Everything is growing fast now and its hard to keep up. Since last time: the daffs are over and the ones in pots have been planted at the back under the tree (we haven't cut the greens off yet, its not six weeks since the last flower). Wood pidgeons are taking great delight in pecking at the branches of the plum tree. I 'ground' some poppy seeds in the ground at back with my foot - I brought a seed head back from Carcassonne in France and it an experiment to see if they come up. The lawn needs mowing every week now, we've had a lot of rain. Its quite a poor lawn, very bumpy and with 'nubs' of plum tree stump where we let it get overgrown last summer (and some plum stones seeded - we nearly had a forest). At least it doesn't get used a lot. Its a work in progress, I'll keep raking and seeding and feeding and in a few years you never know... it might be something to be proud of. Moving towards the house... the iceberg rose has trebled in size and has lots of buds waiting to open; its still not high enough to tie to the trellis but it won't be long. On the other side: DH has planed out some seedlings - Foxglove. I only remembered what they were by re reading this blog - and in doing so have realised that he's planted them too close together. At least they're out of the tray where they were waning from being there too long. The poor poppys (will I EVER get any poppys?) were eaten by slugs in their tray - all except for one which I am going to guard with my life. In the boarder... The climber who's name I can't remember, is at the top of the fence, three long lengths, no side growth. I don't know what to do with it because I don't know what it is, I guess I'll have to cut it back or else it will just dissapear over to next door. The geraniums are doing well, no flowers but bushing up nicely. The French Lavender is lovely and big and attracting lots of bees, and the other one has long spikes ready to flower. The seedlings we planted out I think are Bidens (I saw some on GW last night and I know they were one of the free packets), they will grow to have a small yellow flower. The ones in the border aren't doing as well as the ones I put in the bed yesterday but they're holding up.
Speaking of the front bed.... the clematis is out of my reach now and has found the dead wood from the climber from next door and is using that as support. The rose has got really big and is falling into the evergreen (I have realised I didn't plant it deeply enough and I also planted it too close). The old lavender, which was here before we came, is nearly dead apart from 4 inches on two stems, but the pelagoriums are doing fab...they did survive the winter and have buds - it was whilst searching for info on 'over wintering geraniums' that I found this site... and they have. The sage is much bigger than it needs be, the rosemary thank goodness has not run amok but the oregano is about to take over; we really need to do something about that. The two chives have given us beautifull purple flowers and the lavender on the right has tall spikes ready to pop. The poor erica has been covered by the nasturtiums (no flowers yet but tall and green), we'll have to pull some back, Oh, and the free bulbs I planted are all coming up, the oxy-somethings 'red cross' are quite unusual, and next to them are some pretty pink things. At the back of the bed the others from the 'blue collection' are also about a foot high. The same ones in pots are so big that some have toppled over and I've done a very crude job, too late, of staking them. They've also been attacked by slugs, or mites, coz they look quite torn. I hope the others in pots don't go the same way. I wouldn't have planted them if I'd known just how big they were going to be. This first year of gardening has already taught me stuff, and its only 1st June. One thing is that I don't think its worth growing potatoes in pots (!).. yes, today we harvested our first two tubs, and we got 34 potatoes weighing 1.2kg. They'd better be the best tasting in the world for all the cost and effort I put in. There are three tubs to go and we're leaving them for another two weeks to see if they yield more. Anyway, it was fun and exciting whilst I was at it. I won't bother again though.
The other thing I won't do next year is grow from seed, you get far too many and then feel bad when you have to waste them. No, its plug plants for me from now on; I just don't have room for anything else...(to be continued, dinner ready....)