Spreckly's armchair gardening

Forgot what happened last year - maybe it's here!!
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Willow
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Re: Spreckly's armchair gardening

Post by Willow »

Thats a beautiful Rose Spreckly and looks great there... I think we have the same one over one of the arches, very fast growing and only flowers once but with a huge amount of blooms?
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Spreckly
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Re: Spreckly's armchair gardening

Post by Spreckly »

Reads like the same rose, Willow. We saw it on a massive pergola at some gardens in Wales, and the scent was wonderful. Asked the name, and the head gardener didn't know! They let us take two cuttings, which we nursed during the rest of our holiday. Looked it up on the internet to find its name. We have two smaller ones for the front door, last year's cuttings.
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Annie
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Re: Spreckly's armchair gardening

Post by Annie »

There is a Kiftsgate rose growing wild on the path where I take the dogs for a walk sometimes and the perfume in the evening is just beautiful. I bought one for my back garden but lost it to the chicken run before it had time to establish , I believe that once it gets a start that it can be quite a rampant rose but who cares when it is so lovely ? Its a shame about the Veg, Spreckly, at least your garden has given you some colour and perfume. My lupins were quite good this year too, though the rain has battered them now and I need to sort them out.
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Spreckly
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Re: Spreckly's armchair gardening

Post by Spreckly »

Haven't updated our garden progress for over a month, so here goes. We are enjoying our second early crop of potatoes. First earlies were very, very poor. Second earlies, which are mainly Charlottes are doing well. I could eat a panful on their own!

We are cropping our broccoli now. It is wonderful, very tasty, and a beautiful dark green. I am cooking some for each main meal, rather than freeze it and lose the taste. Runner beans nowhere near ready, strawberries now over, new rasp canes all died off, onions a dead loss, but beetroot looking good, also leeks look well. We have had two of our cabbages, quite a success, normally they have to go to the girls, but this year they have hearted up. We have two troughs of cut and come again lettuce to pick when we need to, and the greenhouse tomatoes are slowly but surely coming on nicely.

We have spent a huge amount of time weeding after the endless rain. Now the ground is dry, and in need of water. The ruts on the front lawn left by re siting the caravan when the builders re-roofed the house are now well grassed over after being re-seeded twice, so we look less like a builder's yard and more like a front garden once again. Our roses, clematis, lilies and all other flowers have been the best for years, thank you rain! We have a lot of container plants on the gravel outside our living room window, very colourful and lovely to look at when we eat our meals.
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Annie
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Re: Spreckly's armchair gardening

Post by Annie »

Spreckly the common old tattie is so much tastier when grown in the garden and dug up fresh that it no longer tastes common at all , when its small and new and cooked with mint and served with butter its fir for any king or queen.
My roses didn't appreciate the rain, I have one called Jude the Obscure which never opens fully just gets to be a bigger and bigger bud shape, its really big and unusual with a scent that astounds you but it needs little rain on it because the blooms rot very quickly so this year is a bad one for it.
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Spreckly
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Re: Spreckly's armchair gardening

Post by Spreckly »

Your rose sounds amazing, Annie.

Today we have been to the garden centre, officially to buy some plants for a friend's birthday, but er, we came back with some stuff for ourselves as well. Garden centre is famous locally, but not actually on our doorstep, so we combined it with a weekly trip to the supermarket. We got two laurel plants to fill the gap where OH dug a dying rose up yesterday. We got two pink phlox and a cream lupin. I also found a pot grown buddleia. Friend is getting a crocosmia Lucifer and two lupins. Most of her stuff dies off because she winters abroad, but hopefully what we have bought will survive.

All our stuff is planted now. We just need the rain, which seems to drop everywhere but in our village, though OH says there is plenty of moisture still in the ground.
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Re: Spreckly's armchair gardening

Post by Maggie1 »

Spreckly wrote:All our stuff is planted now. We just need the rain, which seems to drop everywhere but in our village, though OH says there is plenty of moisture still in the ground.


Cor Spreckly you should have been here this afternoon. We had an enormous storm. Thunder and lightening (which we never usually get) and then it came down in stair rods and then would you believe it turned to hail. The roads are still flooded.
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Annie
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Re: Spreckly's armchair gardening

Post by Annie »

You can't kill crocosmia Lucifer - I bought a plant 5 years or so ago and have split it up twice already and one clump I dug out I never got to replanting so its sitting above the ground surrounded only by the soil (mud) it was dug up with and yet has stilled flowered beautifully for the last 2 years - your friend will have it and I am sure love it for a long time Spreckly - make sure she plants its at the back of her borders though as it is tall and fairly invasive if not kept under control. By the way if you want anymore Lupin start them yourself from seed next year - incredibly easy to do and I find lupin are best replaced every 4-5 years as they seem to go past their best so I have usually got some growing on in a pot for filling in the holes.
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Quote from the proprietor of the The best exotic Marigold Hotel for the elderly and beautiful
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Spreckly
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Re: Spreckly's armchair gardening

Post by Spreckly »

Sorry about your weather Maggie, we have still had no rain apart from a light shower which has done nothing. It has been forecast all week, fine mornings and heavy rain in the afternoon, and we have seen none of it.

Thanks for the lupin tip Annie. I have been busy dead heading all ours. I always understood that if you took your own seed it would come back as the original purple, am I right? If I am wrong, then I shall dive into the brown bin, and retrieve the seed pods, but won't know what colour I am growing! I also looked up Jude the Obscure rose last night, it is beautiful.
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Spreckly
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Re: Spreckly's armchair gardening

Post by Spreckly »

Been through the brown bin, but the lupin seeds must have gone when it was emptied on Tuesday! Scoured the flower beds looking for any stray pods, no joy.
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Annie
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Re: Spreckly's armchair gardening

Post by Annie »

I am not that thrifty Spreckly but buy a pkt of seeds of lupin most years, you can get mixed or single colours , though I tend to find the mixed packets are mainly a range of mostly pink .
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Quote from the proprietor of the The best exotic Marigold Hotel for the elderly and beautiful
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Spreckly
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Re: Spreckly's armchair gardening

Post by Spreckly »

We have been in West Yorkshire all day today. Heavy thunderstorm, and rain, came home, watching fork lightening, and massive rolling black clouds. Hoped to beat the storm, and we did, but no rain here at all. It just seems to come all round us, and miss us out.

At present much soul searching about our willow. We have a caravan in the front garden, with a trellis in front of it to disguise its existence somewhat from the passers by. We have planted roses, climbers, which have disliked the trellis intensely, and now have two beautiful willow trees (not weeping willow), which do the job. But, we overheard someone in the garden centre talking about her daughter's willow to the proprietor, and he said how far the roots can travel to find water. So do we dig the willows up, or leave them, and hope for the best. Added to this, they are also near our wonderful neighbour's bungalow, and don't want to cause problems for her.
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