What have you done today in the Garden?

Today was beautiful!

Plums are starting to bloom. This is a deep burgundy Asian plum called "Hollywood". The plums are so good, dripping in burgundy juice, and richly flavored. I grew this tree from a cutting.



This is a genetic dwarf peach. I think it's "Garden Gold". I keep a tent over it until Spring, because wet brings fungus disease that really messes things up, ruins the crop, and can kill the tree.



I planted more snowpeas and sugar snap peas. We'll see if my latest bird-annoying fencing and covering will keep the jays out.



I cleaned up the rest of the garden blackberries. A lot of that was pulling out Himalayan blackberries, which were supposedly just "making friends" with my thornless, less vigorous, bigger and tastier berry ones, but we know the truth of that! Also put down a thick layer of tree leaves, soggy but I did it. I also pruned them. They will need almost no care now until they bloom, when bird scare tape goes on.



One of those is Triple Crown, which is productive and delicious. The other is a new variety, which is shorter (dwarf), more productive, bigger and sweeter berry. Supposedly. We'll know more this year, I think it's ready to make some berries this year.

Forsythias are blooming too. These are growing up to become a privacy hedge in another year or two or three.



They might be bigger already, but I'm too cheap to buy big bushes, taking my own cuttings instead.

I also did the usual seedling puttering.

 

Daniel—Really good to see the speed of your progress. It is heartening to see those blooms.

 

Daniel…Very nice blooms and plum fruits coming summer.

time to clean out the pond scum… Did you know that laughing gas’s is made from pond scum and many other uses.

https://science.howstuffworks.com/innovation/edible-innovations/algae-food-future.htm

Pond scum - biofuel…
https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2008/01/virgin-airlines-powered-pond-scum/

 

Lucky you LOL!

I looked it up - they say that algae is a great additive for your compost. High nitrogen and breaks down quickly! Now your other plants will thank you!

 

Absolutely the plants like the pond scum. I just use the net scoop it up and toss on the compost pile.

 

I've finished my painting.
Today I did the soffits of the tea-house and the ferules on the corners of the roof. The "decoration" is half golf balls.
I also painted the trim around the roof skylight. This required getting up there by ladder with all the painting paraphernalia and walking round the roof. (I built it like a battleship). Fortunately, my wife couldn't see me.





This skylight, (that isn't one, I covered it with felt a year after I built it as it got too hot in there, in summer) just sits on the top like the lid of a box, it's only gravity keeping it in place.

In hot weather, I lift it up and put the "vent" under the front edge. This is made of two halves of a recycled dishwasher cutlery basket and a block of wood. There are two vents in the bottom of the back wall which I uncover. The arrangement is "vermin proof."

It gets very hot in there. On very hot days I open a door as I don't want the capacitors in my jukeboxes "cooking."

I put that fan in when we had the fox cubs under the floor, as if I'd left a door open they'd be in.
There's an access panel to the roof void on the opposite side to the fan. There's five ceiling spotlights, in there and the cables for the lanterns and the spotlight behind the pagoda pass through there from their transformers on the ceiling next to the side wall.






I gave the shed a bit of a "tart up." It was looking a bit scruffy.




This now forty-seven years old. We still call it "the rabbit shed" as I built it for our eight year-old daughter's rabbits. It hasn't seen a rabbit in more than forty years.

The problem with roofing ply of this era is that the outer skin if exposed to the elements gets very hard and starts to present a few thin cracks and can let water in. So every time I paint it, there's a few more cracks I can see white wood behind. I need to force the paint into them as best as I can. But there's still no rot.

Anyway it's done.





The supply to my second hose reel looks a bit ugly. I would have used speed-fit pipe, but I bought the reel in the middle of Covid and the plumbers merchants were closed. So I used garden hose and fixings I already had in the garage. I can't be bothered to change it now.

It's not patchy, it's the sun reflecting off the shiny bits.

 

Finished cutting the old stems off the lavender, we were talking about the tulips that we're going to buy this autumn. Hubby cut the grass in the back garden, it's not a lot so didn't take long and i was doing some weeding at the same time.

 

Getting maintenance done is what I refer to as a necessary evil. The barn needs to have all the pine needles brushed off and the roof on the house needed moss and debris to be removed. Unfortunately the needles are still a bit frozen in some water . With the sun out today hoping it will melt.

 

Nothing today it's raining, so going to sow the tomato seeds, a cherry type called Strillo F1, it has good resistance to mosaic virus, verticillium and Fusarium.

Got a free packet of Plum tomato seeds called Alfresco, same resistance like the other one. 10 seed in each.

 

Just pulled a sweet onion I tossed out in the garden 3 weeks ago. Great green onions for tacos tonite.

 

Nothing today it's been raining and got other things to do, maybe tomorrow.

 

Nice-looking onion annnnnd nice-looking plate, Pac.

 

Expecting rain later took advantage of the cloud cover today and planted out my Kale, Onion and Leek Transplants. Inside started some melon inside - Sweet Passion, Model, Minnesota Midget and Green Honeydew. Plan on doing watermelon and cukes in a few days.......now I need to find a pic for this caption contest LOL

 

It was the week's shopping day today. I'd decided not to replace the three clematis along the side of the garage, as there's others, there. Presently they cost around £17 each in garden centres.

But I was in Asda this morning and spotted these,

a Mayleen,


Viticella Alba




and an Ashva.





They were small, in 3" pots, but three for a fiver? Couldn't resist.

I decided to tackle the "rotty bit" on the garage pergola. I re-built it sixteen years ago. I have since replaced a couple of cross beams, which wasn't a problem and I may have to replace a couple more later this year or next, but the two long main beams and the two posts are fine, except for this bearer between the top of the post and the main beam. It was very rotty. The one at the other end is OK. Their function is to spread the weight. If the post just connected to the beam, it would want to bend. I could push my finger half an inch through one side of this bearer at one end.




No problem, I'll just replace it. Well...There was a bit of a problem. The beam needed to be supported while I removed it and I didn't want the post "waggling about" whilst it was unsecured.



So I attached a bit of wood to the beam and the post on one side to take the weight.
It took the combination of hammer and chisel to remove all the wet wood, a hacksaw to cut through four screws and a mole wrench to remove the halves of the screws. All the time I'm trying to work around the cascading wisteria!





Fortunately, the beam was pretty much intact except around where some of the screws had been. But I dried it off with a hot air gun and then gave it and the top of the post a few coats of Cuprinol.
I had a bit of tanilised four by two and made a new bearer, gave the facing side a coat of Cuprinol and forced it in.
Then screwed it all together. Covered the countersunk screw heads with wood filler. Removed the bit of wood supporting the main beam.
Gave it all a coat of paint and put clear silicone around where the post, bearer and beam connect

Job done!

Looks no different!

 

The weather has been good today, i did some weeding and hubby cut the back hedge.