Springing into action in the March garden

Well, maybe. I haven't much ventured into mine yet this week.  I must fish the capers out of the fridge and sow them this weekend. What are your jobs for the weekend ?

Not much in the actual garden so far, other than pruning back some shrubs and moving other, unsuitably positioned, shrubs.

A few seeds started, and my experimental tomato cuttings from last year's plants seem to be ok for their winter in the unheated conservatory. They have had flowers on almost from the start, although I presume the low levels of both heat and light prevent any further development. They have been potted on once, about three weeks ago, and when it is reliably rather warmer, I will pot on again and transfer them to the greenhouse. It will be interesting to see if they produce tomatoes any earlier than the plants I am just starting from seed.

My first tomato seeds have germinated - as always, Sungold was the first in just 4 days.  I've used up bits and bobs of seed again including some saved seed of Fence Row which is a red, cherry tomato.  It's been sat, unused in my box for 4 years and this morning some were sprouting after just 5 days.  I must remember to save seed this year because I recall it was a good variety.

I've got some early tomatoes which have germinated too - they were a few years old so I sowed a few more than I needed, but I've had practically 100% germination, which I won't complain about! I only want a couple of plants, just in case we have any unseasonably warm weather, because I hate the idea of not using it to grow tomatoes! (No risk of any warm weather so far, though!) I have Ruby, which I nearly gave up on last year and considered throwing the rest of the seed on the compost heap because it was so unproductive, but then it sorted itself out (and the fruit was delicious!). I also have Buissonante, which is an early bush tomato, which I will grow in the greenhouse in pots. I tried some outside last year as well, but realised that it wasn't suited to being grown at ground level - the fruit dragged on the ground and got dirty.

Yes, Ruby is a lovely flavour but definitely not a well behaved plant. If your seed came from the swap it was probably from me.

I bought the seeds from The Real Seed Catalogue a good few years back - I bought a lot of different varieties, too many in fact, but I've kept on saving seeds from the ones I liked. I have a bit of a love-hate relationship with Ruby: last year the 'hate' bit was more in evidence, but as always, I'll give it another chance!

I started a job today which (in my mind at least) was going to be a quick half-hour job, but has ended up being quite a long one. Our garden is on a slope; two slopes in fact, so to try and organise it a bit I put in a Link-a-Bord border all down one side, to retain the soil and level things off. I couldn't complete the border as there was a holly tree in the way. A good five years ago we cut down the tree, and I put some stump killer on the remains, and waited for it to rot so I could finish the line of the border. Meanwhile, while I waited for the rotting to take place, the border leaned over because it wasn't complete. Last weekend, my other half removed the stump, which was quite an undertaking as it was still solid. So today I thought I would push the border upright, and finish it all off. But I have had to take the whole thing to bits and do lots of soil moving before replacing each plastic 'plank', and also remove a large rosemary plant and lots of snowdrop bulbs. But it's half-done, and hopefully if we get some dry weather tomorrow I can finish it off. It's what you might call a long-term project!

Those sort of jobs are never quick Dandelion. Ive been juggling tomato seedlings. I've been bringing them indoors at night because it's been too cold in the gh but the light levels are too low indoors so its back out in the gh for the day where I have a heated mat and lights but today with a bit of sun they got too hot and started to keel over so I moved them off the mat and put them in a shady corner of the gh. I'll be glad when the plants are a bit bigger and the temperature is a bit more consistent. Nothing else has germinated yet but I can see some sweet peas coming I think.

Holly tree stumps are one of those evils when it comes to removing she says from years of contract gardening. Just as bad is the lilac mind - leave a bit and it sends suckers everywhere.

It's things like tomatoes, peppers, and various herbs on the window sill gardening at the moment while the weather decides whether to stay above freezing up here. At least the onions and garlic went in back in the autumn.

The other day I got round to cardboarding my large veg. bed as I intend to go for the No Dig approach. I also palnted two varieties of shallot. That was followed by a night of rain so they were all watered in. Last night we had the strongest gustiest winds I've heard in a long time and almost half my soggy cardboard was whipped up into strange sculptures. Oh well, I have plenty more cardboard!

Well, I'm an idiot. I managed to sow my carrot seeds in the same place as the broad bean seeds in the polytunnel. I had noticed a few carrots germinating and thought it was some stray seeds so I've been pulling them out. I ended up pulling out all the germinated carrots and put some more where they should have been then realised it would have been better to dig up and replant the 6 broad beans.
If anyone finds my errant brain cells on their travels please send them back!

Oh but your errant brain cells may well be mixed up with mine. I've bought enough seeds for 2 allotments but given up one due to a long waiting list made it not right for member of committee to have 2!

Going into the garden to begin a post-winter tidy today made me realise just how wet the weather has been, over a prolonged period of time. I had been cultivating a lovely bank of thyme for years now, to the side of the main path, which has always been full of flowers and attractive to bees in the spring. I realised yesterday that it had lost most of its leaves, and when I investigated further today I discovered that it had all just rotted - the roots came away from the sodden soil very easily. Although we haven't had any actual floods, it looks as if the saturation level of the soil is fairly high, so we get puddles sitting on the lawn from a shower of rain, as there's nowhere left for it to go.

That's a disaster as well as a reason to delay work Dandelion.

But it does mean you have a space to fill with new plants

We do have to dig deep into the reserves of optimism at the moment ...

Chilli-head wrote:But it does mean you have a space to fill with new plants

We do have to dig deep into the reserves of optimism at the moment ...

Very true!

I am waiting to see what survives in this garden. A Ceanothus repens does not seem the best choice for a garden 750 ft / 228m high and prone to whistling winds. All the leaves are brown and I'm wondering if the few green ones I can see will make it worthwhile keeping. All the Euonymus spheres have browned in places on top but may grow out past that. There's sad-mostly-dead sage languishing in a couple of places, I couldn't even over-winter that in balmy Dorset at 45 ft / 14m! Can't see the beginnings of any perennials appearing but it may be a bit early yet.

Goodness me but I have over wintered sage up here in the north east with the Cheviots in view. But it does have a sheltered corner. Mind I did inherit some old sage plants on inheriting the allotment which had become nothing but wood and didn't even improve after pruning. Funny thing sage but it does seem to like its shelter and it does like sun. But it does grow old younger than other shrubs. It's certainly been a winter that hasn't encouraged things which don't like wind here.

FloBear wrote:  Can't see the beginnings of any perennials appearing but it may be a bit early yet.

It's going to be exciting to see what pops up!

Busy day. Allotment weed control this morning. Put some mulch around the rhubarb, which is up but not big enough to eat.

This afternoon was potato planting. Which meant getting some compost out for them - after a really successful compost year last year, this time it looks a bit disappointing. Needs a bit longer - but I did use everything last year, so this was from a fresh start, and over a colder winter. Mrs C-H helped me feed lots of shrub prunings to the shredder, all of that and more kitchen veg waste has gone on top of the heap - hopefully it will get going. Never seen so many woodlice in one place before mind.