Gardening Tips - From Fife to the Fylde*

This April has seen an upsurge in our activity attributable to our recent viewing of a programme on BBC I-player.  Climate and conditions looked familiar (even though they are several hundred miles to the north of us) and thus a handy tip from the Scottish Beechgrove Garden prompted a search for bio-degradable pots. I have now sown broccoli and carrots in these in the potting shed, to be transferred to the greenhouse once they have germinated.  With our shorter growing season and cold soil the idea is to give these vegetables a head start before planting out.

The geraniums formerly overwintering in the greenhouse are now planted in the front garden, and the strawberry plants from my sister have been moved.  So all our permanent fruit is in the back garden.  The strawberries are in a long narrow bed next to our wall where I hope they will enjoy the mid-day sunshine.   The geraniums are sheltered by our front hedge and we hope they will benefit from the heat of the surrounding pavers.  We toyed with Beechgrove's idea of growing salad intensively among pavers, but it seemed too much of an upheaval (literally), so rather than creating a pattern of extra veg. beds in our front we are sticking with squash in containers under the bay windows.  My hopeful husband has sown saved seed of butternut squash and winter squash in the aforementioned bio-degradable pots.  These are 'heavy feeders' so last week we made a return visit to our source of free horse manure which is now mixed and ready to go.  

I am also delighted that the radish seed I saved from the allotment has begun to sprout next to the rocket.  Today I thinned the rocket for our first taste of home-grown micro-leaves.

*  Finally, we aren't actually located in Lancashire's famed lowland farming country - The Fylde.  But it is only about six miles to the boundary.  

Forget-Me-Nots

We were very familiar with Forget-me-nots during the time we gardened for a living.  Along with bluebells they were the kind of common plant that customers either loved or instructed us to remove, particularly once they had flowered and become straggly. They don't last long in water either.   But they look good massed together outside.

Our back border is now full of them, bringing welcome colour to this grey spring.  I think I could become fond of forget-me-nots.  Like the primulas, sweet william and bellis perennis (daisies) amid which they are springing up, they are resilient and easy to grow perhaps because they are not far removed from their ancestors our native wildflowers.

Later as summer comes our border will have the cottage garden look - hollyhocks (from seed), lavender (from cuttings), michaelmas daisies (from the allotment) poppies, peonies, and a cornflower mix sent to us by G and M which we will inter-sow among the perennials.

Simple and colourful - it seems to be the rule for garden survival up here in the north west.  

 

  

Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme

Parsley: On Sunday afternoon I decided it was finally warm enough to sow parsley in the greenhouse.  Last year's curly leaved parsley was not a great success, therefore when this year's germinates it is going to the front, where it is warmer and drier.

Sage: This herb came from the college garden shop up the road, where they were selling four plants for a fiver.  I tried it in the cavity wall but it did not thrive, possibly too windy and again not enough sun.  My husband moved it to the most sheltered spot in our back garden adjacent to the greenhouse where I am glad to say it is recovering.

Rosemary: One of our 'rescue' plants from a local superstore. It is now situated in the same sunny herb patch as the sage.  It has come back with minimal brown dead bits.

Thyme: I bought two thyme plants from the college, a green one and a golden one.  The green one (lemon scented) is fine; the golden one, like the golden sage before it, is struggling in the cavity wall bed.  I have another 'rescue' thyme from the supermarket (alpines selection - somewhat surprisingly) and another green one grown from seed.  All in the same spot along with a golden oregano from the same superstore - a bargain at a pound and now flourishing. 

I look at our little square of herbs approximately two feet by two feet and remember a former customer with an ornamental fishpond surrounded by paving where thyme grew in profusion among the cracks.  This was something of what I was trying to recreate here by placing it in our low cavity wall bed.  Only the green thyme has spread out of the bed and over the wall as I hoped.

This place constantly makes me evaluate what works and what does not work.

 

Robust and Reliable Rocket

It is now the first full week of April and our rocket has begun to germinate.  It's currently the most hardy occupant of our raised beds no doubt because of its previous success on our allotments.  There is no sign of the broad beans which I sowed at the end of last month (new season's seed); nothing from the beet spinach or ruby chard (the remains of last season's - fingers crossed).  However, the rhubarb now in its second year is doing well.  

Radishes, broccoli, beetroot - the gift of our friends G and M  - it is  at least a month until I think of sowing these.  I am resisting the urge to sow them now so that I can point out a little green line of leaves when they first come and visit us.  Overwintering lettuce - staggered through the cold in the 'crib' by the end of the greenhouse and I intersowed the remainder of last year's salad leaves among them.  Borlotti beans (saved from the allotment two years ago) are now in the warmth of the potting shed.

Violas for my sister have been potted on by my husband and are in the greenhouse - so far so good - and most of our geraniums from last year are coming out of their dormant winter period. 

Meanwhile the sun shines amid intermittent blustery showers and daffodils which would be surely over in the south cheer our front bed.  Results come more slowly up here, are more hardly won.  Let's hope they are longer lasting too.