The Jolly July Garden

by Dandelion 1st July 2022, 3:58 pm

Hope no-one minds me starting a new topic! I wanted a bit of help with weed ID. I haven't been able to find this in my gardening books or even in my wild flower book. They start off looking rather exciting, like miniature annual chrysanthemums, and I have let them grow in previous years because of this (without even questioning the fact that I had never sown any annual chrysanths!!) They then grow large and sprawling, and have tiny insignificant green flowers. I wondered about some sort of mayweed, but can't find it

my book. It's probably a weed from the farms round about. Any idea? Sorry it's such a rubbish photo - I was busy with the hoe this week and seem to have removed most of them!

by Dandelion 1st July 2022, 4:00 pm

Huh? I seem to have two identical weeds! It's the little ferny thing in between the beetroot and kohl rabi leaves

by Ploshkin 1st July 2022, 4:17 pm

It could be something a bit exotic from a bird seed mix. You could try smoking it!

by Dandelion 1st July 2022, 5:28 pm

I've seen large healthy hemp plants from bird seed, growing in a very genteel Dorset tearoom garden (next to the aviary), with elderly ladies quite obliviously eating their scones next to it. It would have made a wonderful photo!

by Dandelion 2nd July 2022, 9:47 pm

Bingo! I've identified my weed! There is a very good Garden organic weed identifier, which went for the more unusual things, and I have (a lot of) Lesser Swine cress. I've seen a map of areas of the UK which it grows in, and the West Midlands and South Wales seem to be favoured.

by Ploshkin 2nd July 2022, 10:37 pm

I have some very prolific weeds with similar ferny leaves but not that one. I'm glad you managed to identify it.

by Dandelion 3rd July 2022, 9:56 pm

I like to know what I'm digging up!! It seems to compost well - I put a big heap in the compost container at 5.30 this afternoon, and by 9pm it was very warm to the touch, which is encouraging

by Chilli-head 13th July 2022, 12:53 pm

Quiet in here. Is everyone busy watering, I wonder ? It is parched here, even the bit of rain we had yesterday had minimal effect.

by FloBear 14th July 2022, 9:12 am

Helloo, remember me? Very infrequent visitor atm. There is a little bit of gardening happening but not as much as I'd like. I culled a Ceanothus thyrsiflorus repens which was brown last year and went completely rampant this year and removed a miffy Camellia and a small Rhododendron that the C. th. repens had completely smothered. These last two I gave away with no promises that they'd survive. Sunflowers are now in that section. I also removed two small supposedly variegated Euonymus as I needed to bury Millie, my last chicken who departed this life a few weeks ago. There are a couple of perennials there now with some late-sown French beans - old seed - which may or may not come up. And today I found the new French bean seeds I bought for this year!!

by Chilli-head 18th July 2022, 2:15 pm

Hello Flo !

I'm caught in a quandary. In this hot weather, I have the choice of pouring on tap water, or watching most things on my allotment die. What to do ?

I have applied mulches to what I can - that may conserve water, but does not help much if there is no water ! I have a water butt, but it is fed from a small shed roof of 2 sq m, to water an allotment of area ~80 sq m. Lasts for the first day or two of drought, but is then empty. What to do in the short term, and in the long term if this sort of thing is the new norm. Question

by Dandelion 19th July 2022, 9:48 am

It's a real issue, isn't it? Not having an allotment I'm able to reuse grey water on the garden, but on an allotment I would think tap water is the only option once the water butts are dry. Even increasing the number of water butts (so that one fills the next in rainy weather) is only a temporary solution.

by Ploshkin 19th July 2022, 11:38 am

We are so lucky to have the river running through our ground, we are never without water. My IBC for the polytunnel ran out yesterday, we were forecast rain for tonight, but the forecast has now changed. Rain fills the IBC quickly from a 400 square foot shed roof. If there is no rain we fill another IBC from the river and put it up over the shed roof with a telehandler with the tap open. The guttering doesn't catch it all but any overflow goes into the ditch and back to the river.
The river goes through my garden so when my water butts run dry I can fill a watering can from the river. The water is, of course, very low just now but there are a number of deep pools or I can fill the watering can with a jug.

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