Today I prepared the cold frame for spring and planting seeds. The cold frame has been used all winter to protect tender plants but March is here and the cold frame is needed for seed cultivation. At the beginning of winter when the risk of frost began I took the shelves out of the frame and stored them in the shed. I put a tender Jasmine in the frame which took up most of the space. There was some remaining room for a Chocolate Cosmos that we had in a pot and a Grape vine. In the winter we were given some Canna Lily and Trailing Begonias which I also stored in the cold frame.
A Video of moving the cold frame ready for seeds
I removed the Jasmine from the frame and replaced the shelves. I protected the Jasmine in a fleece and used some bubble wrap to protect the roots. Although we are now heading into spring, frosts can still easily and frequently appear at this time of year in the UK and it is still worth protecting tender plants for at least another couple of weeks.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
The cold frame in its spring position where it will receive the most sun
In the spring we put the cold frame on the front corner of the decking. It is where the garden receives the most sun throughout the year and is therefore the best place to position it for cultivating seeds. It is not the prettiest place for it to be located, but having a small garden means making compromises, such as potentially causing damage to tender plants and not always having a garden devoted to aesthetics but sometimes function.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
Plants such as this Chocolate Mint we pruned are coming back strongly
Now everything is in position for planting seeds. The tomatoes that I had already planted and placed next to the window inside the house has sprouted and are looking healthy. I have limited space inside so I have decided to start the majority of seeds outside this year in the cold frame. I will plant as many different varieties as possible in relatively small numbers to provide interest and excitement in the garden during the flowering season.
I have attempted the first bit of weeding in the garden. Mainly removing moss and grass which have worked their way into the borders from the lawn and under the fence from next door. One of the great things about having a small garden is being able to control the weeds organically without weedkiller, though even in our small space it can still be challenging. I have made a video about the basics of weeding, what a weed is, how to try and spot them early and whether to remove them.
Once I had done the first bit of weeding, I had a look around the garden to see what is starting to grow. The mild wet winter has started to draw to an end and is being replaced with a colder and slightly drier start to spring. As many of the plants are ahead of themselves in terms of their growth this year it may well be the case that some of our plants could suffer from this sudden cold burst. We shall wait and see if the frosts cause the plants any trouble.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
Tidying the borders ready for the tulips which are coming through nicely
We have our first narcissus in the borders, I have seen many out early in other gardens but the shade in our garden means that it always a little behind many of the other local gardens in terms of flowering, which may be a good thing for our spring plants and flowers as some of the early spring flowers were damaged badly by wind and rain.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
Narcissus Staring at their reflections with their golden nodding heads
Roses have really enjoyed the mild winter and are already looking strong and should grow well this year. They all flowered for a really prolonged period last year and were great. Hopefully we will have a repeat of that this year too. We have seven different roses on the back garden so they could produce a lot of interest for the garden.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
New shoots on one of our climbing roses 'Summer Wine'
We have an apple tree and a pear tree in the garden and they are both producing buds. Four apples grew on our Braeburn tree last year, which is not a massive haul of fruit but it is a young tree and planted in a reasonably small container. We shall see how it grows this year and decide whether we should replant it into a bigger pot. The pear tree we bought late last year, it did not bear any fruit so it will be interesting to see how it does this year. We have it planted in a ceramic blue pot so it should look great even if it doesn't fruit heavily.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
Buds are emerging on our pear tree
Our most mature Hydrangea, that I recently replanted into a forty five Litre pot seems very happy. It is near the house which is sheltered and warmer than the rest of the garden. Leaves are already coming through quite strongly, which is impressive but slightly concerning as we have had a couple of nights of strong frost, which may damage this new growth and potentially impact the performance of the plant later in the year. We shall have to wait and see what happens.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
The new growth on our Hydrangea is looking healthy at the moment
I have already planted my tomato seeds and they in our bedroom next to the window. There is no sign of growth, but it has been less than a week so I am probably a bit optimistic to expect any growth yet. I will be planting more seeds soon, I will have to plan what I plant carefully as we have limited space inside and in our cold frame outside. I am going to concentrate on producing quality plants rather than sheer quantity, which was my general approach last year and although it worked well enough, there is always room for improvement.
Not only do blueberries provide fruit, but they are also beautiful plants with
great stem colour, delicate white flowers and stunning foliage in the
autumn, when the leaves change colour into a range of delightful autumnal
shades.
We have two blueberry plants in the garden. The first one I got was bought in the supermarket a couple of years ago. I knew that they required acidic soil conditions but I did not know the soil pH in our garden. I bought the plant anyway. I measured the pH of the soil in our garden and it was very mildly acidic so i decided to plant it into the soil with a blackcurrant and redcurrant plant.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
A close up of one of our two blueberry cultivars
A little while after, my mother gave me another Blueberry as they fruit best when you have two different cultivars. I kept this one in the container it came in to compare the success of both my plants. The one in the container has produced new growth, flowered and produced a few berries too. The plant that I put in the soil has survived but has not grown, flowered or fruited.
A video of me moving and repotting our blueberry plants
I decided that my experiment was conclusive and for whatever reason; soil pH, the clay or drainage, the cultivar I planted in the soil had done much worse than the one I had left in the pot. I dug up my first plant and potted both of them into new pots as the newer blueberry in the pot had been in there for a while and I decided it would benefit from a slightly larger home. I used ericaceous compost for the plants and I also have ericaceous feed which I add to water occasionally throughout the year.
We have no way to collect large amounts of rain water in the garden. We have considered buying a water butt but the only drain pipe we have is on the decking and there is no real space for one there and it wouldn't look great either. In the summer we filter our very hard tap water to give to the acid loving plants in the garden and it seems to have worked well enough.
We have to water the whole west side of the garden daily in the summer as it is raised above the natural ground level and with presence of the large tree of the neighbour's garden, with its roots spanning throughout our garden, it dries out very easily and plants can wilt in the space of an afternoon.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
Both of our blueberry plants in their new matching containers
I am looking forward to see if repotting the blueberries leads to at least improved growth and hopefully improved crops of berries, which are a definite favourite of both of us to snack on!
Yesterday the rain was relentless, even by the current standards and this morning the garden was soaked through. I was out in the garden early, the sun was finally making an appearance and I was determined to get on with plenty of jobs that needed doing.
I decided that today was the day to start my seed planting for year. I had been trying to hold off as long as possible as last year my early seeds all ended up leggy and were not as successful as the second batch I sowed. However, one exception to my early seed planting disappointments was the tomatoes I planted, which gave me a decent crop, despite the less than ideal growing conditions of last year.
I planted just two seeds of Super Sweet 100's, which are a heavy cropping, disease resistant cherry tomato. I am hoping both seeds germinate but if they don't I will plant some more. I am hoping to grow two plants out on the front of the house in containers, where it is sunnier than on the back. I will grow beans up against the fence on the back where I grew the tomatoes last year. If the two plants do well they will produce more than enough tomatoes for us to make a good few tomato based dishes to eat and plenty for salads too.
A video of me planting my tomato seeds
As well as the planting the first seeds of the year I did the now routine tour of emptying out the nearly overflowing drip trays full of rain water from the numerous containers on the decking and paved area. All the plants were soaked through and I am sure even they have had enough of this weather. I put some plants out in the sun on the bench to drip dry a little and picked up as many leaves from the lawn and borders as I could. Although leaves are potentially good mulch for the borders, when they get in among the shrubs and other perennials they can block light and also hold moisture around the plants which could potentially cause rotting.
I planted the remaining two Macrophylla Hydrangeas into larger pots and did some light pruning of any dead tips to the stems. Last year I had two large containers into which I put some Begonias and Nerines. As a bit of a novice I planted them too deep and non of the Nerine did anything much and only two of the four Begoinas grew and flowered. Three of the Nerines seemed salvageable so I moved those and the four Begonias into just one container and planted them as shallow as possible to see if that helps them this year.
In another container, last year, I had planted some Ranunculus in a container with some Tigridia and although a few of the Tigridia did come up and flower, the Ranunculus grew leaves and then mysteriously and simultaneously all died. I suspect it was to do with watering but I have plenty of other plants to keep me busy this year so will not try again at the moment. The Tigridia Bulbs seemed healthy and also had multiplied a little so I replanted them together in two small containers and hopefully they shall return stronger this year.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
The garden is starting to look much neater after a day of hard work
I cut back the dead growth from the previous year of a deciduous grass, pruned back some roses and by the end of the day the garden was starting to look pretty tidy. The next step will be to do some weeding and work around the now quickly emerging bulbs to improve the soil.
We have five Hydrangeas in our garden which seems like a lot for a small space and it probably is. They are great plants for providing year round interest, with amazing long lasting blooms from late spring right through to late summer and a good structure and colour to the stems which adds some interest autumn and in winter.
By keeping all our Hydrangeas in containers and out of direct sun, as well as being well watered, they have all begun to flourish at their different stages of growth. Four of our Hydrangeas are mophead flowering Macrophylla varieties. The largest of our collection has the more traditional blue/pink flowers which change colour according to soil pH. This is one of the two I have repotted. I bought a forty five Litre pot for it, which is the largest container in the garden, so we are expecting it to grow to a good size this year.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
The largest container in the garden is home to our first Hydrangea
With its previous container empty, I moved a Black Stemmed 'Pink Ball' Hydrangea we got last year into the spare larger pot. The 'Pink Ball' Hydrangea has fluorescent pink flowers and dark shiny black stems on the new growth. We should have a great display of Hydrangeas this year. Our white flowered mophead Hydrangea is still relatively small but we will move it into a bigger container this year to allow it to get as big as possible. It has beautiful dark green leaves which look more tender than the others and we are looking forward to seeing how it does this year. We also have a 'Glam Rock' variety which claims to be the most colourful Hydrangea available. It came as a tiny plug plant and we currently have it in a fifteen Centimetre pot, but i may move it into a more colourful container to match the flowers it may potentially produce this year.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
The new home for our black stemmed Hydrangea 'Pink Ball'
Our last Hydrangea is a Climbing 'anomala' variety and is doing fairly well in the obelisk we planted it in last year. In mid-summer it did seem to suffer a little, as that area of the garden does catch the early midday sun, but it seems to have both survived and recovered and had plenty of buds ready for this years growing season.
For more information on how to grow Hydrangeas and the many different varieties, check out the Royal Horticultural Societies guide to which there is a link below:
It has been a good couple of days. A friend of mine came to visit and after a quick bike ride down the flooded paths of the River Thames and an unnecessary amount food that I cooked for dinner, we made full use of the winter garden and had the first fire of the year in the chimnea.
Copyright 2016 Robert Widdowson
It has been a sunny but cold couple of days and we have had a light frost in the garden for both of the nights, but the fire kept us warm despite the lawn being crisp underfoot and what few stars can be seen from our city location were glinting away. This provided entertainment as well as listening to the passers-by on the busy road outside our house, who always provide some kind of interest to the quiet listener.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
After both of us feeling exhausted from the days pursuit, we were dropping off in our chairs by mid-evening. Some chocolate brownie and custard seemed to revive us and we ended up staying outside until the early hours of the morning.
By early afternoon yesterday, my friend had headed back north and I was left with a little time. I started to clean up the spoils of the night before and when tidying away the garden chairs to the shed on the front, I decided on a whim that it may be just dry enough to give the lawn an early but much needed cut. Despite it being slightly damp I managed to get it done without electrocution and it felt like it was really the beginning of the gardening year.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
The lawn looked better, though not great but this spurred me on to do some further work. I had taken quite a lot of the container plants off the decking when we had the fire so I used the opportunity to reorganise them. I decided to show off the weeping willow which was showing its first signs of life. I gave it a tidy up and removed old dead leaves and trimmed the tips of the falling stems where needed and put it in pride of place on the corner of the decking.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
With that done and the the tree looking great for late winter, I moved on to more trimming and tidying around the garden, preparing it for the early growing season that seems to have arrived despite the recent return of the frost. The honeysuckle in the corner of the decking required some control by tying it to the trellis from which is was making a valiant escape. I am trying to train it into the Buddleia but this is not the most direct path to light but is the ultimately going to be the best for it I hope.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
My partner had been away with work for the night and she was coming home soon. I had managed to spend much more time than I had planned with my initial tidy up but it was great to make some early progress towards the aims of the year. I headed off to the supermarket full of ideas and plans for other little things that need to be done.
It has been a stormy and rainy day and apart from taking out the compost and hanging a bird feeder, I have not been out in the garden. Instead I decided to sort through my collection of seeds and bulbs and plan what we are going to grow this year. I plan on growing as many different plants as possible and filling the garden to bursting point with colour and scent.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
Part of our seed collection that I was sorting through today
I made a video showing the ten plants I am looking forward to planting this year but I will run through them here too.
The first is Tomatoes. When we first started the garden two years ago, I got a couple of tomato plants from the supermarket and ever since then I have been hooked. I love the smell of the plants, the speed at which they grow and of course the fruits. This year I will be growing two plants in containers at the front of the house.
The second is Dahlias. We were kindly given our first Dahlias by my partner's mother and we planted them in a crate to grow. I loved the flowers, intricate and beautiful and so varied. This year I have bought three more varieties to try and will also put them into a container to make them easier to protect during the winter.
Third is MinaLobata. This is a exotic looking climber that produces fiery tri-colour flowers similar in shape to Wisteria. I got the seeds for this plant last year, a little late in the season and started them indoors. When I moved them outside, they did not take well to being hardened off and grew poorly in the soil with only one plant producing a single set of flowers. This year I am determined to do better. I will grow them outside in the cold frame so they become accustomed to being grown outside from germination and then I shall keep them in medium sized pots and place them against the fence to see if they fair better in compost rather than our soil which is an odd mixture of clay, topsoil and builders rubble.
Fourth is a classic, Sunflower. I grew five last year, three behind the rose arched bench and two close to the fences in the border. They all grew to various heights, with one of the three behind the bench being the tallest at a good seven foot plus in height. In terms of the aesthetics of the garden, the shorter plants looked better than the giants, interspersed between the other flowers in the borders, but it is just too tempting to try and grow a giant.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
One of the smaller Sunflowers we grew last year
Fifth is Gladioli. I have never grown these before but the purple and white flowers of the Lakeland variety I have bought were just too tempting in the shop. I will plant these in the borders and see how they go and maybe use some as cut flowers for the house too.
Sixth is Climbing Beans. I have a lot of fence space in our garden and as the garden is new, it has relatively few plants of any decent height in it. I want to create the feeling of being enveloped by plants when in the garden and so I want to cover the tallest fences with climbers to create the effect. Although Climbing Beans are maybe not everyone's first choice as a decorative plant, I think the leaves and flowers of Beans are beautiful and the plants are easy and fast to grow and also should produce a decent crop of food for relatively little ground space.
Seventh is Cosmos Picote. By the end of summer last year, the garden was almost overwhelmed with the vast amounts of Cosmos I had planted. It was our first real year of growing and the Cosmos seeds grew quickly and easily and were a simple way to fill the empty newly dug borders. The Picote were my favourite variety of Cosmos I grew because they flowered heavily for a long period and the plants themselves were reasonably small and dainty in comparison to the others. I will mix them among the other flowers I am planning in my more diverse borders this year.
Eighth is Chard Bright Lights. I grew some of this last year in a medium sized container and it grew well. It provided us with one meal of tasty Chard and the stems of the plant are beautifully brightly coloured. The Sparrows that regularly visit the garden also enjoyed eating it too. This year I will plant it in the borders to try and increase the yield and also add some low cover and colour to the borders.
Ninth is Morning Glory. In a further and unrelenting bid to ensure full fence cover this year, I have some Morning Glory seeds to plant out. I don't really have a fixed plan on where I will grow them but I will no doubt catch a moment of inspiration at some point before the beginning of March when I plan to plant most of our seed collection.
Last is Calla Lily. I am always spellbound by these flowers whenever I see them in supermarkets or garden centres. I only have three bulbs to try this year as a little experiment but I am really looking forward to hopefully seeing them flower.
I have plenty of other seeds I am going to plant this year and I am sure will will cover all of them as the year moves on.
A kokedama is an Japanese ornamental plant display
traditionally made from a ball of soil covered by moss which is wrapped in wire
or string and often suspended in the air. The word 'kokedama' translates into English as ‘moss ball’ but
as live moss can difficult to obtain without damaging the natural environment,
I have made a moss free version which looks great and makes an ideal romantic
gift.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
I have chosen to use a red Gerbera for my Valentine’s themed kokedama but any small perennial, ideally in flower could be
used depending on what you have available to you in your area. Rose or Cyclamen
for example could make great alternatives.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
Kokedama traditionally uses a mixture of peat and Akadama,
which is a clay like mineral, but I have used a peat free potting compost,
which will suit the needs of my Gerbera plant and is easy to get. Below is a Video I made, which shows you how to make my kokedama step by step:
One of the great things about having a garden, even if it is a small city garden, is enjoying the wildlife it can attract. In this post we will have a look at what has been visiting the garden during the time we have been creating it.
We have a wide range of insect visitors including bees and butterflies which we shall continue to try and encourage this year. We put a pair of bird feeders in the garden soon after we bought the house, but for the first year they did not really attract anything. As the garden developed, the potential habitat for birds improved, with the increase in visiting insects and places for birds to hide and look for food, birds did begin to visit the garden, especially during winter and nesting time in the spring.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
This Robin was one of the first visitors to our garden and at least one continues to visit daily
The Robin was one of the first visitors to the garden but others soon followed. The large tree in the house behind us has some disadvantages for the garden. It absorbs a lot of water in the summer from our garden, meaning we have to water relentlessly. The tree also also creates a lot of shade. However it also brings advantages such as attracting local birds. The next bird we noticed visiting was a female Chaffinch, which first started her visits during the nesting season, looking for material to nest with and also visiting the feeders too.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
The female Chaffinch collecting Spider's silk for her nest from our fence
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
Looking for insects on the lawn
During nesting time we also had at least one pair of Blackbirds visiting the garden looking for nesting material. they inadvertently managed to destroy quite a good proportion of my seedlings, as the female was using the compost they were planted in for her nest. After my initial despair, I protected the seedlings with plastic covers until nesting was over and there were no more problems. The female was quite a character and would even drink beer from trays we were using to trap slugs!
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
The male Blackbird patrolling our garden last year
Once the birds had nested and the young had fledged, a very noisy family of around fifteen Starlings started to visit us for quite a few weeks. They would raid the bird feeders at the break of dawn at about 5 am, making a hysterical racket and eating everything in the feeders within about ten minutes. We ended up rationing the food as otherwise we would have been spending an untold amount of money on bird food each week. Despite this, they were great entertainment and we are both hoping a family visits this year!
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
One of the young Starlings posing at the top of the the feeders
As well as insects and birds we have also had some mammalian visitors to the garden. I have always suspected there have been a few Wood Mice in the garden as I could see the trails they left on the lawn. I have to admit I am not not entirely keen on mice, mainly due to their extreme speed which always makes me jump. I have only seen a mouse in the garden on three or four occasions so I have reluctantly accepted their presence but I do try and keep bird food from the floor so they don't get too easy a meal. The last visitor I will introduce today is a much rarer fellow these days, than when I was a child. The Hedgehog population of the UK has declined by around ninety percent, so when I first spotted one in our garden when I was outside one night, I was really pleased as I had not seen one for years. Not only did we have one hedgehog but by the end of the summer in our first year in the house we had a whole family, with young Hedgehogs frequently feeding in the garden at night. We did not see them as often last year, which was a bit concerning, so we are hoping they will make a return in full force this year.
Copyright Robert Widdowson 2016
One of the Hedgehogs having a feed on some cat food in our garden
