What's going on in your garden (2024)?
- Thread starter rascal
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Lullabelle
Midlands, England
Love the smell of basil, even take cuttings for more plants.
JAS_OH1
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I'll have lots of it in the ground soon enough, plus tomatoes, lettuce, and peppers. The 1st one is oregano, a new (to me) variety called bold and spicy. I haven't tried it yet.
Herbaceous
Senior Member
Not my garden, but the cherry trees near my office are in bloom!
rascal
Forum GOD!
Tomato plants all pulled out and in green bin. Still picking the odd raspberry. 100gms more I will do jam.
Fog this morning so airport closed.
Everything pretty much shut down.
Russ
Fog this morning so airport closed.
Everything pretty much shut down.
Russ
I love really foggy mornings.
JAS_OH1
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Except when your driving in it or getting on a plane...
Lullabelle
Midlands, England
We are steadily working our way through the long lawns and weeds, taking time though. Bought some seeds, bee and butterfly loving plants, they are so tiny..
karadekoolaid
Legendary Member
I bought a new purple basil plant and two sacks of peaty soil.
Filled up some pots and sowed:
Filled up some pots and sowed:
- Wonderful purple tomatoes
- Fenugreek for fenugreek leaves (kashuri metha)
- Scotch bonnets
- Thai chiles
- Local green chiles
- Mixed lettuce leaves
- Tomatillos
- Some beans I found in Mexico which are called "cowboy beans" but which just have to be grown because they're amazing. (I'm going to take some photos right now)
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I harvested another 2 butternut squash yesterday along with a big tub of purple potatoes. The potatoes are another crop that's had a very good year. I'm guessing that there's 15kg or so here. I dug up 7½kg or so a few weeks ago.
Most of the pears and all of the apples still need to be harvested, but I'll leave them on the trees as long as possible. The above are all windfall.
And I spotted more raspberries!
Most of the pears and all of the apples still need to be harvested, but I'll leave them on the trees as long as possible. The above are all windfall.
And I spotted more raspberries!
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Just rescued those raspberries... 
Along with another 6 pears.
Along with another 6 pears.
Look how much thyme I have:
That was three small plants maybe three years ago. Now it’s a shrub! And I’ve already cleaned out that birdbath.
That was three small plants maybe three years ago. Now it’s a shrub! And I’ve already cleaned out that birdbath.
Remember when I said grown men around here get a rash of shit for wearing “girly” shorts?
My brother asked me about some oregano he bought, and I mentioned how easy it is to grow, so I sent him a pic of my oregano, with my foot in it for scale, just like I did with that thyme above, and it had some of my shirttail in it as well.
Here was his single response:
My brother asked me about some oregano he bought, and I mentioned how easy it is to grow, so I sent him a pic of my oregano, with my foot in it for scale, just like I did with that thyme above, and it had some of my shirttail in it as well.
Here was his single response:
karadekoolaid
Legendary Member
I finally got to spend a whole morning in the garden and it was time to pay a little attention to the orchids. These particular orchids (Cymbidium) grow forwards; when you pot them, you put them near the back of the pot and measure about 3 fingers width to the front, which means they've got room to grow.
These poor blighters hadn't been touched in 3 or 4 years, so they were growing outside the pots, as you can see in the following pictures:
So the first move is to remove them all from the pots and get rid of the "medium" - they don't need earth, since they're epiphytes (ie. they'll grow with their roots in the air and they derive nutrients from air, water or any plant/medium around them) . The medium, in this case, was coconut shells, dried fern roots, corks and broken bricks. Once the plants are removed, you can see three things: a vast amount of roots, dead pseudobulbs (where the leaves are attached) and possibly two or even three plants in one:
First order of the day; remove the excess roots. This is pretty drastic, but they soon grow back again, and too many roots means the plant gets stressed, producing more leaves and roots rather than flowers. Once the roots are gone, then the dead pseudobulbs get removed. Then it's easy to see if there's one, or maybe even two or three new plants. From the 6 plants I repotted, I got 12 plants.
Final step was to repot them with space to breathe and grow, and securing them with a metal brace so the plant doesn't move. If the plant is well-secured, it will soon grow healthily; if the plant is unstable (ie., if it moves when you gently shake the pot) then it will not grow.
The two final pictures show the newly potted plants (which then got soaked with water and vitamins) and the flowers.
Unfortunately for me, most of the plants flowered while I was in the UK. The perfume is glorious, but the flower only lasts about 7-10 days, once a year!
These poor blighters hadn't been touched in 3 or 4 years, so they were growing outside the pots, as you can see in the following pictures:
So the first move is to remove them all from the pots and get rid of the "medium" - they don't need earth, since they're epiphytes (ie. they'll grow with their roots in the air and they derive nutrients from air, water or any plant/medium around them) . The medium, in this case, was coconut shells, dried fern roots, corks and broken bricks. Once the plants are removed, you can see three things: a vast amount of roots, dead pseudobulbs (where the leaves are attached) and possibly two or even three plants in one:
First order of the day; remove the excess roots. This is pretty drastic, but they soon grow back again, and too many roots means the plant gets stressed, producing more leaves and roots rather than flowers. Once the roots are gone, then the dead pseudobulbs get removed. Then it's easy to see if there's one, or maybe even two or three new plants. From the 6 plants I repotted, I got 12 plants.
Final step was to repot them with space to breathe and grow, and securing them with a metal brace so the plant doesn't move. If the plant is well-secured, it will soon grow healthily; if the plant is unstable (ie., if it moves when you gently shake the pot) then it will not grow.
The two final pictures show the newly potted plants (which then got soaked with water and vitamins) and the flowers.
Unfortunately for me, most of the plants flowered while I was in the UK. The perfume is glorious, but the flower only lasts about 7-10 days, once a year!