Anglesey Abbey, Cambridgeshire

Two sketches made today at Anglesey Abbey (National Trust). A beech tree amongst the daffodils and the Winter Garden: blue glory of the snow (Chionodoxa), purple/blue/pink lungwort (Pulmonaria), magenta elephant’s ears (Bergenia) and white paper birch trees.

 

Sowing Seeds

Sowing climbing bean seeds in the greenhouse yesterday.

 

Wren

I spotted a wren on our patio amongst the pots of pansies so drew this. Affinity Designer on iPad.

 

Woodshed

New woodshed made from odd bits of wood and metal sheets lying around the garden. Now I will have decent dry wood for the chiminea.

 

August Garden

 A few photos taken today of the garden.

Garden Plants

A variety of plants in the garden.

Doodles

Two sketches. The first was just me playing around with an idea, and the second is a quick sketch made in the garden.

Garden

The garden is looking good this year, although it is very dry. As usual, the hops are the fastest growing plants and are already a good six feet high. Vegetables are slowly getting going. I always say the garden is a late garden, I put it down to the conifers in neighbouring gardens. A lorry load of woodchip from some tree cutting nearby has enabled me to resurface the paths and have little left over (or rather, a lot). I've decided to let some rough edges and weeds exist this year to increase the biodiversity. Just occasionally I see some interesting insects and want to see what I can attract by leaving nature to do what it does best.

Garden Sketch

Fountain pen sketch of the garden this evening.

Radishes

The first radishes picked from the garden. For once, I knew exactly where I wanted to go with this sketch and it worked well. Perhaps I will do more like this as I am not out and about as much at the moment along with everyone else. I am missing going out and sketching in cafes so enjoying a few challenges attempting different illustration styles.

Garden Developments

As I have currently had a little more time on my hands due to having to work from home and take some holiday, I have been able to make a few small changes to the garden. Fortunately, I bought all my seeds and compost a day or so before the garden centres all closed.  I have restructured the pathway through the vegetable patch to form two paths and created a new pergola from pieces of woods I had been saving for a rainy day. Fortunately, the weather has been superb and after three or so days of hard work I am exhausted - what with taking up, pressure washing and relaying paving slabs; taking up turf, creating a path, redoing all the edging, reformating a flower bed, building the pergola, hand sieving my compost heap and loads of other fiddly jobs I am now ready to start sowing seeds. One of my neighbours resprayed nearly all his wooden fence panels and did our at the same time. Which was nice.

Garden in August

Hop: My dwarf variety is one of the fastest growing plants in the garden and had already grown over 6ft by early summer.

Leeks: I usually grow a few to flower the following year. The ones flowering now seem to attract more insects than any other flowers in the garden.

Mint: This refuses to grow where I want it to and is much happier growing through the patio.

Raspberries: These refuse to grow when I want them to and are happier in a flower bed.

Climbing beans: poor crop this year after last years bonanza

Cucumbers, courgettes, lettuces, herbs: doing ok.

Dwarf beans: Ok, but not a heavy crop.

Sweetcorn: a late addition to fill some space, doing ok.

Purple sprouting: doing well under netting. Plants nearest the fence where warmer and drier almost four times as big as those towards the centre of the garden. Which seems a little odd. Sweetcorn is growing the other way: shorter close to the fence and taller inwardly.

Tomatoes: bought plants are not brilliant, sown plants not yet ripe but look better.

Radishes and lettuces: can't grow fast enough from seed in the spring. Once summer arrives they almost refuse to grow.

Compost: I buy a variety of bags in the spring as and when I need them. I have a suspicion that some are designed to kill seedlings rather than encourage them to grow - cannot remember which ones to avoid. Or perhaps seedling growth coincided with unfavourable weather conditions....

Carrots: grow well in compost in a planter high off the ground and good crop this year.

Strawberries: did well this year. Dug then up and replanted them in buckets where they seem much happier.

Garlic: each year I say I will never grow garlic again. This year was no exception. Useless crop.

Onions: surprisingly poor crop too. Too dry in early spring?

New potatoes: small crop, only a few meals.

Spinach and chard: mainly grown for visual bulkiness.

Celery: always small and very slow growing

Weeds: Once plants are established I tend to leave weeds in. They add ground cover and so shade the soil thus, I hope, reducing water loss. They add biodiversity and extra flowers for insects etc. They contribute to a wild aesthetic and a sense that each plant has as much right to exist there as its neighbour.

Volume crop production: this is not my aim, I just enjoy the challenge of growing something to eat.

Easter Garden

Warm spring sunshine has at last brought life to the garden. A couple of weeks ago we were still getting frosts so the warmth of this past week has been welcome. Tulips and wallflowers are in full flower and the apple blossom is just opening. Today is Good Friday and I planted most of my remaining seeds this morning and the garden finally tidied up by tea time. Each year is full of tweaks to various ways of doing things with the hope of a good growing season ahead and time more efficiently spent on management. Last year worked well despite the intense heat and I hope this year will be better. I would really like a veg patch that is an overflowing wilderness of plants and flowers with all available ground being productively used. I am not sure what the secret is - plants have a mind of their own with unpredictable successes and failures and that is without the vagaries of the weather to contend with. But you know all that.

The 'trampoline greenhouse' had a makeover and is now covered with commercial thermal anti-drip polytunnel polythene and should last a few years. The greenhouse is not fully sealed, being open at the back where it leans against the fence. The metal framework was covered with cloth and tape to protect the polythene from hot spots/wear. Thus it is more of a large cold frame designed to keep the chill off plants and provide warmth without overheating. Plants started off in here last year did very well.

There is a cold frame next to this that I have had for many years. I recovered this with polythene and changed the polythene front to wire netting. This will also keep the worst of the weather off seedlings without them overheating during the day.

The aluminium greenhouse frame I obtained from a neighbour last year has been cut down in size by a quarter and is now covered with netting. In here I will grow purple sprouting. It won't be butterfly proof but it will keep the pigeons off the plants. I will then move it to a new location next year. I try and move things round each year, not in a strict rotation though. 

Here is what I have/intend to sow/plant this year:

Vegetables:

Potatoes (charlotte and rocket)

Red onions

Garlic

Chard 

Spinach

Climbing beans

Drawf beans

Cucumber (outdoor type)

Courgette

Tomatoes (cherry, on cordon type plant)

Radishes

Carrots (in a planter off the ground)

Lettuces

Salad leaves

Flowers:

Wallflowers

Zinnia

Cornflowers

Stocks

Sweet Peas

Mixed annuals

Herbs:

Mint, Chives, Sage and Parsley to replenish and bulk up existing plants

Fungi on Woodchip

I was surprised to see these colourful fungi growing in the garden last weekend. Earlier in the year I obtained some woodchip from a local tree surgeon and used it to make a garden path. Now it is covered with fungi. What was interesting was that on a pile of woodchip on the front drive some ink caps grew, whereas on the path these completely different fungi appeared.

Garden in June

This year is the first year that I think the garden has settled down into something more stable and productive. It has taken a large amount of micro-management and subtle adjustment to get things how I want them. Starting all seeds off under cover is the only way to guarantee moderate success. So is a willingness to move things or plants that don't work in particular locations. The garden does seem a late garden and always feels a good couple of weeks behind those I see elsewhere. Perhaps because it is shaded all winter. Since our neighbours replaced their fence there are far fewer slugs and snails wandering into the garden from outside and it feels a much easier to manage the space.

Vegetables currently attempting to grow are: lettuces, radishes, kohl rabi, courgettes (yellow), cucumbers (climbing), raspberries, strawberries, celery, leeks, chard, dwarf beans, climbing beans, runner beans, spinach, romanesco cauliflowers, purple sprouting, tomatoes and carrots. Not huge amounts of each, but a healthy variety to see what works.

I managed to obtain a 6x8ft greenhouse from a neighbour. There was a slight challenge in releasing it from the undergrowth back in the spring as the photo shows. Now it is used as a garden feature and tomato/climber support. Attempting to reglaze it was not an option as much of the glass was broken and the frame bent out of shape. I am actually very pleased with it. The wooden planter inside the greenhouse is full of carrots which seem to be thriving high up away from ground pests.

After many years, the purchase of a new wheelbarrow was a welcome treat. One of my old ones is now a garden feature and home to mint and basil.

The plant growing up the right of the photo is a hop plant. It is now in its second year and seems to be doing well. It is a dwarf variety so will only grow to about 8 feet.

What I would like to do is see how much I can grow in the area I have and to gradually introduce different and creative planting techniques, not just plonking a plant in the ground. It needs to be interesting to look at, perhaps a little quirky and all executed subtly so that my wife doesn't complain!

Trampoline Greenhouse

Here is my new greenhouse, made from a old trampoline frame. I would probably call it more of a plant shelter as its aim is to keep inclement weather off my seedlings rather than a place in which to grow mature plants. The metal framework is held together with pressure treated rough sawn timber which was the only main expense at approx. £50. The polythene (3 sheets) I had lying around and the inside table was made from some old palettes. Wood chip was used for the floor as I have quite a large pile of this to use up. The ploythene is attached to the circular frame using small lengths of black plastic pipe cut into a ‘c’ shape so they just clip over the metal work holding the sheets in place. Staples, screws and large cable ties hold everything in place. The back was left uncovered so I would get good ventilation and to ease construction, with the structure placed against a wooden fence (to which I might fix it later). The door just lifts on and off and is covered with fine netting I found and a bit of polythene. If it lasts me a few years I will be happy and if I have to rebuild it then that will keep me occupied for a few hours when necessary.

New Garden Path

A few days ago I spent a merry few hours building a new path through a patch of lawn. This now completes the path all the way up the garden to the summerhouse - a job that I had been planning to do for a long time. Near the house is a patch of patio that is rather dead space perhaps around 8m squared in area. It had originally been covered with paving blocks which, sometime ago, I relocated and then filled the remaining hole with hardcore and topped with woodchip. To make the above path I dug up the larger pieces of hardcore (bricks and old concrete path) crom the patio and reburied it in a trench along the path line. The soil and turf removed will then be replaced back over the patio space to form a new lawn by the house. The path was edged with recycled plastic lawn edging from Homebase and woodchip salvaged from the patio area. I'll put new woodchip on the path when I can get hold of some or buy some. Hopefully it will be last time I see that hardcore and that it now has a permanant home. A pity in some ways as moving it all was an excellent workout! I still have a few lumps of concrete that I didn't have space to bury and so might just move these round the garden every few weeks to keep me fiit.

Chicken Curry

Cooking chicken curry in the garden. The wheelbarrow holds a barbeque fire pit. Suspended from the ash branch tripod is the top grill section from the bbq set raised above the fire by chains from a hanging basket and some thick galvanised wire. This holds a wok and can be raised or lowered up of down depending on the fire beneath. Once cooking complete the wheel barrow and fire pit can be moved from under the tripod to enable a larger fire to be created for evening warmth (and not burning the tripod).

Garden in August

With thanks to the rain and the sunshine the garden is actually looking rather pleasant this year. The spring always seems a stressful time as seeds are sown and expectations are placed high on the ground to bear fruit, vegetables and flowers. Next year I must remember to start off all seeds undercover, that does seem to produce the most successful plants.

The runner beans, courgettes, lettuces, cucumbers and herbs have been successful though not always plentiful. Sweetcorn looks to be progressing well and I will be picking tumbling tomatoes any day now. I have quite a few healthy purple sprouting plants in various places which look very healthy thanks to my de-caterpillaring when they were young. My hop plant is now over six feet tall and looks healthy too. Sweet peas and cornflowers have done well along with all sort of other flowers here and there. One apple tree has failed with small scabby fruits only a few centimeters in diameter but Lord Lambourne seems to be happy!

Digging up part of the lawn and the ground beneath it seems to have eradicated the fungal problem only for it to appear in another part of the garden. Might have to do the same thing there too.

Blackberries have been in abundance with many bags of frozen berries filling the freezer. This has been one advantage of our neighbours leaving their garden to run wild.

Garden in June

The garden seems to be deciding to grow at last. Each year I get the impression that it is several weeks behind what is generally happening in gardens at large. This year is no exception. There was a cold, dry spring and now, after some rain a couple of weeks ago and the present warm weather, plants look like they are growing. Two successive sowings of parsnips failed to materialise and my onion sets are not much bigger than when I planted them around Easter. Fortunately a few things have not succumbed to the elements or eaten by something. Lettuces, runner beans, courgettes, sweetcorn and strawberries a doing well. The latter have given us a plentiful crop off only a few plants. The roses are doing well with profuse blooms in places but the honeysuckle doesn't seem to like the garden and is rather spindly. My hop plant is progressing very slowly and I do hope it does something as I adore the smell of them in late summer when they flower. All the things that have done well are those sown from seed under cover. Most seeds sown in the soil have perished apart from the spinach. The lavender is nearly out and at last the flower beds are filling out bit. I am trying not to buy much this year though unfortunately I have a few gaps near the house which might just have to filled after a visit to a garden centre. Shhh, don't tell the wife....