Friday stuck indoors...

Today there was no gardening group. It's half term but some were helping move the potting shed. I wanted to be there but alas, I had to go to work. I did notice on my walk from Farringdon station the most beautiful ash trees. One of them had lost most of its leaves and was completely covered in bright red berries. It was a wonderfully striking image to keep me going through the day as l worked in a window-less basement. 

And the animals came one by one

Once upon a time in a garden far far away

there was a path that needed to be built in a day.

The ladies they worked hard to prepare the land,

they mixed the ballast, the concrete and sand.

they stopped for lunch with the job  only half done

Planning to return to work in the afternoon sun. 

but when they got back to get the job done

someone else had had all the fun... 

ANISEED the gardening cat had rallied up a team

and while their backs were turned they'd finished the path it would seem!!!!!

THAT PESKY CAT!!!

Rain rain go away

It doesn't rain in Brighton...   certainly not on Fridays

so it stopped (because it's Friday of course.)

It doesn't rain in Brighton, not on Fridays.

Heaven by way of Preston Park

Today was glorious Friday, that is if you're lucky enough to be out gardening and in Bridgette's gardening group. "Why was today so glorious?" I hear you cry...   Well because we were in Lindy's heavenly garden.

and boy did we work like angels



except when we took advantage of her delicious food



yum

How to build a bed from scratch..

For those that think that all the gardening group are as lazy as me I shall have to correct you. They may like drinking tea and eating cake but they also like working oh so hard.

So today, task one was to dig a flower bed from scratch...  

Step one.  Start with a patch of grass and mark out you bed.  (but we live in Brighton, we don't have any grass... so do it in your neighbour's garden when they're out.)

 Step two dig up the turf.. Do it in smallish sections because someone working further down the garden might want to use it to cover up a flower bed later on.

Step three, remove the large lumps of chalk with a sieve. If you don't have chalk then add some...Why? Because it's not fair that we have all the chalk in Brighton and you lot have lovely rich clay soil. It's only fair really. 

Step four chuck on some compost and starting digging for victory.



Step five. Plant some plants and water them in. (Well l know l'm stating the *** obviously but you might forget... )

don't forget the bulbs...  It will be Spring before you know it.

and then sit back and enjoy...   Go on have another slice of Lindy's Lemon Drizzle Cake. Go on. You deserve it..

and if you're wondering what happened to all that turf...

lemon drizzle cake anyone?

Mosaic that path

This is a fantastic use of old crocks (no mother-in-law jokes, thank you)

Step one, find some steps.

Step two, lay your old crocks out in a pretty pattern on the step below they will end up. (You won't have time to work out the pattern once you've put the concrete down.)

Step four, put your concrete down and add the crocks/tiles.

Unfortunately l don't have a photo of this as l was too busy eating lemon drizzle cake at the time. I shall post a photo of the finished article soon...

The Friday montage

Oh we had so much fun...

Winter in a pot

Lots of people in Brighton don't have a garden. If they do, it's likely to be a small patio often with limited sunlight. For example, I was telling a friend the other day about this journal of the lazy Brighton gardener.  She said there was no point reading it because she had nowhere to grow anything. "What?" I exclaimed, possibly not in such a literary manner. "Everyone has somewhere to grow something.."  So, to prove a point to my horticulturally disinterested friend, I am setting an Autumn project for everyone. The challenge, to create a Winter display in a pot. 

There are plenty of very cheap bedding plants for sale in the nursery at the moment. Primroses, Cyclamen Coum, Solanum Capsicastrum, Cineraria, Gaultheria to name but a few. Select a couple of perennial plants (something with all year round foliage that preferaby has some colour) to give the design some structure and you have a garden in minature. 

Just to prove that I am not always lazy, I popped down to Swains Farm Shop near Henfield today and bought some plants just to demonstrate how easy it is. 

So, step one, choose some plants. Be brave, go for contrast. Grasses are wonderful against a flatter leaved plant. Put two colours together that clash..   It'll be dark and dreary soon, you'll need cheering up.

I went for:

2 x Gaulteria Procumbens

A ruby red flowered Cyclamen

1 x Thymus 'Lorna Doone'

6 x Primroses

1 minature conifer

1 Carex comans 'bronze'

Step two, make sure you have a decent looking pot to put your plants in. The pot is as important as the plants.


Buy some Multi-purpose compost. If you care about the planet, make it peat free. If you don't, then just buy ordinary. 

Step three, drainage...  What?  Make sure the pot has good drainage ie. the water is able to drain away freely. Put some old broken crocks in the bottom or better still break up the polystyrene tray your  bedding multipack came in and put it in the bottom of the pot. 

Step four.  Put compost in the pot. Don't fill it to the top. You've got to get the plants in yet.

You can add some slow release fertiliser if you desire but the wonderful fact about Autumn/Winter plants are that they are slow growing and won't need as much food. (bit like us really. )

Step five.  Put your plants into the soil after having removed them from the plastic pots that they came in (well, there's always one...)  Move them around until you're ecstatically happy with your original design and then top up the pot with soil and level. As Bridgette would say though, don't over fill your pots with soil. 

Step six. Add some grit to the top of the soil. It looks good and keeps some of the moisture in

Step seven.... WATER!

Now go and put the pot somewhere where your neighbours (and you) will see it. It's very important to keep up appearances. You don't want them thinking you're a horticultural ignoramus.. now do you?

ps. What I didn't tell you is that this pot also has some daffodil bulbs in it...  SPRING!!!!!!

Glorious Gunnera

I've been thinking about Gunnera since bumping into some at Sheffield Park on Saturday. (I think it was Gunnera Manicata.) I love it. I always think you know you've really made it in life when you have a garden big enough for Gunnera. Generally people that have gardens big enough for Gunnera don't love it as much as us poorer folk who idolise it from afar (across the electric perimeter fence usually.) It is invasive in warmer climes but then who cares.... If your garden is big enough for one Gunnera then it's surely big enough for ten. 

Charles Darwin whilst on a ramble in Chile in 1834 wrote:-

"I one day noticed, growing on the sandstone cliffs, some very fine plants of the panke (Gunnera scabra), which somewhat resembles the rhubarb on a gigantic scale. 
The inhabitants eat the stalks, which are subacid, and tan leather with the roots, and prepare a black dye from them. The leaf is nearly circular, but deeply indented on its margin. I measured one which was nearly eight feet in diameter, and therefore no less than twenty-four in circumference! The stalk is rather more than a yard 
high, and each plant sends out four or five of these enormous leaves, presenting together a very noble appearance." 

Voyage of the Beagle, Chap. XIII

It's getting colder

It's Autumn, it's supposed to get colder, but how many times have you forgotten to bring in those tender plants before it's too late?

We have a mild climate in Brighton, we are virtually frost-free for most of the winter but even still, tender plants such as Aeoniums need to come in before it gets too cold.

Tonight, the weather forecast will drop to 5 degrees (in Brighton.)

You've been warned...

Autumn Colour at Sheffield Park

This afternoon we scurried up to the glorious Sheffield Park to check out the autumn colour.  If you haven't been there it's a fantastic informal garden of shrubs and trees famed for it's Kaleidoscopic Autumn colours. These are provided predominately by an incredible array of Acers. At this time of year, it really is a photographers dream. 

I have uploaded the photos to Flickr

The publication of Allotment Gardening

There was a ripple of excitement over the morning coffee and cakes at yesterday's group. We were surely in the presence of greatness. There on the gingham clothed table sat the book.

Bridgette's new book, an essential on anyone's Christmas list (Dad if you're reading this, act surprised when you open presents on Christmas Day.) can be pre-ordered from Amazon now. 

Details to follow about the book launch.  Dress code with probably be Tiaras and Wellies. 

Week five

The wellies are on. The secateurs are sharpened. The gloves are on. It's Friday, It's Brighton, It's Sussex, it can only mean one thing..

It's week five for the Gardening group

Take it away ladies...

Stipa Gigantea - Plant of the week