SoS 24/10/20
I’m in town and thus in the Matchbox garden for a little while. Husband is having his cataracts done (I had mine done last year) and so it gives me time to try and boost this tiny garden along. It’s needing a tart-up as spring comes to an end and we get ready for summer.
Starting with the vastly small piece of lawn which needed topdressing and re-seeding. THIS has been headache-inducing as it has been such a wet spring and so the seed quite literally went soggy and refused to sprout. I have added bucketloads of seed through the last few weeks and finally!
Finally! We have new grass! Thin to be sure, but it will pad up with a cut or two and the blades set high.
While husband slept off his first procedure, I decided to start trimming the English Box hedges on the raised beds. They have come up okay (note wire over seedlings. Let it be known that today I HATE blackbirds! Love their song but hate their mining for protein!) but…
…I need some help for the back path as I am not good with the battery clippers and am afraid I might shear off the Solomon’s Seal and Hellebores.
I’ve replanted some of the tubs for summer. Mostly white petunias and a divine Black Cosmos called Mocha Choca.
The largest pot is waiting for inspiration. I’m trying to decide between a lime-green Euphorbia or Erigeron. Not wire…
My five year old rhododendron has opened its first ever flower. I’m over the moon with the colour.
Our little evergreen Clematis Paniculata Purity has flowered in its first year. It’s very ‘Starry Starry Night…’. I love it.
And finally my garden gloves. Monty Don says to get out and ‘feel’ what you are doing when you’re gardening and I honestly understand what he’s saying. After all, he’s my hero. But to be honest, we have beasties like redback spiders and jackjumper ants, to name just two Australian insects that can make the gardener very ill should they be bitten. In addition, a friend’s husband was hospitalised from handling potting-mix un-gloved and un-masked. Subsequently he developed neurological problems. So I’d rather be safe than sorry. My gardens are my escape and I would hate to be prevented from spending time grubbing about.
And that’s it from me, folks. I hope you’re all safe and well and despite copious Lockdowns, are managing to enjoy your green spaces.
Pop over to Mr.P for a global horticultural tour. It’s a great way to spend the evenings.
Cheers!
The town garden is looking a treat and you have a sharp eye – and cutters – for that box hedging which is looking perfection itself. Best wishes to husband for a speedy recovery.
Thank you, Paddy. I love my little city garden. It was bare when we bought the place five years ago. There are large stretches of time when it has to look after itself, so we’ve gone for easy care, easy shapes and a timed irrigation system and because its the city, tall fences for privacy and a white theme for calm…
Husband currently doing the pirate thing – one good eye, one a bit off! 😉
Garden looks fabulous as usual, ours still has plenty of colour but pretty soggy at the moment so much rain here. We’re wishing your beloved a speedy and uneventful recovery. xx
Thank you, Libby. It’s certainly easier to garden in the Matchbox compared to the coast. The size is about the size of our energies. 😉 Re OH, one eye done, the next in two weeks – they give healing time. He drove for the first time today and in another day or so can start doing physical stuff. Just as well, I dread to think what the lawns are like on the coast. Spring, rain and lately warmth – I think we could cut sileage!!!!
Your hedge trimming looks very professional to me! Lovely rhody and clematis. Hope hubby is feeling better very soon.
Thank you, Gill. I don’t mind doing it the once but happy to hand it back to The Patient when he repairs. 😉
You couldn’t lose those gloves, quite a striking colour! I much prefer using gloves, I can remove slugs and redirect worms without flinching. That black cosmos is very dramatic. My Solomon’s Seal has been good this year, so we might see some autumn colours rather than the usual skeletons that the Solomon Seal caterpillars leave us. Hope your husband recovers quickly.
Granny, I always buy the brightest I can for the very reason I won’t, hopefully, lose them. I’ve always wanted a set of handsome wooden-handled garden tools but realise that bright orange is by far the better option. I’ve lost countless secateurs and trowels over the years…
I’ve been trying to put a name to that exact same Rhododendron for a gardening friend, you don’t happen to know what it is do you? Doesn’t look like Soloman’s Seal sawfly made it to Australia, I can only envy your perfect plants, mine are shredded every year.
Oh Jim, re the rhodo, I wish! It. was before I started saving labels of plants. If I find out I will let you know. As for the Solomon’s Seal. No sawfly – yet. But on the coast, my Solomon’s seal becomes shredded as if the wind has blasted it. Does that sound like the sawfly you are thinking of? We certainly get sawfly in eucalypts.
These gloves look comfortable and warm! Very pleasant also to see the first flowers of clematis and rhododendrons. Enjoy them!
It’s so exciting to see. the rhodos and clems, Fred. I have 10 forms of white clematis in this tiny garden.
As others are, I’m admiring your phenomenally even box hedge! Yes, I’d be pleased as punch with that rhody and its peaceful color. Your Solomon’s seal looks incredibly healthy, Prue. Beautiful Six in your city garden.
My husband has found the perfect little plastic box which we slide along the wooden edge of the raised beds with the clippers atop. It’s a cheat I know, but it works as I can’t cut or sew a straight edge for the life of me. Thus essential when I have to take over!
Yours are the only boxwood I’ve seen I didn’t hate! It’s cute and neat and fits that use perfectly.
Oh wow! Thank you, Lisa!
It’s looking so very green and lush in your garden Prue and like others I’m impresssed with the hedge. We inherited box hedges in our garden and I have a love/hate relationship with them as there all ways seem to be one or two plants that are failing and need replacing.
I have never heard of jackjumper ants. We have an ant here that causes an itchy welt almost the size of a saucer and I wonder if it’s the same one.
Hi Jane. I have to say I do like our box hedges. It was a theme in the front of the townhouse when we bought it, so we continued it in micro-form in the back garden. Monty Don talks often of a box blight in box hedges. Maybe that’s the thing…
Re the ants – they’re not big and are awful; their bite is nasty. Two members of my family are allergic and carry epipens at all times. The opinion seems to be that the more one gets bitten, the more sensitive one can become. We frequently have nests in the orchard and we douse them with flystrike powder from our sheep which works really well. One can go through a rigorious desensitisation programme through the local public hospital. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_jumper_ant