Gran/Grandads Gardening Corner

overthehill, I haven't heard that black spot remedy before, have made a note of it for future reference.

Jalima thanks for passing on that earworm and on that subject, overthehill whenever I see your name I have 'Monster' as an earworm ( what's that coming over the hill is it a monster?) If you don't know the song look it up on youtube,( very catchy)

You can use Fairy liquid and water too ( for blackspot/ greenfly) on roses, but you should take off the affected leaves and get rid of them.

DH uses dilute Fairy liquid for greenfly etc; yes, burn or dispose of leaves affected by blackspot in the refuse (not recycling) bin.
We are not allowed to put bindweed in the garden recycling bin either.

I shouldn't tempt fate by saying this, but I have never seen bindweed in my garden. My parents' used to be overrun with it. My veg patch at the top of my garden has lovely easy to work sandy soil, but it hardly grows weeds. Does this mean the soil doesn't have enough nutrients for decent crops? I cover it with a thick layer of my own compost over winter. All I had to remove when preparing it for use this spring were about 6 tufts of grass. I spinkle Growmore around each area I sow or plant.
I wish I had light soil in the rest of my garden, the slope was cut into to build the house and exposed blue clay. I could make lovely pots!

Yes Jalima I have that song on my ipod. Nevet connected with myself though......probably will now you've pointed it out

We have sandy soil all over the garden. Makes planting easy, but we have to top dress every year as well as use Growmore.All the nutrients wash through,which is a nuisance.We don't get bindweed either,but have done in the past, and as Jane Austen may have said ' Truth, tis a f*****g nightmare'!
However, nature is generous, and instead of bindweed we have a small creeping clover like thing ( name escapes me for the moment) with yellow tiny flowers.It gets everywhere, and although it can be dislodged, you can never be rid of it (better than bindweed though.)
DH has just gone out to mow the lawns and will be treating them with moss remover bought on the reccommendation of shysal so am hoping it works .

Rosesarered I also have that little yellow flowered plant, I think it's a type of Oxalis. Although it self seeds everywhere it is easy to get rid of.
I have no idea where it came from. I wonder if sometimes things come in on the soil of plants bought at the garden centre.
My mother once got a tiny magnolia in the pot of a plant that she bought. It grew into a beautiful tree.
I wonder has anyone else found a freebe in their plant purchase?

Yes, it's Oxalis Corniculata.

I'm quite pleased with my front garden, it's been largely left to get on with it this year because I'm helping DD with the garden at her new house (untouched for 15 years and it has beautiful black soil, no slugs or weeds!)
We live north of Bath and the back garden has a totally different soil to the front (loam vv virtually all sand and stones!)

Loving reading this new thread ?

That looks nice and neat, loopyloo,with lots of spring colour. My tiny front garden is always unruly as I tend to concentrate more on the back, which is also unruly!!

Lovely spring pics of your gardens. It is strange when different bits of the garden have different soils. The bed I've just created has clay in the middle and a stone loam soil at each end. Over 100 years ago it was farmland on the edge of the village, so the soil could be a result of farm cultivation.

Lovely pics. ladies - I love the flowers. We've got pansies in containers, otherwise just a few shrubs.
Husband is busy rotovating our veg. plot, preparing to plant some potatoes, Agatas.
I'm going to do some grasscutting soon.

The clematis is absolutely romping away and I will have tied them all in twice this week as I'm afraid they will break in the wind before they can get hold of the supports.
The first shrub to come fully out is an actinidea (?) Its leaves then get splashes of white on them which later turn pink - it really is a lovely thing.

Greyduster did the egg shell thing but DH decided to make wooden ones as more sturdy

I used to do that as a child and also did it with my GCs. Very effective!

That's really good overthehill and can be used a lot, clever old DH.
The lawns are done now shysal we will wait with baited breath to see what happens.

My grass is done too Roses. I watered it next day as there was no sign of rain, then surprise surprise, it rained overnight!

That's a cracker, overthehill (my handle on another forum by the way!), and can be re-used!
DH bought a couple of shrubs yesterday and guess where we have planted them? Yes, in the space we have just spent three bloody weeks clearing of - shrubs! They will give a bit of colour though. One is a kerria and the other a weigela. The rest of the ground is going to be planted with heathers, hellebores and maybe euphorbias. Chuck it all in, stand back and admire - or not as the case may be! I was weeding the wall rock garden and pulling up what I though were tiny bits of grass coming through and then realised that they were seedlings from my snakes head fritillaries ?! Some gardener, me! Fortunately I didn't pull too many up, as I love them and want to encourage them to naturalise. Don't know where all the white ones have gone this year though.

Just interested in what other people 'feed' their fruit bushes with please? We have summer and autumn raspberries, black and red currants, loganberries and gooseberries.

I wonder if anyone can help. I want to start off some runner beans in a pot or trough, so that the other half can look after them. I can raise the pot or trough on some bricks, so that he will not have to bend, but I am not sure how many to plant together, obviously it will depend on size of pot/trough, I realise, and how often we should feed them. Does anyone have any ideas about growing potatoes in sacks/bags? Anything that is easy and will keep the other half interested, but not too strenuous.

It depends how many you want in the large pot, but I would think 3 or 4 would provide you with enough beans. Put some broken up polystyrene bits in the bottom for drainage. ( lighter than broken crocks or gravel) then fill with humus rich compost. When the plants flower begin to feed them with liquid tomato feed. If you feed before the flowers appear you will get a lot of green growth.
We grow potatoes in sacks from Wikos. DH puts them in organic compost and plants up 4 sacks with a two week gap between each. Fill each sack with a few inches of compost, plant 4 or 5 potatoes in the sack and cover with about 4 inches of soil. As the spouts appear, put more soil in, ending up with soil near the top of bag.

That what we do, others may have different ways.

I'm happy to report that my pot grown Wisteria is still covered in flower bracts fingers crossed no frost kills them off.
Got my lawns cut today they look lovely looking forward to the reports about the moss killer.

It does strike me that runner beans in a raised pot may grow too tall to reach the top beans. Perhaps French beans would be a better size. I am always over generous with planting runners, as their root systems are only small. I plant a 6-sided wigwam with a bean at each stick and each gap plus a few in the centre! They always do well. I agree with J52 re the feeding and polystyrene bits.
I hope you manage to please your DH, Printmiss.

Potatoes - I've read that you can grow them in straw. You put the seedling into some soil then cover with about a foot of straw. So you could start them in growbags.