The Garden and The Forgotten Plot

After a day chilling I got a phone call from a Lady about the Allotment waiting list.I put my name on it 14 months ago!
I have arranged to meet her tomorrow morning to look at the two thirds of a plot!
The Allotment or Community garden is still thriving here, after going out of fashion there are waiting lists now to get some.
I have tons of seeds here that could be grown up there. Its just behind the hospital.
I think I have enough horticultural energy to split my time between the Home Garden and the Allotment.
The photo shows the garden today, with the colours on the left, and the foliage on the right.I had forgotten that I had applied. I thought the other day my name would be fading on the dusty waiting list paper.A nice suprise on the eve of my birthday.If I take it that would be a good Birthday present. More soil to grow Vegetables and Flowers!

A Gift From The Garden Birds

I found a Pea seed on the soil in the left hand border.I took it inside and dried it out further before planting it a few weeks ago. I imagine a Black bird found it then dropped it whilst startled, like in the Aesops fable about the Fox and the Crow.
It has germinated and is now happily climbing up the stick I planted for it to grow up. A new plant from the birds beak!
It will be planted outside in a month when it has warmed up a bit. Its enjoying the comfort of the kitchen window for now.

White And Dutch Style Flowers

The Polyanthus Blue Shades showing many colours besides blue! A white flower, and a cup like blue and white, like my Dutch coloured pot with the Queen Of The Night Tulips.
It was a cold start with some frost on the bird table. The garden birds have been flying in and out all morning.
The mouse was back today feeding on sunflower seeds that have fallen from the feeder.He has moved to the Butterfly Bush end of the right border.
I want to plant my signature plant today. At Hampsons I found a perennial Astrantia Major which is what flower adorns the top of the Blog page. The colour on the packet is pink, but still the recognisable pin cushion flowers.
Snappys garden will have an Astrantia Major I hope flowering in the summer!

Milkweed And Cat

This is an Asclepias plant I bought from Hampsons. I told Cat on Thursday I thought it was named after the Greek demigod of Healing. A google search later:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asclepius
The Asclepias flowers for almost nine months a year in bright orange and red flowers. Its due to flower from April untill November..
The plant itself is called Milk weed and has been used in traditional healing.
It is also used in Butterfly gardens to attract the Monarch butterfly. It is suprisingly toxic to everything else, and birds will not eat butterflys that fed off the plant.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milkweed





To the Left is the Rod of Asclepius... traditional symbol of Medicine. Asclepius the Greek Demigod was a fabled healer who said was to be so skilled that he could heal all manner of ills, and even bring back the dead. He observed a snake bringing another one healing herbs.
He upset Zeus, so was killed by a lightning bolt, then brought back to life to sit with the gods on Mount Olympus. He also became a constellation of stars called Ophiuchus. The Serpent Bearer.
Linnaeus named the Milk weed after the Greek Healer due to its folk uses.
Cat has been poorly and was admitted to hospital during my nights. Get better soon Cat! She needs some Asclepius healing...

Daffodils

The Daffodils I bought from Harlow Carr flowering in the Boots chemist jug. These are large trumpeted and smell quite sweet.Its Mothers Day here today.
The winds have been blowing hard all night damaging tree's and fences. My garden fence is damaged again at the back. The plants just go with the air flow then spring back up.

Muscari

Despite being exposed early when the weather damaged its covering leaves this Muscari is developing beautiful blue and yellow buds. With the Crocuses these are my early nearly spring warning flowers!
The Ghostly Gardener had planted these in the big blue ceramic pot. Multiple spring bulbs have grown but I need to identify them once they develop flowers.
The garden looked okay this morning after eighty mile hour winds battered Wakefield and the north of England. The garden birds have been out in force this morning as I drank my last coffee before bed. Two more nights to go before I can garden again.
Its the first of March. My namesakes Saints day, patron saint of Wales.
http://sucs.org/~rhys/stdavid.html

Garden Additions

The Polyanthus Blue Shades is growing lovely now, even with todays wind and rain.
I am back on nights for three so the posts will slow down untill Monday.I was very productive yesterday with Cat helping me out. I bought three large 75 litre bags of compost, two bags of Pea gravel stones, and a few more plants to go with the four from Harlow Carr. I wanted to make the African bag gardens with Cats assistance.
http://www.sendacow.org.uk/schools.asp?active_page_id=271
The Charity Send A Cow started me thinking about vegetable growing in a container (or Sack) in December. I ordered two kits and they sat waiting for the stones, soil, bottle, and nice weather to be made up.

Take one hessian sack. Line the bottom with stones for drainage. Use a two litre bottle cut at both ends to leave a hollow tube. Fill the bottle with stones in the centre of the sack in a column. Fill around the bottle with soil and cow manure..I used some of the garden compost as no cows were available.
In Lesotho where these bag gardens are used they have a plentiful supply of stones from the mountains, and cow manure.

A bag garden in construction. Each bag took one hundred litres of compost and I found after halfway they are very heavy. They were placed in situ on the pavers. I put some long canes on edges to keep the sides of the sack taut and out of the way of the soil filling. The sticks can be used as stakes to hold the bag in place.

The Snappy Gardener in Action with the Second Bag Garden. Each kit came with seeds to grow vegetables. With names like Purple Power and Rocket Fuel. The finishing touch will be to decorate them with paint and coloured material. A job for when im off from work..

The central stone column is used for watering the Bag garden plants.It runs down the middle of the Sack. I need to cut some V's into the sides of the Bag to grow plants from the side as well as on top. It is heavy too and not movable by me on my own.

After the bag gardens were done I turned my Attention to planting the new additions from Harlow Carr and Hampsons. Two Teasel, One Valerian, one Catnip, two Photinia's, one Thuja Occidentalis Rheinegold, and a Picea Glauca Conica. I moved a few of the plants about to accomodate the newcomers. The garden is in a state of change. I moved the other green bird bowl to by the corner by the Blackberry bush. There are two pools of water now for the garden birds to drink and splash about in.

After Le Tigre et Le Crocodile in Paris here is my version. Two stone statues by the Holly. I watched a video of a healing garden that did Art Therapy in California. It had a collection of Art work around the Garden. This is part one:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vz3_CyZ8WkA
and the second part is here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJub3-ul5lQ
I saw plenty at Harlow Carr and on this video. I realised I had the plants, and the hard structures but not the fun things like Statues, gnomes, pink lawn flamingoes, or fairys etc. It is the fun twist that puts your personality on your garden. Whatever you like, if you like it...

The Bag Gardens just need a splash of rainbow colour to brighten them up. I have seed potatoes from Marshalls sat in an egg box developing shoots ready to be planted in the two grow bags.I went halfs on Wednesday with Cats dad to buy a patio Herb Planter. A round polythene bag with eight pockets rather like the Victorian strawberry planter. Thats what mine will be used for too :)
Strawberrys and Potatoes will join the African Bag gardens on the Pavers. The Container kitchen garden is growing slowly. I ordered another two Veg planters but they have not arrived yet. I think there is a movement in the UK to grow Organic Vegetables and Fruit, and the experts mention how container gardening can be done on any sized plot.
The benefit for me is that the two borders can grow flowers and soft fruit, and the Vegetables will grow on the pavers. It will be interesting to see how it all grows. The seed packets have been organised into envelopes with coloured names of the bag gardens.

The Mystery red spear growing. I saw some plants at Hampsons that looked like this. I will leave it for a while before saying what I think it is. Blackswamp girl you have already guessed correctly.
Its Febuary 29th too, a leap year! March starts tomorrow and I imagine the growing plants will speed up. So much is going on in the small urban plot of mine that its hard to know what to blog about. I have plenty of topics to write about and photograph.
Hope you all have good weekends and that your gardens keep growing on :)