What have you done today in the Garden?

My hydrangeas arrived late yesterday afternoon, so this morning I potted them up and put them on the patio steps. For the last few years, I've been putting plants in plastic tubs that fit neatly inside our many Apta ceramic ones. Someone on a message board mentioned it as a good idea. It means I can ring the changes and also there's some air between the two walls of the tubs as a layer of insulation.








I've stuck a bit of the pots with the labels on it in each of the tubs.

I've taken the hebes out of the troughs in front of the teahouse.





I gave the troughs a bit of a clean. They won't need re-painting.



New turf doing well, I'm still watering it twice a day.





My mixed dahlia tubers arrived this morning. I'll pot them up this afternoon and leave them on the bench under the window in the shed.






My intention was to put these in four plastic tubs in the troughs. But I'm debating whether or not to put the troughs back where they were, as it had become impossible to pass between the acer and the troughs to get to the side of the tea-house and the hedgehog house. It'll mean I will be walking on the same part of the lawn on a daily basis. Not a good idea.

The hebes are temporarily residing in, "the alley of shame." Our drive where, apart from two myleen clematis, roses "out of favour," spend their time.
I'm not sure what i'll do with these hebes, there's nowhere else to put them.





Two more at the far end.

 

More hedgehog activity last night. It attempted to get in the feeder, but despite the entrance tunnel now being very short, it didn't try to push its way in.



Contrast this with last year where in the old house entrance was very much longer, which presented no problems




As I mentioned before, this seems quite a large hedgehog. The one that hibernated in the house under the azaleas ought to be much thinner without eating for months. So possibly, It didn't survive the cold weather.

The contrary camera at the bottom of the garden, after not picking anything up for weeks, not even me when I've been down to the tea-house to collect a couple of beers, after the camera is activated, picked up this, (extreme right edge of the photo).

I would think it came through the new doorway.

It always shows that the battery charge is low despite having an adapter connected to it, like the other one.

I've ordered another camera to replace this one. They've come down a lot in price, £38 with free postage direct from Apeman.









As I mentioned earlier, I'll point the other camera at the hedgehog house under the azaleas, this evening.

 

@Doghouse Riley That is a very fat hog and he might be older, a bit claustraphobic, thinking he might get stuck half way in !!

 

Watering is now firmly part of our everyday routine , the ground is so dry.
Likewise so is weeding and pricking out....but all part of the Springtime fun!

 

Even here in "The Tropic of Trafford," it's going to be warm and dry until at least the beginning of next week

Tomorrow I'm going to put a dab of silicone over the drain holes of all our pot movers.
So after I've watered the pots, any water that drains through, will remain in the mover.
I leave it on until the autumn when I'll take it off again.

These roses need a lot of water when it gets warm.

 

I tied a bit of string to 2 road irons today

 

I repotted another container of Alpine strawberries. I grew them from seeds last year. They are smaller than most garden strawberry plants, so I planted them closer together than the everbearing strawberries. As it turned out, I think they are much too crowded.



There were eight plants per "window box". I separated them so now there are three plants per box. The roots had completely filled the box, much more than I would have expected for such small plants.



I mulched with arborist chips.

I have one more box to separate, but no spare containers to transplant the extra plants into. Maybe I don't need so many (true) or maybe plant them into one of the raised beds.

The alpine strawberry plants already have some flower buds.

One of the rhubarb divisions is looking very good. Three years old.



The parent plant is in a difficult location, but it's the best rhubarb I ever had. I don't know the variety. It came with the house. Thick, bright red stems, no green, with pink flesh. Sweet / sour mild flavor.

Always stop and look at flowers.



I tied some climbing rose canes to the kitchen garden fence, so they are not in the way and not as likely to draw blood. They show promise for dramatic blooming this year.

I repotted a grocery store micro mini rose plant. They do better outside, so that's where they are now. This one - a red variety - was outdoors all winter.



The challenge with having them indoors, is they are magnets to mites and diseases, even though my other plants don't have those issues. Outdoors, it doesn't happen.
I had one do very well, indoors, this winter, but the others did not.

 

Well.. It had to be done. I thought it would be a pig of a job and so it proved to be.

I've made the apertures in the inner and outer facia and inserted a slice of soil pipe in the entrance tube. I could have glued it. But I hadn't any and anyway, it would always be under tension, so it could fail as it would often be damp. It was hard to drill holes in the plastic from the inside and countersink them because of the angle. But it's done. The diameter is now the recommended size. 4.5."
If I'd made it any larger, there's a possibility a cat could get in.
I won't alter the other house. That size of pipe was good enough last year for those hedgehogs that visited our garden. It's early days yet. So I'll see how they get on.

 

I gave all the pot movers' drain holes a dab of silicone so they will now retain some excess water and cleaned the pots. It was surprising how warm these pots were. The roses all got a good water and another small dose of Sulphur Rose.


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The lawn is doing well. It always looks better photographed with the sun behind me.
Just a couple of patches that are slowly recovering.






This plant with small blue flowers is quite attractive. It was just a small clump at one time.






Over the years it has filled this narrow border.

 

I got outside at the crack of dawn, watered all the plants I had started from seed and had potted on and set out in the garden this spring, then used 22 bags of mulch on the south flower bed by the house and got half of the east bed that faces the road mulched before I ran out. I'm debating whether or not to go get more mulch now or wait til early in the morning. I'm leaning towards the latter since I'm totally pooped right now !!

 

Had to water pots , baskets and seedlings when I got home late afternoon.....very warm day here. I did put up the shading in the greenhouse this morning before we left to go out thankfully.

 

I got my second wind and did some weedeating along the fenceline, then went to the Garden center and got 16 more bags of mulch and 3 orange marigolds for $1each. My marigolds didn't germinate well, which is highly unusual !!

Hopefully, now I have enough mulch to finish the flower beds !!

 

Ok I am over the moon it;s a beautiful sunny day in April. 70F. A very rare day in my zone. So I’m gonna take the day if from everything and just gloat about how lovely it is to just have the sun out this early in the season.
The cherry trees and magnolias just glow in the light of the gentle sun this time of year.
Pic from security cam.

 

Having a day off from 'doing' as a swap for a day of 'looking' is good for the soul! It can be just the right time to have a few more brilliant ideas .... that usually involve spending too much money!

 

@Daniel W, I'm a bit puzzled about why you decided to bring roses indoors during the winter at all? They are such tough plants, and have survived here in the very coldest weather.