Friday 5 July 2013

Garden Update...Summer Flowers and Veggie Growing...

The flowers in mums garden are beautiful this year...




And my veggie garden is growing really well...


I have a pumpkin and courgette (this is my 4th courgette, the slugs keep eating them!), chickpeas, broad beans, mini sweet corn and a few verbena and lobelia plants dotted around too.

Today I planted spinach, chives, kale and lettuce.  You can see on the left of the photo that I snipped some twigs of an obliging privet plant to mark out my patches so I know where to hoe and where to water!  My broad beans were grown from saved seed from my best plant from last year, I'm proud of how big and healthy they've grown this year.


Here's what else is happening, clockwise from top left - chickpea flower (I'm excited to see what happens with these!), courgette buds, alpine strawberry flower, first broad bean pod, variegated nasturtium leaves (I'm going to try eating these!), pumpkin buds, blackberries, broad bean flowers, the first ripe strawberry!

I'll show you my balcony another time, it's currently overrun with ants, which are destroying the plants and scaring me!  Once I've defeated them I'll make it pretty again!

You can see the progress of my garden this year (and last) by clicking this link!

How are your gardens growing?

9 comments:

  1. Your garden looks wonderful!
    So how do you get rid of slugs naturally?
    I'd love to garden, I'm a city girl by nature and know nothing of gardens, I'd love to have one though...and some chickens! :)
    Have a great weekend!
    Tammy

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    1. Thank you!

      I generally don't mind slugs having a bit of a nibble, if they get out of hand I throw them into next doors garden, which is a wilderness of weeds and brambles. Mum does a slug patrol at night though, with a torch and a pair of scissors, she snips the slugs in half, gruesome woman!

      Maybe when you move to the UK your home will have a garden for you to play in, I hope so! :)

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  2. Looking forward to seeing how the chick peas grow - never seen anyone growing these before.I have sprouted them to eat but it never entered my head to grow the plants.Hope they are successful for you :)

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    1. Thanks Dreamer! I have a new gardening book this year, lots of ideas of exotic things to grow, which is where the chickpea inspiration came from.

      http://www.jameswong.co.uk/#/homegrown-revolution/4572077593

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  3. The flowers look amazing! And I'm excited to see the chic peas too!

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    1. Thanks Connie :) I have my first chick pea pod now - won't be long till I can pick them!

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  4. Hi Susie

    You have a lovely blog! I'm really impressed at how many different vegetables and flowers you have growing in your garden! Whats your favourite? Mine definitely have to be chrysanthemums, but they are hard to keep alive over the winter time!

    I was looking for your email on here, as I'm doing some online work for Fine Flora (www.fineflora.com) and I would love to collaborate with you. If you send me an email on piketim22@gmail.com I would love to tell you more about it.

    Have fun in the lovely weather!

    Cheers,

    Tim

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  5. Your veggie garden looks amazing! Mine is overcome with weeds at the moment after being gone a few days so I am very jealous of how nice it looks. Your mom's flowers are stunning too!

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    1. Thanks Shannon :) I hate weeding, at least it's quite dry now so the weeds will be easy to pull out!

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