#garden borders

[huariqueje]

Summer Garden , Fawley Bottom (Levinson 369) - John Piper , 1984.

British , 1903-1992

Etching and aquatint in colours, 39.2 x 57.8  cm.

[flowerishness]

65

[tinyshe]

Garden Report & Frugal Living 24.06.30

I wasn't going to post. With the loss of Bronte, health struggles and the garden not doing well, I thought 'why bother'. I sat with that thought all week ... why bother. When I came to the conclusion I bother because this really isn't about me. Yes, I write about what I am doing, seeing, feeling but the reason for this is to encourage others: go garden, go try, struggle through it! Don't give up! So I'm not giving up this part of the blog (sorry).

I did get out and do my own watering today. Its back to being foggy cold and damp weather (the usual in the land of eternal fog). The weeds are rampant. The fruit trees had three blooming periods this year. I have never seem that. All the trees are long and leggy even though I don't fertilize nor water. The new growth this Spring is over 60cm/2feet. The fruit setting is very light. There was lots of rain during the regular/initial blossoming season. I also haven't seen many bees but the bumble population is strong and more plentiful than years past. Nothing in the garden is growing well. There is no difference between what I seeded and planted earlier in the season and the start I bought over a month ago. Neither are doing well. Its like they are frozen in time. Its warm enough for them to grow but they do so ever so slightly Unlike the damn trees! Its not like I am new to this. The soil is amended, plants tended and nurtured ... and I talk to other gardeners who are suffering the same lot. So I started looking wider, videos on youtube for Ireland, USA, UK, Spain and other European gardeners and many of them that are posting have similar problems Except those that are growing under the cover of poly-tunnel or glass/greenhouse. I wish I had a greenhouse so I could compare myself to myself.

Entering into July and there is still time to replant. Things that are quick growing in the 30-60 day range. I've got to think what I can manage vs what I can buy cheaply (is there such a thing anymore?!). Will I be able to put up the harvest (either homegrown or commercial) for the winter pantry is another concern.

Rethinking this food production/veg patch. This year the caterpillars again arrived and decimated the gooseberries and even the currants that I thought were hidden enough. The wasp that eat these pest arrived late and at the tail-end of this, after the majority of the damage was done. I will try to nurture the bushes back but this year was pretty damn hard on them and there is hardly any fruit and even less leaves. I was in the thought pattern of perennial planting the veg patch and then planting annual veg along the borders but that just doesn't produce enough especially with the downturn in annual plant health. Its like double dipping on the poor end of the spectrum. Do I try to invest money into a small poly tunnel? Do I do both under cover? Do I have enough protection in the back garden for a tunnel? What a mess/damage when pruning the fruit trees? Its like one of those rubik cubes or little slider number travel puzzles. My brain moving slowly through the pro and cons. You know that meme of mathematical equations and that confused woman ... yeah, that's me.

If you have any of your garden observations or have used tunnel growing in cold foggy maritime climate, please chime in. My only experience with poly is starts/propagation of native plants in a production scale for sale and not full cycle, less lone doing a stable veg thngie. Yes, Huw makes it look so lovely and easy. Can his team come over? He can come over too :) We'll have tea.

Frugal Living tip: this may only apply to fellow city dwellers but do-able for others. Instead of paying for green bin for yard/garden waste, you can do a chop and drop or in cases where there is nasty things you don't want re-sprouting (brambles, ivy, etc.) you can get a heavy duty construction grade plastic bag and load it up, tie it shut and set aside. It will eventually compost/degrade where you can load it back into your garden as a side-dressing. There has been some controversy in this as that 1) its plastic! and 2) some have been treated with pesticide (or worse! perfumes) on the inside. This will have to be for you to do more research and decide on your own. We bag and tag, and set aside by the rubbish bins and at some point just return right there where the butterfly bush, fuchsias and climbing roses can benefit.

I hope that wherever this finds you in life that you have many opportunities to enjoy a garden and nature.

Ps: Delightful gardener's reading: The Garden Essential Gertrude Jekyll, intro by Elizabeth Lawrence. This one is c. 2018 by Quiller an imprint of Amberley publishing/ Charles Scribner's Sons

[izuminokamiis]

Walkway in West Midlands Design ideas for a mid-sized modern full sun backyard landscaping in summer.

[hisinfernalmajesty666]

Tuesdays are for gardening! Laid some bark mulch down in the borders. With this current heat wave in the UK, it will help stop moisture evaporation in the soil as well as preventing so many weeds popping up. Plus, it looks so much better than the soil.

[jillraggett]

Plant of the Day

Monday 6 January 2025

The heart-shaped, deep red-purple foliage of Cercis canadensis 'Forest Pansy' (purple eastern redbud) produces these amazing shades of orange, bronze and red-purple in autumn. This large deciduous shrub or small, often multi-stemmed, tree is best planted in the final location when young as older plants resent being moved.

Jill Raggett

[wiltyrose]

⌗﹒　☆　　chao dividers　　🍼💫🌀

　　꒰　credit and ♡/rb appreciated　꒱

[cuties-in-codices]

floral borders growing from a garden

page from a manuscript of the "schwabenspiegel", freiburg, c. 1410

source: Freiburg, Staatsarchiv, Gesetzgebung und Verschiedenes 42, fol. 109r

[sitting-on-me-bum]

Spring sunshine illuminates the crest of a grey crowned crane at the Bird Gardens Scotland in the Scottish Borders, UK. The 3ft-tall bird is far from home: it is the national bird of Uganda

Photograph: Phil Wilkinson

[wirlibirb]

a short work that i made feverishly after reading the echo garden twice in a row

i wanted to make something that represents a main melody, layered over by warmer, drier (?) feeling tones.

[thefreckledcollie]

she loves the snow ❄️

[huariqueje]

Garden Walk at Sunset   -   Philip Craig 

Canadian, b.   1951  -

Oil on canvas ,  91 x 108 cm.   

[snekdood]

hey if ur in the midwest or more specifically missouri here’s some websites i’ve found helpful for finding native seeds and live plants (they’re not all in missouri or the midwest specifically but have some seeds from around here too bc truly human made borders are fake and plants go wherever they want so):

wildseedproject.net

mowildflowers (this websites cool bc they’ll deliver live plants to you if you live nearby enough and they also go to different places around missouri all year to sell plants at festivals or events or whatnot)

nativewildflowers.net

swallowtailgardenseeds.com

strictlymedicinalseeds.com

toadshade.com

treeseeds.com

ouriquesfarm.com

putnamhillnursury.com

sugarcreekgardens.com

prairiemoon.com

seedvilleusa.com (also on etsy)

mybutterflylady on etsy

everwilde.com

and if u ever need help or info or whatever about plants or even find a place to exchange plants and buy some on a forum check out dave’s garden

if anyone knows any other websites and wants to add them on i’d totally appreciate that c: !

(i will update this with more websites too if i come across any)

[andallshallbewell]

[catboymachinegun]

tomochao, my precious omochao (his wind-up works)

[nncastle]

Pretty colors at NJ Botanical Gardens, Skylands.