A BETTER DAY

It's been so lovely today to have blue skies, warmth and sunshine...OK there was one heavy downpour this morning but this afternoon more than made up for it...When I was in Bury St Edmunds yesterday some of the plants from the Abbey Gardens were being cleared to make way for the summer bedding...for just a few pence I got this bag of 6 Silene (dioica I think)...I've chopped them back, tidied them up and shall look forward to having a piece of the Abbey Gardens in our humble Great Cornard garden.
I've now managed to get some more of the seedlings and cuttings into various pots; ready for a good Summer show.....there are various kinds of fuchsia (trailing and upward facing), verbena, lobelia, trailing geranium, petunia, bidens, ...all sorts of bits and pieces have been popped in.

The Pitcher Plants ( Sarracenia) I've potted up and put near the pond for the Summer; the leaves were going very crisp indoors and I'm hoping the humidity around the pond will help.
They may not look much yet but the Hestia bean plants (minus the ones caught by the frost) have now been put into a container......a few lettuce seedlings acting as a catch crop....way behind compared to when we've done climbers in the past but hopefully this dwarf variety will soon start bulking up...not sure whether to put some pea sticks in or just let them do their own thing...............
The rest of the lettuce seedlings have now been "troughed" up and hopefully by the time the Little Gems have all been eaten I'll have some tasty Webbs and Red Leaf Curled leaves to replace them.

I've still got quite a variety of "bits and pieces" that can go into the odd space or pot but I'm keeping them in reserve just in case those weather beaten annual poppies don't pick up.

I hope Mother Nature is being kind to you all....I've been reading on Danielle's blog about the terrible drought conditions in S. Florida and I know many other parts of the world have similar problems......and there's me complaining about rain!!!

GOOD NEW(t)S!

I've really got a glut of lettuces at the moment; the Little Gems are starting to heart up beautifully and although the slugs have had a few nibbles there is plenty left for me. I'm a big green salad fan and have been adding some Strawberry Spinach leaves to my salads...
I've heeded the WARNING on the link sent to me by Scarecrow and only added a few leaves at a time; I'm pleased to say I've suffered no ill effects.
I've had a pleasant morning tidying out the shed and putting the plastic greenhouse away...the forecast is that the weather is going to warm up again and I need the greenhouse space for pots now. During my numerous coffee breaks I sat on the bench by the pond and was pleased to see the Newts are playing the mating game.


And guess what!!!!!!!...................Drum Roll....Fanfare of trumpets...................

THE RUBBISH HAS GONE!

WHO SAID SIZE DOESN'T MATTER?

I thought that I'd try and put some of the lessons Talj taught me into practice and try to take some more "up close and personal" photos.

I decided to start indoors; these two are of my Flaming Katy.................

then I decided to try some outdoors; I hadn't realised how windy it was until I tried to focus in on the plants; this first one is of some lichen, a fairyland jungle...............I love the colour of our Coral Flower; can you see that little splash of flower hanging over the path?It was a down on my knees job trying to photograph these (ouch...ohh..ahhh...creak) and with the wind blowing I had to take countless shots to come up with these two!The remarkable thing is the insects you can see in this type of shot; the wee insect on the top one of these two I never saw at all with my naked eye!....similarly the insects on this Cyclamen seed pod I never saw until I looked at the photograph......this one's slightly closer still......it's so clever the way the stem coils into a spring then springs open and releases the seed.....

Now for some wildlife......this moth may not look like it here but it was minute

OOPS......sorry that was "MY NEWT"..........this is "MINUTE"...LOL

Being one of my least favourite creatures....I hope you appreciate how brave I was to take this!!!

and finally..................................................

No not a "close up" shot....it's the space where the first lettuce came from that we had in our salad on Friday.........well you can't get much more "up close and personal" than by eating something!

GONE TO GROUND

When Andi and Talj arrived on Saturday Andi gave me this..... I'd heard about the latest idea that coffee grounds could help repel slugs but I hadn't realised that they also attract earthworms....and are a GREAT soil conditioner. The Little Gem lettuces are doing really well (we'll be harvesting some this week)....................
but I have noticed the odd slug and snail holes...I don't mind them having a little but I don't want them to demolish the lot so I've sprinkled some of the grounds alongside each plant! Good for Starbucks who are supplying these bags of grounds free of charge.
I've also put some around the delphiniums and the hostas......................
it would be lovely to have a slug free Hosta year.

Having Talj here taking photographs has really made me see our plants is a new light. The close-up shots she takes are fantastic and show up minute details that I don't see with the naked eye. All the years Mick and I have grown Tumbling Ted (Saponaria Ocymoides) we had never realised that it had BLUE stamens, stigma and pollen. This photo was taken by Talj..................................................brilliant isn't it......................... I think I'll stick to frogs!!!

FISH SALAD?

I dropped by Petunia's Garden(click to visit) earlier this evening and there was mention of a lettuce called Flashy Trout Back with a photo of a seedling she has coming through. I was so intrigued by the name and the "look" of it that I did a Google and came up with this info;

Frank Morton of Wild Garden Seed in Philomath, Oregon, was growing the Austrian heirloom lettuce 'Forellenschluss' (which in German means "speckled like a trout") because of the beautiful reddish leaf speckles. He noticed the degree of "speckle-ness" varied dramatically from plant to plant and decided he wanted to isolate "the flashier end of the spectrum." Out of 200 plants, he selected 20 of the splotchiest and healthiest, transplanted them to a separate plot and saved their seed. After repeating this process for two generations, he had 80 percent showing the degree of red speckles he wanted; after four generations, he had his new creation which he named `Flashy Trout Back.'

I wasn't going to do a post on my garden blog today as I was a bit "achy" after some heavy lifting today but I've had a nice soak in the tub and feel a lot better now.

This afternoon Leanne and I installed some new garden lights; This next photo I've already posted on my Million Stories blog but as Sheila likened it to an impressionist painting (sounds better than ...it's blurred) I thought I'd post it on here too. One of the 25p bargain Clematis (the unnamed one) is now coming into flower.

22nd February

It looks quite like Nelly Moser or a Dr Ruppel. It's started flowering even before the Montana which is usually the first Clematis in bloom in our garden......I guess it must have liked the TLC I lavished on it.
I love the shape of the Jack-in-the-pulpit buds
and even though it's not in flower yet (though in bud) the shape of this hardy geraniums leaves are lovely
I know the Amaryllis that I have in bloom keeps creeping into my indoor photos; but I love it so much and it's blooms are the size of my outstretched hand.
HAPPY GARDENING

YESTERDAY IN OUR GARDEN

A quick run through of the latest photos; I didn't have much time to get outside today...such a shame as it was a lovely day......when I did pop out though I made sure I had my camera with me.....I don't want to miss anything!

I know these are indoors and not in the garden but just had to photograph this huge Amaryllis bloom

The (almost) black Tulips are stunning

The first Pond Skater of the year

I love the way Fern leaves unfurl

Aeroplane trails make for an interesting photo; I wonder where this plane's going

I'm really impressed with these red Tulips

The Strawberry Spinach seedlings look ready to move on
The lettuces (Little gem) are growing
The self seeded Cerinthe should have been thinned but it's making a lovely show
The first pond grass in flower
That's all folks!

LOTS OF "GOODIES"

With having family visiting this weekend I didn't actually get any hands on gardening done, but still managed to spend some time outdoors and the sunsets have been spectacular.I am trying so hard not to photograph plants until they are in their full glory but couldn't resist taking a couple of the Dicentra; pink and white....they just shoot up and start flowering so quickly!
They are commonly known as Bleeding Hearts or Dutchman's Breeches...the reason is clear from this photographbut did you know they are also called "Lady in the bath"? You have to pull the outer petals aside to understand why......our youngest grandad loves doing this!Can you see the lady?????

It was also a weekend of "goodies". Leanne had gone to Wilkinsons (a shop I love..so full of bargains) and had picked me up a few things I needed for the garden...................including one of the Solar Dragon Flys that I seen on Libby's blog.
with all the sun we'd had it really shone brightly last night.


I hadn't got around to sowing any lettuces yet so Lynn and Manda went down to Smuffy's (an old friend of Micks...(he looks like an aging hippy but sells every plant you could imagine out of great big poly tunnels in his garden) and got me a tray of Little Gem plants....they will give me a head start till I sow my own. There are actually 23 plants in this tray and only £1!!!!!
I wish we could get there ourselves but his house is right at the bottom of the steepest hill in Sudbury. I don't think I could push a wheelchair up it and going down would be difficult as well...it would be so hard to "hold" the wheelchair back...it really is that steep a hill!
I was quite excited that, after for the first time ever my Aloe Vera flowering, I now have a seed pod. I have so many of these plants already so I don't know if I ought to actually try and sow seed.....but then knowing me I may have to give it a try just for the fun of it.

HAPPY GARDENING!