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Jun 2020
8:49pm, 30 Jun 2020
11,996 posts
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Markymarkmark
That looks very satisfying, Hanneke!
We ate the first broccoli (calabrese) harvested from the garden for tea.  . Along with a handful of feral peas which self seeded from last year. (And cottage pie, which was home cooked but wasn't home grown!)
I have baby green tomatoes fruits on the plants in the greenhouse, together with a couple of cucumber triffid plants which I can see nascent flower buds on.
In less good news the pigeons got to most of the blackcurrants before me this year. And have pulled down and broken the branches. They've also stripped a couple of the caulis that were planted outside of the netting. Wretched creatures.
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Jun 2020
8:51pm, 30 Jun 2020
10,477 posts
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rf_fozzy
I'll take some photos tomorrow when it's not raining, but sadly most of the lower half is dying or dead, so keeping much of it isn't really too much of an option. And the best bit is swamping a forsythia I want to rescue.
Jacdaw - that might be an option.
I have a slightly more difficult question to solve too - which I'll ask tomorrow with photos, as it'll be easier to explain
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Jun 2020
8:52pm, 30 Jun 2020
10,478 posts
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rf_fozzy
FDNB - yes, that's a possibility, but it's not my fence, so the trellis would have to be freestanding and there's the possibility that the neighbours might object to it.
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Jun 2020
8:57pm, 30 Jun 2020
70,602 posts
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Hanneke
Are you having the stumps ground Fozzy? Leylandii are veru hungry beasts and depelet all soil around them and by a wide margin. Make sure you mulch with compost before planting anything else. To keep moisture in and ad nutrients. I would think a yew hedge might work in stead of the leylandii? Bare rooted is cheaper, establishes better and you can get larger plants. It isn't fast growing though but evergreen and takes well to keeping it to the size you want.
I am a big fan of hornbeam mind and considering how high the property et the back is, you could even interplant it with pleached hornbeams, which I did for a client when house went up next door. Practically, we had an almost instant 5 metre tall hedge... I don't work there any more or I would take some photos to give you the idea. Hornbeam isn't evergreen, but within 3 years you have a pretty solid hedge that does hold onto its eaves for most of the winter.
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Jun 2020
9:00pm, 30 Jun 2020
70,603 posts
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Hanneke
Flatlander, the pond is 2 metres diameter so indeed a reasonable size. Not too small, not too large. It is housing my overflow plants of a medicinal that is called yerba mansa. The bulk of which is in a massive cattle trough near the cold frames. The pond is positioned in the food forest/orchard/wildflower meadow and out of shot to the right is a willow structure that will grow into a shelter. I have already been sitting there tonight with a g&t, the chickens for company and my feet up.
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Jun 2020
9:55pm, 30 Jun 2020
16,876 posts
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Rosehip
That's a lovely pond Hanneke - I must finish edging mine that I dug this year, then I might take a pic
I wouldn't know what to replace the Leylandii with to give height - but wouldn't recommend anything other than getting the stumps ground right out - we have some that are at least 10 years old and still too solid to dig out.
Strawberries have been quite good this year - but small because keeping up with the watering has been difficult,
Had first handful of French beans and first few mangetout at the weekend. Spinach has bolted now and the chard is getting too big to be really nice.
Can see heads forming on the summer cabbage, which pleases me because I've never had any success before.
Oh and my plums are ripe! they're an early variety - but June is a bit bonkers. Never had so many either. There may be quite a few jam-making sessions in the next few days.
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Jun 2020
10:32pm, 30 Jun 2020
19,949 posts
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Columba
My cherry tree has zero cherries this year, and I suspect the plum tree is also fruitless.
Spent a long time this morning cutting back a cotoneaster which had got much too big for its boots. Took me about three times as long as expected, but it is now a compact bush which is not interfering with the rose bushes either side, nor blocking the shed window.
Wonder how long that will last.
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Jun 2020
10:36pm, 30 Jun 2020
16,878 posts
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Rosehip
I have a ceanothus that's starting to block the light from the kitchen window - I suppose that's tomorrow's job.
Never stops this gardening lark, does it?
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Jun 2020
10:39pm, 30 Jun 2020
19,951 posts
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Columba
Oh no, from that point of view it's as bad as housework.
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Jul 2020
10:05am, 1 Jul 2020
3,120 posts
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jacdaw
Can't touch my Cotoneaster (horizontalis) at the moment, it's covered in bees. I have a Cotoneaster hedge with flowers that wasps love.
I love ceanothus, but we get frosts that kill them.
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