What have you done today in the Garden?

Just got back from a morning out visiting family.

Too hot now in our shade-less garden, so will pack for our weekend away and have a general tidy round inside.

Will go out later this evening and deadhead, water and move pots into whatever shady areas we can find .And then keep our fingers crossed they survive the hot weekend to come.

 

This seems to be the busiest time of year for everyone. And lots of harvesting and cleaning weeds and the best is yet to come. Fall my fav time of year.

Decided to use the blower on the driveway after using the weedwacker in several places along the driveway to eliminate the weeds popping up along the border edges. Then reclaimed the circles round 5 paper birch trees that seemed to have also included a couple of moles . Geezzz. Then mowed the front and back lawns and part of the pasture. Washed off the mower and cleaned the brand new blades. The repair guy said there was hardly any blades left and they needed to be replaced and wow it’s a whole different experience with brand new mower blades.

Tried to chop out and around the darn blackberries (wearing blackberry gear) , around the flower beds and cut off a couple tree limbs that were encroaching along one side of the pasture. Then blew off the area round the trees and clean up the area a bit. You could eat off my driveway floor , however….. I wouldn’t take that claim to heart. But it’s super clean. Finally . Just need to have a power-washer guy come out and eliminate the shady spots under the trees where the moss thrives and has grown thick in spots. Maybe do the roof and the barn. Those pine needles and the moss are really a constant threat to anything that doesn’t move,

I also noticed while doing the pasture check that the bobcat is scratching along the areas where the ground squirrels have had their under ground dens. Soo.. I guess the squirrels aren’t totally gone yet.

It’s a beautiful cool day and everything in the garden is growing like they are on steroids… super fast this year with the cooler weather.

Ya all have a nice day..

 

Came in at 10pm from watering the pots and grouping them together on large trays in a corner of the kitchen patio that holds on to it's shade the longest..Will top up the trays again tomorrow morning before we leave. Also moved all the young Wallflower plants too and the Tomatoes and Cukes. Fingers cross they won't suffer too much.

This is the ideal time for a spot of gardening though, much cooler despite it being 22C ( feels like 25C).

 

No one here likes the malabar spinach, not even my chickens. I was given a plant last year, and did not want to hurt my friend's feelings. I thought the chickens would like it. Nope. I have had it in my garden a few years back also. I removed it last fall. I hope it is not a perennial?

I got more mowing done today, so that is 4 sections done a second time. I made a mistake on how many sections. I forgot to include the path to my pond as a section, and it is now neck deep in weeds, so that will be a challenge next week. I also worked on some of the trim work. I need to figure how to put more string in that thing but have not yet tried it.

I noticed that some seedlings in the pots where I had planted rhubarb a few months back are my garden sage. That is good. I planted more seeds for garden sage, and some pink daisies. No rhubarb seedlings though.

@Anniekay There are both YELLOW and WHITE blossoms on the vines in my compost heap. I did notice that some of the fruits look like bird house gourds. I must have tossed the spoiled ones in my compost last fall. I had bought a packet of seed, and it only had 3 seeds, only 2 grew, and there were 2 gourds that spoiled. I think I have a gourd vine where they were last year too. At least these vines are doing much better than last year's vines. I know I planted pumpkins (I have hoards of pumpkin seeds) in that pile. Some potatoes that I tossed are also growing. I probably have two kinds of vines growing together, but they are all going crazy growing there. I think next year, I will plant WATERMELON in my compost. I have more pumpkin vines in my compost barrels too. They are also doing very well.

My potatoes are nearly ready to harvest. Maybe sunday, I will harvest them.

 

Nothing really apart from topping all the plants up with more water, just settled down on the train now.

Have a super weekend ,slap on the sun screen and keep hydrated.

I will come home a year older but definitely not any wiser.

I will leave you with this......x

 

Nothing much today it's too hot, later in the evening do some watering, the pots and polyanthus.
I only iron hubby's shirts, my tops don't need any ironing, when washed and dried i roll them up, it keeps the creases down, my skirt or trousers don't need it.

 

Those Chinese Chives that I TLC'ed (is that a verb?) are already growing by leaps and bounds. We'll have pot stickers in a few weeks, I bet. I watered them by hand. I'm not confident the drip system is working so well.

I watered other stuff too, especially the youngest fig trees, the squashes, tomatoes, and odds and ends. I still need to water the deck stuff after lunch.

Harvested a summer squash and a zuke that overnight became almost too big, in the Way of the Zucchini.

Next I need to make hammocks for the trellised squashes, so they can hang out and relax and grow bigger on these lazy summer days. Nothing fancy, just some support.

 

Oreti— have a good one.

Daniel— Nice work.
I do not know much about that new verb…you just keep on being you, mate.

 

Big cleaning in the lottie, then brought the debris away. That is five green trugs and two pruning bundles.


Oh yes and a little harvest:

 

We got an inch of rain yesterday afternoon so, the grass was long and wet this morning. I had to wait until 11:30 am before the grass was dry enough to run the riding mower over. I got all I could mow with the rider done then thunder and lightning started so I put everything away and got my shower before it showered outside. It's still drizzley so, I'll finish the grass trimming tomorrow.

 

A nice sentiment, Oreti.

 

Oreti have a great trip and Happy Birthday,

 

Another hot day, so I won't spend long in the garden. I've just fed the birds and went down to the bottom of the garden to open the tea-house doors. I don't need the heat, "cooking the capacitors" in my jukeboxes.
I put a lot of water on our garden last night. I've also been spraying the acers' foliage twice a day to prevent leaf burn.
I'm never "stingy" with water, the slight increase on my water bill would be nothing compared to the cost of replacing plants that died through lack of water.

Several areas have had hosepipe bans already, the north-West is usually one of the last to get a ban, if at all. We've not had one for years.

Watering with a can is a bit of a pain, but when I've had to, because of a hosepipe ban, I use my "two can method," one filling whilst I'm watering with the other.

 

After I had my coffee this morning and walked Rags I did a ton of deadheading and tidying up the flower beds. I got a 5 gallon bucket full of compost material from it and then put it all in the compost pile. Later, when the sun starts off to the West and I have shade to work in, I intend to finish trimming the grass around the edges of the beds and borders with the weedeater.

 

Happy Birthday @Oreti

Had to cut down the fruit bushes as they were covered in scale Took the opportunity to dig out the nearest row (mostly blackcurrants) and leave the row at the back (I think they're mostly redcurrants) I set 2 posts in the ground with the help of Brian the Auger and strung 2 wires across (a bit hard to see in the pic) so I can fan train the bushes as the grow back.