What have you done today in the Garden?

Very busy today,

I weeded the rockery, mostly grass and the weeded all the borders.
It's a "hands and knees job." Firstly I did the front of the main border, also pruning off any low azalea or rhodo growth, that was overlapping the lawn.

Then any debris I'd not picked up, I blew with my garden blower, to the backs of the border. Then another "hands and knees job," doing the back. There was a lot of grass from next door's lawn creeping under the concrete base panels of the fence.

Anyway, job done. I gave those two tree azaleas, in pots, a top-up of fresh compost.




The back border was the worst to do. The bamboo has shed a lot of leaves, but has thickened up with new growth.





Scraped out between all the paving stones on the "rose patio." Then put a bit of weedkiller on the joints. (excuse my bottle of, "gardening Budweiser," on the near end of the balustrade)





The dead azalea in the main border was annoying me, so I pulled it out.

I checked on the £10 azalea I bought earlier in the year and has just been sitting in a bigger tub.

It had a nice big moist root ball so it went in its place. I enlarged the hole considerably and put in plenty of compost and topsoil.





It should look like this in May again, although it's already spread out a bit.




It's a continual "fight" for space, between the big acer and two azaleas. I've had to put wires on three branches of the azaleas attached to a fence post to coax them away from it.







Gave the lawn a dose of iron sulphate where I might get moss later in the year.

I keep saying I'm going to clean the outside of the tea-house, but so far I've not got round to it.
Maybe I'll do it tomorrow. I can't remember when I last cleaned my car.


Today was also, the "annual quince harvest." There must be over 200 in there...




They went straight into the green bin.

 

This and that today in the garden.

Watered, of course. Watering attracted moles to the raised beds. They have barrier mesh at their bases, but moles figured out how to get through that.



Plus, the pathways between beds are a bit treacherous now.



I don't think I can do anything about that now, except try to push the soil back down around the tomato roots. This fall I think I can install a hardware cloth base after digging out the raised bed. Maybe.

I'm not much for 'warfare in the garden", so I'll leave it alone for the moment.

The green beans are germinating nicely. I wondered, because the seeds are several years old and I just had them in open jars in a cabinet.



Not all of the emitters are working. So I have been watering those by hand.

I am getting a few strawberries again.



The container peppers are doing great!







The pink Mandevilla is blooming better now, with more on the way.



The red one has a lot of buds, but none opened yet.

 

Just watering after we got back home this evening. So hoping our forecast will be correct ( very rare) for tomorrow as it shows a day of rain for our region......yay!!! No more watering for a day or two...maybe.

 

@Anniekay , I love your mule Millie. She is adorable.

I did get more mowing done today, but not so much because of the heat... At least it is only 54 days until fall.

 

Oh @AAnightowl ......noooooo!! I don't want to think about Autumn/ Fall.

 

That mule is a real character and very sweet. I'll bet your Pally is too !!

I can't wait for fall either but down here the time of year you get cooler weather varies yearly. Anything under 90°f I will be very, very, grateful for !!

 

Spent the morning having a general tidy up of a couple of the bigger borders.

Collected up some more seeds.....can't have too many can you!

Deadheaded a couple of the Buddleias, the white one in particular looks messy with it's fading blooms.



Our promised rain never arrived. But being cloudy made is pleasantly warm to work in. As you can see our lawn is a nice crisp brown feature !!

 

This afternoon I tidied up and did some drastic cutting back on one of the borders on the East Patio., which mostly involved cutting back the Poppies after sprinkling their seeds around, neatening up the Heucheras and cutting off tatty Hellebore leaves. Hubs trimmed the boundary hedging.

Before..





...after.


Next to sort out....probably on Thursday.

 

Late yesterday around 7:30 pm I pruned my Nectarine tree and set up the sprinkler @ 5:30 in the shady flower beds. Then watered the remaining flower beds each for an hour since some things looked at the very first stages of wilt. Finally got done @11:30 pm.

This morning @6 am I deadheaded and when I went to put my hose away from the previous night, found it had sprung a leak. Can't fix it since it's a flexi hose. Now I'm on the hunt for something light weight but not as "delicate" as the flexible one is.

 

I envy you @Anniekay , we are under a hosepipe ban because of low water levels due to this prolonged dry spell. I find it very difficult ( and painful) at times traipsing back and forth filling up watering cans then carrying them around to all corners of the garden. Oh how I wish for a real good downpour. Hubs helps , usually, he can carry two cans at a time. I did try this but the strain put on my still delicate knee was too much to bear.

 

Today I cleaned up the first half of the onion harvest. They are in a single layer in a shallow cardboard box, so the husks will dry out.



Kind of a small harvest, bit I like growing them.

The rest was just watering. It's too hot for me outside after about 9 am. In fact, best to get it done before 8 am.

If I can dig out the rest of the onions tomorrow or thurs or fri, I'll turn on the drip lines for that bed to hydrate the soil, then plant more green beans there.

 

When I have to use watering cans what I do, because I have three cans and three trugs, is I put my cans and trugs in the garden cart and wheel them over to the beds. I had two operations on my right shoulder from going to the drug store for my very first flu shot and the woman stabbed me to the bone ( I had a bone bruise the size of a pingbpong ball) and all the serum went up into my rotator cuff. So, no carrying heavy stuff in my right hand. This is so much easier and less stress on my arms.

 

I did not do much. I did hook up the sprinkler for the veggie garden and my horse, and let it run for a few hours. I set it so it can spritz over the fence and if she wants to, she can cool off also. She does not like this heat either. I fell asleep.

The to-do list is so long, it is hard to choose what to do next.

 

When I lived in Idaho, my best friend had horses. Her daughter, who was 10 at the time, had a POA pony, named Buffy. Her spots really showed up when she was washed. She was so sweet. The daughter and I decided, one day, to ride her together to the store a couple blocks away. So we didn't saddle her, the store wasn't far. We were minding our own business talking to each other, she had the reins and I was behind her. There were bushes on our right and we were on the rocky dirt next to the road. We're just walking along and suddenly we heard another horse behind the bushes. I don't know what he/she said to Buffy but it spooked her and she kind of went side ways to the left and we both slid off on the right. She was trained well enough that she didn't leave us, but we walked her across the road and the rest of the way to the store. She did not want to go near that other horse. We got home and told her mom (and my best friend) what happened and she laughed so hard because Buffy never threw anyone! Her daughter went on and rode her in Jr Rodeos. She did really well.