Cats, cats, cats!!!!

Before I start moaning about just how much I am hating cats right now I had better say that in my lifetime I have been the owner of five cats - at one time I had two at the same time......so I quite understand the 'passion' for them as pets.

Maybe my current situation is karma/payback for all the poo my cats must have deposited on other people's gardens over the years!

Whatever, my garden is a cat's toilet at the front and at the back, in the beds and on the lawn.  There isn't a single day where I am not left a little (or large!) present; some days more than one.  I am fairly sure it came about because until last winter we used to spend half a year in the States and the cats had free rein.  I am trying to believe that the quantity is reducing by degrees as they get used to the fact we are in full time residence.

I have tried just about every suggestion under the sun that is practicable, with no success whatsoever.  Indeed they were the reason for my giving up trying to grow edibles in the back garden a few years ago.

In a last desperate effort we are currently trying two of these.......

They are solar powered sonic cat (and dog) repellers.  They emit a high pitch sound which is uncomfortable for cats and dogs but humans can't hear. There is a suggestion that children might be able to hear it.  I certainly can't.  They have a 70 degree spread with a twenty foot (plus) reach.  As our front garden seems to be the worst hit we are using them out there right now. It has proved difficult on our corner plot to site them so they form a barrier across the garden.  Think we've cracked it.  They have a couple of small flickering lights which flick on when something comes within its range so it is easy to check they are still working.  We have no means of hard wiring them so they rely on recharged batteries.

 Sadly our front garden is mostly in the shade (NE facing) so the solar element doesn't work at all.  We also have a lot of foot and car passing traffic so the batteries run down very quickly.  [The photo above was taken in sunlight in the back garden]

For us this means they are a bit of a pain as we have to keep an eye on them almost daily to check they are still working and then charge the batteries when they are not - so, for us, they don't seem a good long term solution.

Amazingly we have only had one deposit since they went in so I am fairly confident they are working.  I am living in hopes that the eight cats - really! - who use our garden may get in the habit of going elsewhere - huge apologies to anyone who inherits them.

Putting the garden to bed.

We've had some nice sunny days this week so I had no excuse but to get out in the garden and 'put it to bed'.

My other half removed the timers for the watering system and turned off the taps that feed the outside taps.  If you have any outside tap that doesn't fully drain (neither of mine do) they should really be wrapped in something like bubble wrap to keep the worst of the freeze out.  It can freeze further back than the tap if you have any water trapped in a pipe and that can expand and crack the pipe and next year you'll have a leak.  Often they are in the very worst of places and a fiddle to replace/repair.

Cut down dead and dying herbaceous plants.  That said, I leave ones that will look good in the frost and snow and those that may feed the birds or make a winter home for good bugs and critters.  Basically I hack down the ones that will fall over and become straggly messes.

I threw away my hanging basket and two chimney pot fillers that have done their thing and I will be off to somewhere like Park Farm to find their replacements for the winter.

Climbing roses can take a small hack back to stop them flailing around in any high winds.  I do the major trim in Spring.  As we are 'in the North' I don't want to risk too much die back from any frost if we get a bad winter.  To be truthful I never managed to get this job done in my time in the garden this time, but I will be doing it soon.

I shaped up a couple of olive trees that came out of their pots and went into the border this year.  They had put on a lot of growth and I want to keep them almost like topiary balls.  So, obeying the maxim 'cut for shape in the autumn and for growth in the Spring' I gave them a trim.

Most of all I was out there to plant a heap of bulbs.  B & Q have a pretty good deal on some nice quality bulbs right now so I picked some up on a paint buying trip.

If you do the maths you might figure out that three of each variety meant  planting 126 bulbs - doesn't sound much but it was enough for me.  I remembered the days I would go out with fair size sackfuls of daffodils to plant..... not any more.

These really are tulips from Amsterdam brought back from a friend's trip there.  They have gone in a pot rather than the ground as I don't do very well with tulips here - too wet for them really.

As for the planting - this blog is more about sharing what I've got away with for donkeys' years when gardening, rather than the perfect way to do things.

Ideally (most) bulbs like free draining soil, so you can add sharp sand or grit to the hole plus a little bone meal.  The hole should be twice the depth of the bulb.  In reality I make the deepest slit I can make with my trowel, wiggle it a bit, push the bulb in (right way up) pull the trowel out and close the slit - job done.  It works well enough for me.

So, I need to spend one more day out there, before winter sets in, to hack off some climbing rose stems, check the borders, sprinkle slug pellets absolutely everywhere.  I do mean everywhere - they love lurking in nooks and crannies especially over winter; they need to be lured out in hopes of killing a bunch of them.  Less to breed in the spring.  Reminder: only scatter the amount recommended; more is not better, it actually puts them off because the smell is too much for them.  This is a bait after all, so they hunt the bits of food (aka slug pellet) lying around and Goodnight Vienna.

At this time of year people with beautiful lawns aerate them and brush in sand and bone-meal to help the drainage and to strengthen root growth - do NOT feed at this time of year - you'll get soft sappy top growth and basically it will weaken the grass.  I skip a couple of these steps but I do scatter some bone meal over the lawn to boost the root growth.

On that cheerful note of snail death and crushed bones - bye for now - time to hunker down and dream of cocoa days ahead.

More saved from the bin....

On the lines of a recent post saying I like to buy 'dying' plants in hopes of saving them - the following is even cheaper.

Lots of potted plants you buy are really 'designed' to be a one-off.  Many people, like me, think that things like orchids and amaryllis (often gifts) are just supposed to do their thing and then be binned - far too difficult to do anything else with?

Not so, I have just discovered......

I had a Tesco orchid (phalenopsis) which bloomed beautifully and for a long while and then was reduced to a few sad leaves and a short stump.  I kept it as I had a sad little landing window sill with nothing on it.  It got very little water and virtually no feeding.  This seems to be roughly the right thing to do.   Look what I have now........

I solemnly swear it has thrived on neglect.

In exactly the same vein I had two Ikea (£3?) amaryllis at Christmas that did their glorious thing and I was curious as to what they would do if I just kept them going.  Mine have done this....

They must be well over three feet tall, strong as an ox and glorious blemish free deep green leaves.  The googled advice to get them to flower again this year is to chuck them in a darkish, coolish place at the beginning of September and let the leaves die off, re-pot the bulb in an inch of fresh compost and bring back in when temperature goes below 10 degrees centigrade.

I haven't the heart to dump this one but I will, cruelly, experiment on the other..... watch this space.

Take a punt

I like to 'rescue' sick plants!  Strange, but true - not only do I get the satisfaction of having brought something back from the brink of death but they only cost me pennies.  It is always worth the gamble of something making it or not - they rarely fail with a bit of TLC.

This lovely passion flower has three six foot stems and over twenty buds to come out (more to come after that no doubt).  It was a sad little thing in a tiny pot for 49p back in the Spring.  I had bought my friend one for her birthday at the usual sort of price from a reputable nursery which didn't look fantastic for its price and has struggled to do anything as yet.  A short time after giving that away I thought how much I wanted a passion flower for myself and I saw this one.

At the same time as buying the passion flower the shop was selling what appeared to be two dead sticks for a pound - not properly labelled - could have said magnolias?  I genuinely thought these might be consigned to the rubbish bin but I faithfully stuck each of their badly damaged hairy little roots into a pot of their own where they remained all winter as two dead sticks.  Spring arrives and - and Bingo! - I have two very promising magnolias (????).  

I have no idea what variety they are so they could be anything from six feet to thirty feet tall and wide when mature.  Looking now at the stick and the size of the leaf it is reasonable to think they are common old magnolia soulangia, so they are the big ones!!   I am seventy and they take twenty years to maturity so may not be a bother to me when they swamp the garden.  In truth I do have the right spot for one of them.  The other may just reside in a pot for a few years and I will think again then.  Meanwhile whoopee-do, three lives saved; total cost, £1.49.

ECO Plant Holder

I thought I would share a nice find with you.  I got these on sale at a silly price (£1.99???) from Wyevale Garden centre but worth keeping your eye open for as they are proving very handy.


I just Googled them and you can get them for around a fiver (three in a pack) from various places.  They store flat and therefore easily, they won't rust or rot(?) and are made from recycled plastic..... coffee cups I think.

They are designed to fit in horizontal fencing without additional support.  They can also be screwed in place (two holes in top tab) or hung on a hook or a nail in a wall or fence.

I have vertical lapped fencing so it is no use for me in its primary form.  I also don't want fixed pots in fixed places so I lob mine around where I want things using 'S' hooks over the top of the fence.

waiting for its pot

brightens up a bit of empty fence

smells lovely where I walk past