Hobbies and Crafts

Maryanna
Your choice of colours for your pots sounds lovely and will look just great when you are able to plant them up and place them near the summerhouse.

Sounds like the dahlia is reaching for the sky............

Thank you for offering help with the plant.
Not sure how fully grown it is, so will have to describe it in the state which I saw.
It was growing in a flower border in poor soil containing alot of pebbles in south Kent.
Owner had not planted it, so windblown seed or otherwise self planted.

Growing upright to a height of about 15 - 18 inches with one central stem.
Leaves were about 5 inches long and attached by very short stem directly to the main upright. They were about 3-4 inches at the widest part tapering to a point, which hung downwards. They reminded me of a dock leaf, but much softer dull green and matt surface, not shiny...a bit like foxglove.
At intervals , I think from the main stem, grew little creamy white flowers grouped in clusters of about 8 or 9 heads in one formation, which hung down. Looked bell - shaped? but hard to say, as it was early evening and some plants in the garden had started closing up. I didn't get the impression of separate petals.
Each individual flower head was about 1 inch long.

Plant was not woody, eg. like a fuschia.

Any help identifying would be great
Thank you

Needless to say, I have now spent all my birthday vouchers.

I bought a few more tub plants but there is no way I can plant them in this hurricane.

We have even had to put the heating back on since we came back from Scotland, it's so blinking cold.

I have two pots up on the top terrace that were my grand mothers, they have Spring bulbs in them so I have to wait until they have died back before I can plant up for Summer. I got some huge double blue Petunias, blue Scaviola and Bacopa and white Pelargoniums and Lobelia so they should look pretty in front of the blue Summer House. I usually go for yellow and red up there so that will make a change.

I think next doors brolly might have come over again if it hadn't been for the fact the Cotoneasters have grown so much and stopped it. Why she doesn't put it down I have no idea.

My hanging baskets are swinging around like mad too,I am worried that the trailing geraniums are going to get snapped.

The 99p Geums are doing well except for one that has given up the ghost, got too dry when we were away I think.

It will be nice when I can finally get everything out of the conservatory and we can sit in there without being poked by a pot or basket or I don't have to keep telling Himself to watch where he is putting his feet.

The tomatoes have got loads of flowers and about three little tomatoes and the Dahlia is about three feet high, it's going to be a tall one. Don't know what it is, it was a Pom Pom from the £ shop. The other two I put in aren't doing very much as yet but I planted them a lot later as they weren't shooting.

Gwyn, I love all sorts of Petunias and Surfina but the blue ones always smell the best.

What did that plant look like ? I have a lovely book that was my Mums it has everything by colour and also leaf type, very useful but I think it is mainly wild flowers.

M. :-)

Really windy here too Ann. Definitely not a day to be out gardening !
Keep safe away from flying chairs.

Your new plants sound great. What colour petunias did you buy? -Such a useful long lasting plant for summer colour.

Where is the best place to look up a plant I saw growing locally? Is there a site which you can search by leaf type, colour etc or would anyone here like to have a go.?
It may even be a weed for all I know, but not a plant I recognise.

Gwyn

I do wish this awful wind would drop, it is hurting the roses, I have just picked up at least six completely broken off heads. And, every time I look out of the window I expect to see hanging baskets all over the lawn. I have picked up one of our wrought iron chairs on the patio once, plus two tubs were over this morning. It is a really vicious wind, don't remember anything like it this time of year before when the roses are so heavy on the trellis. :-( :-(

Just been to the garden centre (well two actually, one this morning down the M5 and a local one this afteroon. the one down the M5 is a Wyvale and they take used pots and plant trays so we took a load down there. Bought two petunias there and two at the local garden centre, plus a lavender and a fuchsia, oh and a white antirhynium and had a devil of a job protecting them from the wind when getting them to the car. I think the planting will wait until tomorrow now.
:-)

Maryann said on the bird thread that her garden had grown while they were away. Things are really growing fast at the moment and also the roses seem to be very early this year. We have a lot out all over the trellis and a couple of new ones coming on well too. Paul Scarlett is doing well except that he seems to want to face our neighbours rather than us!!

We took a small tree out early this year, a type of twisted hazel but it was turning into a bit of a thug. since we took it out the Alliums, Aquilegias and a large peach flag Iris have bloomed well and spread and also, and I haven't a clue where this has come from, a small yellow iris (more like the ones that grown by ponds), has spread rapidly, it does look pretty growing among the deep purple Alliums. However we will have to watch it as I don't want it to take over. There is a young Budleia growing where the tree is now and also a climbinbg rose was planted behind it last year, both see quite happy with the irises but we need to watch them I think. I am wondering if theyw ere among the buys I made at the pound shop last year, most of which have not re-appeared this year. However, that could be down to OH's need to pull up anything in sight in the spring when 'weeding'. I think I have lost poppies and a foxglove that way as well. :-D :-D

Thank you Vera, I am pleased that you had a good day. I suppose you didn't buy the sculptures because you couldn't get them home? Wonder if they sold them eventually. I like deep purple flowers in the garden, as long as they are contrasted with something that shows them up. I have this year discovered I like the effect purple and red give so some of my pots and hanging baskets reflect this. As you will know from my blog garden photos, I love Hostas, I don't seem to be able to keep the tiny ones. I did see one at Malvern that I liked, I think it was called tea spoon, but didn't buy it. I used to have a couple of small ones but when we had our fence done last year the men were trampling on the bed where the hostas would have been a month later, I think they disturbed things as several didn't come up.

Well, I spoke too soon in my last post. I have found red lily beetle :-| Only one in each tub so far but now they have found my lilies I am expecting them to appear in droves. I am not a happy bunny.

We had a lovely, but exhausting day, at the Chelsea Flower Show. We left home just before 6.30 am and got there about 9 am and it was already quite busy. By lunchtime you could barely move.

We went straight to the show gardens as I thought they would be popular and we wanted to see them while we could still get close to them. It was difficult to pick out a favourite as they were all quite different. Several had quite formal, geometric hard landscaping and very informal planting. The flower colours this year seemed to be more in the light blue to deep purple range, obviously with patches of other colour. Reading the boards showing what the garden was trying to achieve did make more sense of some of them. We got lots of leaflets from the gardens as they all had planting lists in them, so I'll be able to check some plants online when we come to plant up our garden.

We saw the fresh gardens but by the time we got to the artisan gardens it was so crowded that we gave up trying to get near them. We also managed to walk round the Grand Pavilion in reasonable comfort. There were some amazing exhibits there and it was full of colour and scent. We spent a short while talking to a chap on a stand that had every sort of hosta you could imagine. I was very taken with some miniature ones. He has taken my email address and will email me in September when they start sending out new hostas.

I saw a lovely sculpture for the garden - a snip at £30,000. Then I looked round the corner and found a better one for a mere £95,000 !!!

I had worn sensible old lace-up shoes as they are the most comfortable for strolling around and being on my feet the whole day but boy, was I glad to take them off when we got home again around 6 pm.

All in all a very successful day.

Your garden sounds beautigul Maryanna. How about a few photos?

Vera, it will be great when they start on your garden make-over won't it? Oh lucky you I have seen some of the gardens on the TV from Chelsea so will be looking forward to hearing what you think of it and don't forget to tell us your favourite garden. Have a lovely day. :-) :-)

Maryanna, your garden sounds lovely at the moment. I hope nothing has been damaged by the heavy rain and hail storms.

Virtually all the flowering plants in my garden are in tubs or big pots. I have two big half barrels filled with lilies that look as though they will be in bloom soon. One perk of moving here is that I haven't seen a single red lily beetle though we used to get loads in our old house. The three pots of agapanthus are looking healthy as well.

We have at last got in quotes for the make-over of our garden and they vary quite a bit in price. We have discarded the most expensive as their price was way over the top. OH practically fainted on the spot when he saw it. We are currently tossing up between the other two. I think we will probably go with the cheapest though OH has seen the chap who will be doing it four times now and talked to him about how he will do the work and made sure he really understands what needs to be done. Whoever we give the job to is unlikely to start before early July.

In the meantime we have a treat tomorrow. We are going to the Chelsea Flower Show as our son and his partner got us the tickets for Christmas. I know from midday on it gets really busy so we are planning to leave home at 6.30 am and get there about 9 am so we can wander around a bit before the real crush starts. The forecast is for better weather so I am keeping my fingers crossed.

The garden just looks so lush at the moment.

No Daffs left at all and just two big red Tulips in a shady corner, they came out very late, , all the others are long gone.

There is a Hawthorne at the end of the garden and at the moment it is smothered with white blossom, it looks like a great big dollop of whipped cream is sitting on the shed.

I risked putting the Pelargoniums out when we had the party, so much for hoping we could all get out in the garden afterwards, but apart from bringing them in one night when they said there might be a frost, they have been outside and are looking lovely.

I have also potted up some of the planters that are sheltered and they are coming along nicely.

There is lots of colour, from Forget me nots, Kerrias, Welsh Poppies, Wallflowers and especially the Aquilegias, which seem to be trying to take the garden over and look so pretty but are swamping some of the newer and not so vigorous plants.

For my birthday I had some lovely new big blue pots, to replace the ones next doors cat broke when using them as a loo. Needless to say, they didn't stay empty for very long !!!

I also got £80 (!!!!!!!!) of garden vouchers. Trouble is, I now look at the garden and can't see a square centimetre in which to plant anything at all.

I may hold onto them for a while.

Going to go and have my breakfast in the Summer House and read yesterday's paper. Can't imagine how I didn't get round to reading it yesterday.

After running around with bubbles we went to the garden centre, just for a browse you understand. It wasn't my fault that they were selling HUGE red Geums, yes I know Ann, the others died, again, and Delphiniums, for 99 p each. It would have been rude not to get half a dozen, and a couple or three Delphiniums,they do look lovely though bobbing about with the Wallflowers. They are about two foot high, maybe more. I. Have put them in pots, they seem to do better that way rather than straight into the ground.

Do you remember the Sweet Peas in hanging baskets thread of a couple of years ago ? Well mine didn't really do very much and since then the basket has been hanging in a bush half way down the garden with Pansies in it. Now they have got to be at least two years old and are still flowering their little socks off. However, the most enormous Sweet Peas are growing amongst them and are climbing all over the bush, should be interesting. So much for when you should plant them and whether inside or out is best, just shove them in a pot and leave them in the middle of the garden for a few years.

M. :-)

Feeling very frustrated :-| I just typed a long piece about the garden, pressed submit and it disappeared into the ether. Goodness knows where it went but it doesn't seem to have made it to the thread.

I'm too tired to redo it, so I am going to go to bed with my book. Goodnight all.

Thanks Ann. I did wonder about slugs but I can't see how they are getting on to the plants. They can't be climbing up the wall and reaching them that way because the pots are too far from the wall. They could be climbing up the outside of the pots but I have copper tape round them and they won't usually crawl across that - at least it's always worked in the past.

I think I'll have to give the slug pellets a go though I don't like using them

I googled Vera.

Damage limited to holes in the leaves: No pests are seen. This most commonly is evidence of slugs, those annoying shell-less cousins of the snails. Slugs feed at night so they usually will not be found on the leaves. Remedies include clearing any leaf litter or debris from beds. Remove boards, bricks or other material that retains moisture and provides a haven for slugs. Thin out groundcovers to improve air circulation and drying. Handpicking the slugs, best done at night, is very effective in small gardens. Beer or any other yeasty or fermenting liquid can be used in a trap. Make sure the trap is buried to the rim in the surrounding soil. Chemical treatments require a molluscide (usually metaldehyde and/or carbaryl) but are hazardous to children and pets.

The only things that eat my Hostas Vera are slugs and snails, I'm afraid I resort to slug bait to keep them off. If they manage to get on the plants I do find large holes in the middle and no trails. I know it is snails because I also find dead ones having fallen foul of the slug bait.


We had a a day out last Friday 8th May it was the Malvern Spring festival garden show. We left home at 0830 and got home just after 3pm. Unfortunately we arrived at a time when we were directed to park as far away from the gate as it was possible so a long walk in. It was a long day but an enjoyable one. We headed first for the food hall where we bought Asparagus, cheese, pasties and sausages. We then had a cup of coffee before splitting up for an hour and wondering round on our own. I had a quick look around the plant stalls outside before making my way to the Flower arranging hall where there were some beautiful displays. People are so clever and so artistic. After we met up again, we bought a few plants then headed for one of the halls where we could eat our pasties for lunch. There was a really good amount of seating available this year both inside and out, we were very impressed. There were as usual, however, long queues for drinks and food.

After lunch we walked around buying climbing fuchsias, Hostas and Aquilegia before staggering back to the car. Well I went as far as the gate while Tony trekked off to get the car and move it into one of the spaces left by people who had gone home early. Back in then for a final look around and a visit to the show gardens which is always interesting. There was a party of school children in there at the time, about 7 years old and they were enthralled by a couple of the gardens, one that was very bright and one that was based on Alice in Wonderland, the other one was a bee friendly garden with a large 'bee' prancing around.. I had a quick look at the classic cars before we started to make our way out. We stopped en route to look round a country craft marquee, which was a mistake as we had a bit of a fright in there.

As we were walking past a stall selling up-market shoes and sandals, which I was looking at, I turned in time to see a rather tall man, in I would say his sixties, falling towards me, he appeared to have tripped over the camping stool he was carrying and didn’t seem able to regain his footing, the marquee was carpeted and there was a slight slope which didn’t help. Tony was behind me but I literally jumped sideways as the man fell, in the process he took his wife down with him. It was a good job it was the shoe place as there was no counter for them to hit and they didn’t seem to be hurt as people, in the shoe ‘shop’ helped them to their feet. Frightening thinking afterwards how much worse it could have been with many of the stalls having expensive glassware etc on them. And a good job the crowd had thinned at that point, if he’d fallen on me he would have done some damage.
Anyway, we continued on round and on back to the car and home. Really enjoyed it and have just about finished planting what we bought.

Has anyone any idea what might be eating my hostas?

I don't think it is slugs or snails. We do get a lot of snails here but I haven't had them munching on the hostas before. The plants are in large pots, away from the wall and they have copper tape around them. There are no signs of snail trails and I cannot see any insects on the plants or in the soil.

The holes are large and mostly in the middle of the leaves, though one or two have been chomped round the edge and just one stem seems to have been chewed.

Help!

EDIT Nothing else in the garden seems to have been affected, just the hostas

You are probably right Ann, but its grown so large and I have nowhere else to put it...

lovely heads of flowers but they dont last long sadly.....
thanks for the answer... love jean xx

Maybe it is warmer and sheltered by the wall Jean

Can anyone tell me why all the flowers on a huge Camelia plant has faced thier faces to the wall, the back of the plant is full of blooms the front as some buds but it seems very strange to me.... thanks

Jean x

Woke up to one of the newly replaced fence panels laying across my flower bed, naturally it had to be the one with the most Daffs in it.

It was a terrible night I could hear things blowing around the patio and a couple of tinkles when something broke, will have to go and investigate in a bit. What with the wind and Himself up and down all night, I don't feel like I slept at all.

Our daughter is at the house in Somerset at the moment, they are having awful weather down there too, not much to do at the seaside when the weather is awful with a little one. They are not ones for a blustery walk along the beach or moor.

She will have a nice catch up with her big brother though.

We will be going to join them all tomorrow and will stay until I have to go back to work. Not sure what we will come back to if this weather keeps up.

M.

Yes we have primroses white and yellow and polyanthus yellow, plus daffs and mahonia. As you say very yellow. Although we do have a lot of dark red helebores and cerise aubretia. OH just managed to get the lawn cut before the rain and cut back a large conifer type shrub. Trying to get it under control before we go off on our travels again. :-)