Through the Garden Gate --February 2023

February came with more sunshine, but quite cold at times.  I did  have to keep reminding myself it was only February, but I think a lot of gardeners like me are longing to get back to doing their gardens whenever there is some decent weather.

There are signs of new life all over the garden and little pops of colour as buds open up.  Gradually over the next few weeks more of this new growth will be bursting into flower. The snowdrops have continued to delight me and are still flowering away.  The pots of tete a tete and tulips from last year are showing buds so I brought them out of the corner where I store them over winter and put them out ready  to brighten up the patio.  I got a lovely surprise early on in February when I spotted these little irises in flower, later on in the month as they died down the tete a tete popped up.  

We wondered if we would get any frog spawn in the little pond we made last year but all I've seen so far is a dead frog! No new life there then.

I've been out in the garden, tidying the beds of dead plants, they look a bit empty now but soon they will fill out as plants come back from their winter rest.  

Last week we bought bark and soil improver. The bark has gone on the hosta bed in the front garden and more will go in the back garden on the woodland bed. It looks lovely now as the tete a tete and crocus are starting to flower. I bought some cyclamen coum plants for this area as they grow well in shade and under trees.  They should spread about more each year as they get established.  The soil improver I will use as a mulch for the other beds.  I've started spreading that in the back garden, not finished yet, it will take a few more bags of mulch to get around all the beds.

February is the time to cut the old growth from the grasses which die down in the winter. We have a few big, tall clumps in the back garden and I have been working on them.  They create a lot of mess when they are cut down.  There were grass stalks all over the place. I'm hoping that the birds will make use of  some of it when they start nest building. 

One really big grass we have is a Miscanthus Zebrinus. It's a really lovely grass and provided us with a lot of screening when we were on the patio, but it had grown too big and it was time to dig it up and divide it. It caused more mess with grass stalks all over the lawn which Holly enjoyed playing with. Now it's been split up I will plant a smaller section back in the bed it came from.

The garden is looking good after it's tidy up and I'm feeling happy that at the moment we are fairly on top of our spring garden jobs.  

I am linking this blog post to Sarah's blog at 'Down by the Sea' for her monthly 'Through the Garden Gate'   post

Bad weather but getting a few jobs done at the allotment

We've been having some really awful weather this month, when its not been snowing we've had really heavy rain. We haven't been out much because of the weather, and I'm so looking forward to being able to get down to the allotment again regularly. We've managed two visits to the plot recently when we had some fine, dry days, although it has been very cold so we didn't want to stay too long. We watch the weather forecasts and if there is likely to be any suitable days then we plan ahead to go and do some work. 

Its been lovely to get down to the plot on these two days so far and we've done quite a few jobs. On our first visit I went with a plan to start cleaning out the greenhouses, but instead I decided to dig up all the beetroot which was left and take it home to store in the shed. I expected the soil to be quite wet and soggy after all the rain, but it wasn't and was quite easy to weed and hoe the bed. I try to follow the

'no-dig method' of growing vegetables so the next job was to mulch with home made compost. It looks great now and will be ready for sowing and planting into when the soil warms up in the Spring.

There are still a lot of leeks growing but they are not looking too healthy, so I dug a few of those up.  And I was delighted to be able to pick brussels sprouts, this is the first time in years that I have had any success with growing them. I think they were in a more more sheltered spot and didn't get blown about by the wind.

The asparagus bed and adjoining cut flower bed was looking untidy so I cut the asparagus stems down and pulled up the dead flower stems.  This bed will get a mulch of compost too next time we go.

The rhubarb is coming through already and looking very colourful.

On our second visit to the plot we concentrated on clearing out the dead tomato and chilli plants from  the two greenhouses. Then I swept them both out and swilled with water.  They still need a good clean out, the windows and all the nooks and crannies will need washing down with disinfectant. I'm saving that job for a warmer day, it's one of my least favourite jobs.

It was good to get to the allotment, we felt we'd made a bit of progress getting the plot ready for Spring. I think the robin was pleased to see us he followed us round as we worked finding worms in the newly worked and composted beds. 

Slowing down on the allotment

Autumn on the allotment is a time when I start tidying up, slowing down and preparing for the next growing year. Every year is different and all gardeners know that there are good years and bad years for crops.  It can be a result of the weather, pests and diseases, time and energy.

We are not spending as much time down on the plot now--about once a week we go down.  Although I have a long list of jobs to be done, they are not as urgent and can be tackled through the autumn and winter when the weather allows.  As I walk around the plot and see the empty spaces where the summer veg were, I am pleased to see that there are plenty more veg to see us through the winter. The brassica bed is looking good with lots of cabbages. I thought I might have overdone the planting as I always plant extra in case any get attacked by slugs or caterpillars. 

At the moment there are some really healthy looking cabbages and the kale bed looks really colourful with three types--'dwarf green curled', 'cavalo nero' and red kale.  It looks a shame to cut at them, but I do of course. 

Other veg still growing are leeks, brussels sprouts, parsnips, beetroot and purple sprouting broccolli. 

The last couple of weeks I have been weeding the fruit beds which were in a mess.  There are two cages, one with blueberries and raspberries, the other with blackcurrants and redcurrants. In addition, not in a cage are gooseberries and rhubarb. I have been working my way through these beds doing a different one each week and pruning as I go along. The raspberries are still producing fruit and every week I am always surprised and delighted to see there are still more to pick. 

The sycamore tree at the top of the plot has been dropping its leaves for a few weeks now.  They were all over the place on the paths and the beds, so sweeping them up  was another job which got done. They are now all in the leaf bin composting down.

The weather has been really rainy this week so we haven't been able to get any more done, but its good to see jobs gradually being crossed off the list.

Through the garden gate--February

 The garden is starting to wake up, little clumps of bulbs and primroses are flowering in the borders. Crocus, daffodils and cyclamen which I planted last year are looking bright and colourful.

There are some lovely blue pulmonaria flowering now, they are always early and bring some welcome colour to the garden at this time of year. I brought these from my old garden and they have taken well to their new home.

Last year I planted 50 snowdrops in the green and planted them around the garden. But 50 snowdrops doesn't go very far. So this year I ordered 100 and I have planted them all in one place, under a big weigela in the front garden. This should give me a better display. It's a shame that I have to wait until next year to see the result. 

I've started tidying the borders, cutting back the dead flower foliage which I had left over the winter for the wildlife. February is a bit too early to start disturbing the soil as the new plant growth is just starting to come through and I didn't want to damage anything. I'm still trying to remember which plants are in there as it was all newly planted up last year and I don't always label my plants.  As I worked my way around the beds I was doing a bit of planning as some of the plants were planted in the wrong place last year and will need to be moved. That's a job for March when everything has grown a bit more.

I am linking this post to Sarah's blog at 'Down by the Sea' for her monthly 'Through the Garden Gate' post.

Clearing out the pond and bog garden

The allotment pond has been much neglected in the last few months and every time I have been down to the allotment recently I have looked and thought I really must do something about it. The plants in the boggy garden around the pond needed deadheading and the weeds were growing tall around them obscuring the pond. The pond itself was completely covered in pond weed so that I couldn't see if the tadpoles were still living in there.

My time on the allotment has been limited recently so the most important jobs have been getting vegetables in the ground and looking after them.  But I recently found myself fairly up to date with the jobs and having an hour to spare I decided to tackle the pond.

I started by weeding around the pond and deadheading the plants. The irises, trollius, candelabra primroses and marsh marigolds had all gone over, so they got cut back. But the lovely pink lythrum was flowering away and I was so pleased because I only planted it last year and then earlier this year decided I had planted it in the wrong place so decided to move it. At the time I wasn't sure if I had done the right thing, but it seems to like its new place.

The rodgersia has lovely red leaves, but is still quite small. This plant should grow really tall when it gets more established.

Once the weeding and deadheading had been done I could find my way to the pond and using a small metal tea strainer I scooped the pond weed off the surface of the pond, leaving it on the stones at the side so that any little water creatures could get themselves back into the pond easily.

 I put this water soldier in a few months ago.  When I bought it from the garden centre it was quite small and I nearly bought a couple more.  I'm so glad I didn't, it has grown quite big and I have since heard that it can be quite invasive and may not be suitable in a small pond. So I will watch it carefully.

The pond and bog garden looked much better after this tidy up and peering into the water I could see that the tadpoles were still there swimming around. I was even more delighted when I spotted two huge frogs next to the pond and when I moved and disturbed them they both took a big leap into the pond and disappeared. At least I know there is plenty of wildlife in there.

Tidying up

This time of year is quite an untidy time in the garden. Leaves are all over the place and as fast as you sweep them up there are more to take their place.  The borders are full of the the heads of dead flowers and wilting foliage. It can be really damp and murky too. Clearing the vegetable plots results in boots caked in mud.

Fortunately my obsessive tidiness in the house does not extend to the garden. Here I am happy to see summer flowers fighting for space, tumbling over paths and lawn edges. In the autumn the dead flowers take on another beauty with golden tints to their leaves and interesting shapes with their seed heads.

Untidiness in the garden is also good for the wildlife. Seed heads and hollow stems provide homes for insects which then provide food for the birds. Much as we love to compost our leaves we find it impossible to keep up with the constant sweeping . Around the garden most of the leaves are left, they tend to get blown under hedge bottoms and into corners where they become homes for more wildlife like hedgehogs, frogs and toads. I find that the leaves on the lawn blow away onto the borders. I clear them up gradually through the winter or early spring. But where the paths and drives are covered in leaves we sweep up as they can get slippy.

This week I have been sorting out the cold frame which gets full of all my plant cuttings.  I have a number of echiveria plants in pots around the garden. They grow well outside in the summer but need protection in winter.  I've tried different places to store them over winter like the front porch and the allotment growhouse.  Last year I put them in the cold frame under cover and they survived, so I decided to do that again this year. I have also put some pot geraniums in there to see if they survive. I bought an aeonium this year at a plant sale. This is too tall for the cold frame so I have wrapped it in sacking and bubble wrap and put it in a sheltered corner.

One area I do clean up in the autumn is the shed. As the lawn and hedges get their last cut the mower and hedge trimmer are packed into a corner of the shed. Shelves are sorted and tidied, the jumble of canes put into some sort of order, the plant pots are cleaned and packed into boxes under the bench. The floor and bench  are swept and given a quick mop with Jeyes Fluid. All is neat and tidy, but not for long, a gardener's work is never done!