The 'What I Did Today' Archive - 2007

[sewer rat]

Well, that's my first week on my site over - progress to date is as follows, Old fence down and removed. New gates on site awaiting hanging, fence wire and posts too. Strainer put in today.
Roadside verge strimmed - needs a second cut though.
Layby created between public road and field entrance.
Foundation slab dug and concrete laid for workshop.
Polytunnel frame erected (all the metalwork anyway).
Some other good news - as you may recall, Parcel-line lost my 25kg onion s and I couldn't get any more, but Chrissie, a very nice lady at Edwin Tuckers has managed to "acquire" 25 kg of Jagro for me. (There is another post about this variety on veggin' out)
Things is lookin' good

[denise]

What a busy day I had. went shopping for cloches, bought 2 in Homebase £ 10 but good ones, strawberry plants were in bought 6 and growbags for hubby early easter - got them plamted up at home, covered in fleece over night.
Went to plot sowed 1 row of broad beans, soil very cold and sticky still - the joys of clay. Put a cloche over these to help a bit I hope.
Made the compost din less rickty - quite professional looking for pallets.
Re sizes 3 beds 6 more to go, had made them 5ft by 11ft but thought lots about it and decided to go with the 4ft as recommended every where. Ground was dry and craked on the path areas.
Beetroot has germinated from last week sowing. its up in the back bed room at moment.
So back to work tomorrow wish I was off, guess where i would be going? got the GYO bug

[Morty_007]

I find myself in an odd place now...having made a lot of early sowings of toms and peppers they are all doing really well but I have come to a stop....so much to sow and completely unable to do anything. Dislocated my knee a week last Monday and hobbling about on crutches with leg in a full splint so although i can get into the garden/conservatory to water and talk to current seedlings, I can't get around enough to sow and sort any newbies. It hurts too much to sit or stand for any length of time and i'm not sure anyone has ever tried sowing whilst lying down but if so, let me know how you got on!! I can imagine Mr M having to rescue me from under a small pile of potting mix in no time!!

So i'm a little gutted and as far as what I did yesterday...NOTHING but:
I am hoping that Mr M might set me up outside with my compost, pots and seeds in reach today so I can get some done. I feel like I am being left behind now

Happy Gardening
Mx

[Hans Mum]

know how you feel morty had my appendix out a couple of weeks ago, so everything is at a standstill Got loads still to sort out on lottie but no digging for me so have organised a digging party with some friends bribing them with alcohol - they're easily pleased so all i have to do is sit an direct events, should be an interesting weekend, dont know what the other lottie holders will think but you have to take it easy, this past weekend i thought i felt ok and decided to slap a coat of wood paint on the shed, big mistake managed to irritate the wound and am suffering for it.
at least i can sit on a high stool and plant seeds and repot which is a bonus.
take care

[kirsty b]

I've had a busy few days.
Greenhouse is up and mostly glazed, due to breakages, we are improvising half the roof using corrugated perspex and silicone sealant as new glass is not on the budget at the mo.
Started digging where my spuds are going to go. Ground a bit sticky still, but not near as bad as it was a couple of weeks ago. Some compost and manure will help sort that out.
Hubby started a fire for me in my old oil drum on Monday, and it is still going today so as a result I have got rid of a HUGE pile of chopped down brambles over that last couple of days.
Have extended my fruit bed today and moved the redcurrants over to there so I have all my fruit together. Planning to make a small raised bed around the outside of the g/h for my strawbs when they are big enough to go out.
Managed to get sunburned ears and prickly heat on my arms (in March!?) which was clever, so will be digging out the sun cream for future visits. (I'd better find it quick cos I'm going back in about half an hour)

Kirsty

[madderbat]

Feel quite pleased with myself;

Managed to get some leeks into t-roll holders at the weekend (leef days) and started some parsnip seeds on a tray of damp paper today (root day). The leeks are cokimng through already, and hopefully won't need transplanting until I drop the pot into the garden.

We also managed to cut the acrylic sheet we bought for our greenhouse (it's only been about a month!) so hopefully will get that fitted and functioning at the weekend - then I can really start sowing some seeds

[pigletwillie]

I went to our local farm and filled my trailer with 1 ton of 12 year old vintage manure which I will add to the raised beds tommorow. By chance we got talking about wood burning stoves and have come to an agrement that I can cut as much timber from the spinney as I want as long as I keep his wood store filled up as well. What a result, especially as the winds of a few weeks ago brought down some good sized oak and ash trees.

This afternoon its back to pricking out leeks and sowing salad leaves in modules.

[kentish girl]

Had a spare hour before work so nipped over to the lottie & planted out the broad bean plants from the greenhouse. Managed to do a little more digging too.

[Flummery]

Got some leeks sown in a pot on the kitchen windowsill (sill filling up now with 4 types of tom and a red cabbage.)

[serenity]

Help, I need more room.

A shed load of pre-germinated parsnips were sown in dunny rolls and put outside the home greenhouse. Also some 280 "Jolant" and "Bleu de Solaise" leeks were pricked out into trays (40 to a tray) which will be taken up to the lottie greenhouses tommorow.

Spring onions were also sown in modules (6 or so seeds to each) and these will be planted out as clumps when big enough in the raised beds.

Tommorow I need to collect some more compost and start planing out the flowersthat require sowing.

hi pw, could you please tell me why you don't just sow direct into the seed trays in the first place?

[johnty greentoes]

A whole day spent listening to highly paid govt operatives reading from a script. Otherwise known as teacher training (New Primary Framework...for those in the know).

Looked out of the window most of the time - bright sunshine, a gentle breeze, wishing I could be digging instead.

Met someone at lunch who keeps an allotment and talked sheds!

[shirlthegirl43]

I sowed some celery seeds - Golden Self-Blanching 3. Actually, thinking about it, I sowed a heck-a-lot of celery seeds. Any advice on these would be welcome as I never grew celery before.

[denise]

No gardening to day as such, but watered the seeds in back bedroom and spotted that the Broad beans and peas have joined the beetroot in the great germination race - its so good to see them growing.

[pigletwillie]

Hi Serenity, the vast majority of my plants are started off either multi sown in 4" pots or into modules. Large seeds go into individual pots for obvious reasons.

With leeks for example, I can prick them out into trays with the number and spacings I require. Sowing direct into trays might give me too many seedlings (or too few) that are all in one corner for example. In addition I can prick out the strongest seedlings and discard the spindly or small ones. About 60% of my plants go into raised beds much earlier than can be planted directly into the ground as the soil is warmer, easily protected from cold and certainly not waterlogged. By module sowing I can bring the season even further forward as the seedlings going out have been brought up first in a heated greenhouse and after hardening off in a large cold frame, planted out. The vast majority of my leeks will be planted into traditional beds in June after the early tatties are out but a large chunk will be planted out in April into raised beds about 1" apart for harvesting all summer long as baby leeks. Its another way of "adding value" to a crop, winter leeks are cheap to buy as every allotment has plenty, but baby summer leeks are very expensive as nobody has them and they are flown in from goodness knows where.

I hope this explains the means behind my madness.

[Snadger]

Progressed work on various project at alottment. Cut some four foot boards and nailed supports on them for edge of deep beds. Fastened in position. Scrounged a hexagonal paving flag for the centre of my new herb wheel. Finished demolishing an old shed and started breaking up wood to fit in homemade log burning stove. Had the stove glowing red the other day.

I have access to birch logs but no axe to split them.....problem now solved as fellow alottmenteer has given me a huge woodcutters axe on long term loan. My parting words to him were " Chr*st, I can do a bit of damage with this!!!"

Lit stove and figured out way of boiling kettle on it....coffee galore!!

Sowed a few Cardoon seeds and watered plants in heated greenhouse. Using cold greenhouse as a cold frame at present and for tomatoes in summer. All other greenhouse plants will be grown in heated greenhouse. Both are about 8' X 12' with another similar sized one coming into comission once I get it renovated!