to the ground in the spring but this year we didn’t and feared for the worst. We shouldn’t have as the two plants are giving us a spectacular display this year.

We’ve had a bit of blackfly on them but they’ve now seemed to vanish. We’ve given them a bit of TLC in the form of regular watering and a weekly feed of comfrey liquid and loving the results. All from a couple of tubers bought in Shannon’s a few years ago! Anyone out there got any nice varieties we can show on Weeds? Pictures please…

November spawned a monster

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A few photos of the state of play in the Weeds garden at the moment. There’s fun and frolics in the pond with the goldfish and this year’s batch of tadpoles and it’s not looking too murky in there at the moment. There’s no sign of that thieving Lewisham heron either thanks to the folks at Shannon’s for telling us to put pea netting over the top of the pond (with a few escape routes dotted about for the local mini-wildlife).

The poppies are doing their thing too. Any seed heads that form we dry out and distribute around the garden so they’ll come back next summer.

The vegetable bed at the bottom of the garden has moved on since last month. The spuds are on their way, the alderman peas are starting to grow and we’re finally seeing the runner beans germinate. And about time too!