Hello again and welcome back. Imagine opening the curtains first thing in the morning and seeing the sky pictured above – I was greeted by the surprise of this glorious dawn sky a couple of weeks ago and it was a great start to the day. But shepherds were right to warn of morning red sky – gorgeous dawn it might have been but followed by an entire day of heavy rain with grey skies. Our weather this winter, in my…
Hi again – cold now but there is still the odd day of bright, clear weather to enjoy. Last month I was thinking back to when I worked in a community garden – one of my first roles after training – it was in a very urban area of south-east London and my brief was to cater for people who didn’t have space to grow much i.e. people without gardens, people with balconies or window boxes only. Having usually had…
Welcome back again to all you garden lovers – I appreciate your support of this gardening blog – and goodnight to our gardens. I’ve recently been going through a mental checklist of the late season tasks required before the dormant months; maybe you have been doing the same? I’ve asked myself these questions – have I saved seed from all the plants I said I would? What seeds do I need to sow now? Have I divided all the overgrown…
Hello again gardeners – life is a little more relaxed for us during the season of mists and mellow fruitfulness. There is, of course, all the preparation for next growing season but then there are months ahead of us to do it before the bad weather sets in. As September drew to a close I finished most of my preserving – another kilo of Piccalilli and a similar amount of pickled cucumbers. I am now waiting for the first frost…
Hi fellow gardeners – here we are in late summer, the heatwave is behind us and the days are for the most part sunny and pleasant enough and there is some welcome rain now and then. I now miss being one of the crack-of-dawn waterers group who for weeks on end fell out of their beds and onto their allotment plots in a daily struggle to water and keep everything alive in extreme heat. Allotment harvests vary considerably each year…
For as long as I can remember Kings Cross for me was just a place I went to get a train when travelling north, although I was always well aware that it was not generally considered to be the best of environments. For a while I worked in the City and I used to walk from near the Angel to London Bridge so as to take in London places I had not yet seen. I remember being surprised and delighted…
Hello again. I seem to have been a blur with two watering cans for what seems like weeks trying to keep alive plants in various places during our otherwise delightful heatwave. Green Spaces In the “big picture” this month are visitors enjoying the rose garden in Queen Mary’s Gardens, Regents Park. People love roses, you can visibly see people enjoying being amongst them. One person, making the inevitable phone call, was describing this rose garden as “heavenly”. In…
Hello again garden lovers. I am not sure why I usually think of June as a time to relax and enjoy lazy summer days because this year that certainly isn’t so. Like most people around me I know I am still hard at work with the fruit and vegetables trying to get everything planted in time, or netted to avoid seasonal predators, or trying to keep the grass down which with the current alternate days of rain and sun seems…
My new friend you see above took up residence in late April. This is the time of year when all the last minute digging that should have been completed months ago (weather allowing) just has to be finished and I do feel rather guilty about digging and exposing the worms for the benefit of my new friend who lies in wait for what my spade reveals. Robins are a familiar sight for gardeners, companionable little birds with their heads on…
First of all my apologies to all because due to technical problems this blog has been offline for an unhappily protracted period. Now all seems to have been resolved. At last we seem to be getting back to normal seasonal temperatures after the longest period of sub-zero cold that I have ever experienced in the south of England. Amazingly, the above Hellebores photographed after the severe cold, storms and heavy rain we have had are still blooming strongly in April…