What have you done today in the Garden?

Mart, thank you. I will try your advice. First time for me.
I have grown the white potatoes, Irish potatoes, Russets.

 

I did a bit of "gardening" on my laptop whilst watching my recordings of the Australian Open Tennis on TV.

Our birdbath (here in the summer last year).




has developed a leak due to cracks caused by frost damage, I'd tried to fix it yesterday with some silicone without success.
So I trawelled eBay yesterday and have ordered a replacement, it was £72 including delivery. Saves traipsing around garden centres if they are open looking for one.
It's the same size 18" tall. It's advertised as frostproof, so it'll do.
It has been given a "weathered" appearance. The pedestal of the old one always looked "new" so never looked right.

The supplier had sold over 100 and only had three left. I went back to the listing just now for the photo and they were down to one. So someone must have bought the other after me.

 

I like it Riley. It'll look good on your garden& the birds will appreciate the drink/bath.

 

I just put a sweet potato in water about a third of the sweet potato. After a few days the roots will start and soon they will grow slips. This is one from my garden of last year. When the slips are about 20 cm you can cut them off. I usually bend the planting end into a fish hook shape and put in a pot in a tunnel until the danger of frost has past. Sorry the picture is sideways.

Today I phoned my work and told my boss I did not feel like working today. He said fine, so I spent a few hours in the garden. First I checked and opened my tunnels. Everything has germinated. I weeded and composted the garlic and some strawberries. I have so many strawberries now. I harvested rocket and lambs lettuce and some leeks. I transplanted some lettuces. I also broke my favourite tool. So I will have to weld it.

 

Sorry about your favorite tool, but at least you have the ability and skill to fix it. When my favorite trowel broke after about 20 years of use, I nearly cried.
I need to look up this sweet potato propagation method, and what a slip looks like. We don't eat a whole lot of sweet potatoes, but I'm betting they will go down a treat at the food pantry!

 

DH Riley, the birds will appreciate your gift. our birdbath is more years old than I recall, looks much like yours, but appears to be various shaped cement pieces, cemented together. The bath part is cleaned and tipped over in winter, leaving a perch for the birds as they await their turn at the feeder. Also the place squirrels sit while contemplating the leap to the feeder. They rarely make it to the feeder, but if one should get so lucky, he gets one seed before sliding down the pole.

 

Odif, thanks for the advice. I hope I can do a few as well. Do you eat the leaves? In all the years my parents grew sweet potatoes, I only recently learned that the leaves are edible, eaten as one would eat spinach.
I understand about your favorite tool. I broke a short shovel handle, my favorite. Fortunately my mate made and inserted a new handle.

 

We eat the leaves in salad or in soup or stirfry. The plants take about 5 months or sometimes much longer depending on the variety. I usually harvest my main crop of sweet potatoes just around the first frost. They do need to be started early though. Some take up to a year to be ready so unsuitable here.

 

Great looking birdbath, Riley.
In fact, I really need a new one of those.

 

Seed starting has begun
Started Black Beauty Eggplant, Tall Utah Celery, Rosemary, Oregano and Thyme

 

Growingpains,,, forgot to say you can also use a pint canning jar and stick the stem end in and fill about halfway with water ! Then set it on a sunny window sill ! Thats what is easiest for me ! I did mine the same day you posted the question ! You should have plenty of slips to eat or plant depending on how many you want to grow ! Can`t really say since i have no idea of your garden size !

 

It was a nice day at the lottie today. We had several things to do and the weather was really working for us.

We began by clearing the clematis off of a couple of arches and cutting more ornamental grass off and storing it in bags to use as winter mulch in the fall.

Half way through our work schedule, we stopped and talked to the neighbours directly across from us. The lady and man told us last fall that they planned to construct an elevated strawberry growing frame. They have ordered, I think she said, four different sorts that will yield fruit throughout the season. She could not recall the names, sadly. She did say that some of the plants were perpetual bloomers.

At any rate, they were pretty pleased with their structures, the man explained their planning , reasoning and hopes. Well mates, I was impressed and thought that I would share their scheme with you all ( with their permission of course).


After clearing-away the clematis vines, some work had to be done to re-enforce the twin arches. The winds and rain had made the uprights loose and some joints were gaping. There is some age rot as well. I popped over to ask my neighbour if I could borrow his drill to remove some rusted screws before repairing the arch. Do you know what that guy did? He brought his drill and some leftover wood from his strawb table construction and just did the repair himself ! How nice was that.



Of course on a relatively warm day with sun, the bees were flying, we saw them on the Galanthus’ as we entered the lottie. I slipped over to the hives to have a look.


There were only a few on the fly plank, because the air was full of them. They were everywhere, flying and pooping and learning the area. They were so dull they they just bounced off things and were landing on everything. It was a delight to see them.

To end this posting, one of those lovely bunches of Galanthus.

 

Say Riley, I think you read only the first half of the posting, as I made a mistake and uploaded the first half of the posting before placing the piccies. Sorry mate.

 

Odif, I will probably make this year a first try at growing sweet potatoes/
If i do a short row and they grow well, I'll be happy and anticipate 2022/
Mart, I will post any news of my efforts. A cousin didn't know the leaves were edible, just as I didn't know. He said the deer eat the leaves.
Clay, it sounds like you made a great start. I ordered seeds quite awhile ago and have yet to receive them. Everything is blamed on COVID!
Sjoerd, you have very helpful Lottie neighbors. I'm surprised to see Bees doing their roaming already.
Our snow will need to melt before seeds can be planted.

 

Did a couple of hours or so in it today. Mostly clearing more dead leaves and loose moss that's the birds have chucked out of the gutters.
Really need to get more dead bamboo leaves out from between the stems in front of the back fence, but that's a hands and knees job, not for today.
At some time I'm going to have to jet-wash the patio, it's beyond a bit of "Wet n' forget" treatment. I'll wait until it's a bit warmer.
This amount of time in the garden means I can turn on my jukeboxes, I select 30 sides on one, then when they've played through, 30 on the other. I do play a couple of sides on each, twice a week during the winter, but they need a good "blow out" every couple of weeks or so, it keeps the mechanism and switches from stiffening up. They were built for heavy use.