Volunteers needed

Close Park Rangers are looking for volunteers to help on the 16th September.  Just an hour isn't a big ask and you get goodies as a reward.  How good is that!  We can do it ......

Volunteers needed!

16th September, 1-4pm, Close Park Radcliffe

For 1 hours volunteering in the park you will receive:

Book

Trowel

Spade

Seeds

Tub

Soil

Seed Tray

 

We have 100 of these hampers to give away, in return for 1 hours volunteering on the park.

Meet at the Ranger Base at 1pm. Hampers will be given to the first 100 people who complete an hours volunteering with us.

 

Please bring gardening gloves, all other tools provided.

 

They can ring me if they need more info

thanks

 

Amy

 

Amy Leach

Ranger for Radcliffe

Bury Ranger Service | 15, Stock Street | Bury | BL8 1BU

 

Email: a.r.leach@bury.gov.uk

T: 0161 724 8173 | M: 07787 115 945

Website: www.bury.gov.uk/parks

Thompson and Morgan Babies

Back in June I ordered these plants from Thompson and Morgan.  They promised delivery before the end of August!

True to their word they arrived while I was away on holiday!!

Fortunately most of them survived as you can see from these photos. It looked like I had lost four but I planted the stubs in hopes there was still life in them.  Sadly not.

This was one of their regular 'free plant' offers. This time there were 36 plug plants; all perrrenials and all in my border colours so I thought I'd give them a go.  I sent off my £4.90 for post and packing and settled down to wait.  Truth is I had pretty much forgotten about them until, as I said we got home from France and there they were.  they were a bit sad looking as they had been awaiting some TLC since leaving T & M's tender care days before.

I moved them on into these trays and they have put on some growth in just a week so they must be doing OK.  I have them in the greenhouse with the door open every day just to give them a bit of protection at night and from the hurling rain.  I want to get them to grow at a rate of knots and hopefully need moving out of these trays by the end of September (?).  We leave for Florida at the end of October (late this year) and I want to get them in the ground and ready to face the winter as I won't be here to take care of them in the greenhouse.  Ideally they would be great potted on, kept in the cold greenhouse and planted out next Spring.  I am probably just being super optimistic but it seemed worth a try for less than a fiver.  If I end up with two plants out of the three dozen I will have broken even on buying two small plants next year.  

They are made up of six of each of the following:
Geum, Lavender, Delphinium, Penstemon, Echinacea, Digitalis.

The dividing line in each tray are cuttings of pinks I took a while ago.  Again some are clearly doing well and others not so much.  These too are going to have to take their chances in the ground by the end of the month.

I'll keep you posted on their progress or their demise.

... and the first shall be last....

If, like me, you read (logically) from the top down, you may have discovered that Blogs file stuff the other way up - last is first so to speak.  This is a great idea except when you want to post several items on the same day.  Today is a case in point.  My ramblings actually start six items down at the post headed 'A Bunch of Stuff'.  So, if you'd like to start there and work your way back to here, I'll let you get on with it.......

Help! Pest???

I am hoping someone out there can help me.

Every year my rudbeckia flowers are eaten by something before they even open.  It has been the worst ever this year.  As you can see I have three puny-looking clumps.  It particularly matters because the half moon bed at the front of the house only has one variety open at a time so they all have to work really well to look good.  

The rotation starts after the daffs with day lilies then a succession of geum, crocosmia Lucifer, rudbeckia , finishing with a late, small, yellow crocosmia.

This is a close-up of the damage.  I am pretty sure it isn't slugs or snails as I have them knocked right back now.

I do wonder if it is earwigs.  It looks like the chewed petals I remember (from childhood) on my mom's dahlias when they were attacked around this time of year and that, most definitely, was earwigs.  

That said, I only see the occasional one, whereas I am seeing a lot of these caterpillars and some ordinary looking small green ones.

Please, please if you know what is eating my poor old coneflowers I would love to know.  Even better if you also know how to get rid of it.......

If you don't want to 'talk' here in the blog (and some folk don't) you can email me.

A bit of support

I try to avoid any plant that is going to flop.  I hate the look of supports and I don't want the work!  This year it has been impossible to avoid it as it has been so wet.  All the rain has made stuff extra tall and extra floppy.  I've found myself shoving plants into the vertical that I've never had to do before.

I may have shown you this before - apologies if that's the case.

They come in three sizes.  This is the middle size which does for my stuff (mostly).   I might invest in a couple of large ones next year.  I've bought two lots of two (they come in two's) for three years now so I didn't feel the pain of six quid a go.  They soon add up to a useful number and make a difference in your borders when you need them.  Dead easy and quick to shove in and you don't have to think about them in advance - just see something having a swoon and shove it in.  I promise you none have mine have been at all visible when they are in place.  The leaves of the plant generally cover them.  Most tall things are also fronted by smaller stuff which neatly hides the supports of their bigger cousins.

They are at any large garden centre.  I got some from Newbank and some from Gordon Riggs.

Plant of the month

My garden is a May, June, July garden so by August onwards it is on the decline.  That said, the Japanese anemone starts to come into its own about now.  I especially love the white one at the bottom of my garden.  It is a border which is pretty much always in shade being North facing and having a  fence and neighbour's house behind it.  White's are lovely there, they just glow.

Fruit to flowers

Nature's normal process is flowers to fruit which I am in the middle of reversing.

Because I have decided to quit on the veggies I also decided to not bother with the strawberry pots and I have converted one to perennial plants already and I have bought plants for the other pot.... I just need the weather to let me do it.

Before....

........After

















It looks a bit puny right now but hopefully next year it will flourish.  I am also trying to replace all annuals with perrrenials to cut down on the work a little.  This is a start.