What have you done in the garden today?

Nuffink..
But on Saturday I'm orfed to the Chilli nursery, soooooooooooo excited, give me this over clothes carp shoppnig any day...

And.. and over half term, Ol is making me more raised beds... so any day now, I'm hoping to really kick into action... I feel all bubbley and excited...

Too much snow to even think of chitting ! Not that I bother with that, anyway; my spuds go straight in. I'm afraid it's survival of the toughest in my garden
In place of being able to actually do anything outside, today I am off to a garden workshop. Fun !!

My spuds have lovely sprouts on, and I have popped some in bags in the polytunnel...

Planted some shallotts, a tub of potatos, & some onions.

Started off some broad beans & peas in the greenhouse.

I kept expecting Michael to write in about our tomato plant. If he hasn't already done so I just have to!! Sunday I finally transplanted our volunteer tomatoe plant into a smallish window box!

Last fall I had re-potted a jade plant which had outgrown its tiny decorative container and evidently the new dirt in the larger window pot had a tomato seed in it. Probably from our Matt's Wild Cherry breed since they're very persistent. I just left it there because I thought it was cute, figuring it wasn't going to last. Well, last week we notised it was setting tomatoes. And the pot was much too small, obviously. I've just been watching the plant take over the window space on top of our chest freezer. Entertainment, you know? It never occurred to me the thing would actually set fruit.

So Mike and I carefully transplanted it and waited to see if it lived. It lives!! Amazing. Now I wait to see if the fruit (very sensibly) just drops off. I'm utterly astounded at this plan'ts persistence!

Spent the morning digging and bashing in fenceposts to enclose the first vegetable plot against the predations of rabbits. Got a good 30 metre stretch done before running out of posts. Was secretly quite glad on behalf of my back.Really ought to go and buy the rest then I could get the chicken wire up tomorrow and get on with turning soil next week.

I am so jealous - we still have 2-3 feet of snow and ice on the ground here

Whoa! Really, Billy??? I'm with Badger on this one. Jealous.

A lot of our snow has subsided over the last warm spell (got up to 50 degrees F. --apologies again on the Centigrade ignorance) a few times. We still have between one and two feet most places (not counting the snow mountains where we dug out the driveway of course).

But I have my miracle tomato plant in the window

Today I cut 8 holes in a piece of polystyrene sheet, filled each one with compost, put two iceberg lettuce seeds in each one and floated it on our little pond.

Have NO idea if it will work but couldn't see that bit of space being unproductive

Also planted chard, peas, stir fry blend, strawberries, spuds, some bolted onions, onion seeds, tom seeds, petunia seeds, and the list goes on!

Twas 82f down here in the sunshine today and even our soft shell turtle on detox was out basking in it.

Hmmmm, that last sentence reads a bit odd really

OMGosh penny i've just done the maths and 50f is 10 celcius. I don't think it has ever gotten that low where i am living now It's hard to imagine that yr excited about it getting that warm lol

Out of curiosity how warm is it in summer there?

Anyone know what i can do to stop my dog eating the aloe vera?

Badger and Penny, you can feel less jealous this morning and instead rejoice in the fact that you are not hobbling around like a wizened gargoyle with back, shoulder and thigh muscles that has completely seized up from bashing and digging in fence posts.
May have to rethink plan of finishing fencing today - I am wailing and crying outloud when I kift the teapot, let alone a sledgehammer.

I'm feeling crabbit too Billy, after I fell over in the garden, rubbed half my leg off on the edge of the pond (rocks!) and bejeebered the shoulder just put right by the physio . . . Give the old post knocker a rest for today . . .

Nothing daunted, I have blown the dust off my seed store - all sorts of goodies which either never got started last year, or I bought greatly reduced since (the 75% off Wilko sale was temptation beyond endurance . . .) So far I've started off some pots of early peas, and double cream Nasturtiums & Strawberries and Cream Nasturtiums. I've got spuds chitting (King Edwards) and some Sweet Peas soaking. I've dug over the raised ex-herb bed at the side of the house and moved one of the glass cold frames up there so I can start some salad stuff off this week. The yard is south-facing so gets the sun all day. It cheered me up SO much to do this!

I've been clearing the little patio garden that was my mum's and that's looking tidier already. 3 wheelbarrowfulls of leaves later . . .

Aberlemno wrote: . . . Give the old post knocker a rest for today . . .

fnarr fnarr.

Cried
Polytunnel collapsed totally. That will teach me to buy cheapo carp

ah well, all stuff moved to chum's greenhouse and shed - after we'd cleaned and sorted them out.

That's awful AJB - can you get your money back? (Not that having your money back would compensate for the inconvenience).

I don't think so, Dandelion. It's just we've had so much rain the past few days, it just wasn't strong enough.

live and learn!

Oh dear i AM sorry Ajb....hopefully not too much in there just yet though...

I have dug over a 2 x 3 m raised bed today and dug in some rabbit/guinea pig poo which should make it lovely for beans

Other raised bed inside is to be done tomorrow, as is the start of filling up the huge beds where I grow early spuds...barrowing loads of compost onto them will mean I have lots of henny company!

Well if course not in the garden (still deeply buried by snow). But first planting for the garden. Penny and I just planted a tray of onions in 36 2x2 cells. About 50 scallions, 50 early onions (large but not good keepers) and 200 serious keepers (a modern, larger, relative of Copra). We haven't had good luck the last couple of years but still trying. Works best for home gardening around here to do onions by transplant, but instead of buying plants we grow our own from seed. Have a much wider choice for ideal varieties that way instead of non-descript "yellow onions".

In theory we should be able to establish a permaculture bed of the scallions as the variety, Evergreen Hardy are supposed to be hardy enough for doing that in our area. The early onions aren't the same variety as I am currently trying an "overwinter" experiment (planted last August) but if that turns out to have worked will give a go with these, supposedly better ones.

Next week we'll start lettuce plants and leeks. No point in having the lettuce ready to transplant before we can expect temps not to drop as low as -5C and in any case will need time to get the boxes along the driveway dug out of the snow so they can warm and dry some.

PS -- poly tunnels to be of much use around here need to be strong, way beyond what even the heaviest rain might take down (think snow; any time of year for which you need a polytunnel it could snow -- heavy wet stuff even though too warm for it to last long). See the sort of stuff listed in catalogs for here and might give you ideas how to build yours so immune to a heavy rain disaster.

Mr D and I got the third raised bed put up and I got it about half filled before my back started to twinge so that job will be completed in bits and pieces over the week. It's a complete mixture of soil - some rotted down turf, soil from an old raised bed, homemade compost, all kinds of things.

Think I may be a bit ambitious for Illinois weather, but I've got my entire kitchen table full of about a dozen different types of things in cells to get started. Apart from that, there's two jars of things for sprouts, containers of things that have gone to set (onions, garlic, noting wasted!), and things in plastic baggies to soak a day or two. Done way too much for being in sick with flu for the weekend, lol.

Planted a Jostaberry today - haven't actually tasted one before, but it's meant to be a cross between a blackcurrant and a gooseberry which sounds good for pies and jam!!

Apart from the normal small pet animals and hen routines, and watering seeds etc ....

Nothing! We went out for the day, had lunch and did some shopping.....

I started a bit late in the day, but managed to clear an area for two more raised beds.. yayyyyyyyyyy..

I'm also about to commence, or was til I looked out of the window... performing my annual plant moveaboutheplace... do it every year, can't resist..
I shall also top dress me potted shrubs etc to give them a good boost before the warm weather arrives... pleaseeeeeeeeeee soon!!

Put some seeds to soak
tomatoes,
peppers
gerkins
parsnips.

Put sweet peas into tubes & planted a pot of spring onions
Also some sprouting seeds.

Want to put the peas and beans in tubes tonight. Not sure if I've enough table left to put them to though!