Mostly, the ground has been frozen this month, so I've not been able to do much gardening.
We had a couple of sunshiney days and we spent most of them painting the new fence, which was a bit of a waste of sunshine - but we didn't know such snow was on it's way! As you can see the old fence was on the verge of collapsing, it was also rotten on the bottom. Please note - the fortifications made from sticks and pots and boxes were to prevent my plants from being stomped on, the ground was too hard to dig anything up and move it!
Ta-dah, new fences! The new lady next door paid for them too, thank goodness! I could have done without the mortification of our paint dripping down onto the gravel boards next door, and the neighbour calling over the fence to say so - but she was pretty nice about it and I sent Joe round with a sponge and a bucket of soapy water to clean it up! I like the fence on this side so much better painted white, it makes the garden seem so much lighter and bigger. (it does look a bit grey in this photo, but that's because it was a grey day, in the sun it looks much better!)
Also when it's not been frozen I've been watering the garden! I don't know if that's a totally misguided idea or not, but my waterbutt gets full to the point of overflowing, and they do say the best place to store water is in the ground, so I'm giving it a go! I'm not doing it when it's waterlogged or anything, but my trees and pots have all had a good watering and so has the back hedge.
I got the last of the spring bulbs in (maybe they'll flower next year!) and I bought a pretty Thrift and a sedum from the supermarket. I love thrift, it grows on the hill with the funicular railway on it in Aberystwyth, which has happy memories from my childhood holidays, university days, day trips with my mum and holidays with my Joe - it's a happy plant for me! My mum treated me to three roses (from the pound shop, but they look lovely healthy plants!) that I think'll look lovely jubbly along the new fence.
The onion seeds I planted last month have popped up! They did nothing in the (unheated) conservatory, so I moved them to the dining room by the radiator and they took a couple of days to sprout. I've invested in a couple of heated propagators, because I have peppers and leeks and delphiniums and some herbs I want to get an early start on and there's not enough room by the radiator! I got two of these £14 ones from Wilkos, which is quite a bargainous price, I'll let you know if they're any good.
That's it for my garden this month, I'm longing for the snow to bugger off, I want to play outside! How's yours?
That is one v smart fence and lovely when you have reasonable neighbours who'll help with the cost. Your bargain plants look promising- i'm a convert to non-garden centre plants these days. I've had some fab ones from one of our local supermarkets recently. We've had about a foot of snow here in S Wales, so the garden's vanished a bit. I'm hoping the strawb plants, garlic & rhubarb are alive under there! I've been putting out extra bird & squirrel food and attracted lots of them. Pity they weren't about when we did the Big Garden Birdwatch not so long ago (I swear they must all keep away when they see me with my clipboard!)
ReplyDeleteI don't feed my birds, because we get rats in the garden (we live behind an alleyway, there are allotments on the other side, and a big national trust property to the right of us, so lots of places for ratties to hide undisturbed!), but I try to leave my garden a bit wild and don't prune anything back until spring, and there are always little birds hopping about and pecking things from the ground all winter, so I guess I'm doing something right!
DeleteHope you have less snow by now and your plants have survived!