What did you do in your garden today?

[Esther Knapicius]

mowing in the woodland area, cutting down the spent ugly hosta flowers. some other mowing. that's it. time for wine.

 

[Oliver Buckle]

That lavender was a good buy, Sean. Our local Waitrose was offering ones smaller, and half dead, for £24. I wasn't tempted

Did a bit more hedge, the first bit was straight up privet sticks about eight foot tall laced with bramble and ivy. I ripped out all the rubbish and took a few sticks down to about half way hoping for some green lower down. The next section is lornicera , not quite as tall, but it had expanded sideways to about six feet thick, not any more. Then I sorted out the sticks for my next fire and chopped everything else up with the mower, filled six old compost bags turned inside out so they are black, and stood them in the sun with a bit of water added. That will make a nice mulch in time. That must be at least the first fifteen feet, and it is only a hundred foot long Still I tackled some bits further down last year, they should be much easier, give me another three or four years and I will have a decent hedge, still I might give my back a bit of a rest today.

There was a little bit of drizzle yesterday and it was overcast most of the day, so things didn't dry out as much, much less watering.

 

[Oliver Buckle]

Repaired a window in the old greenhouse. The glass had been replaced with plastic when I came and then a storm blew it off. It's the little one that opens, I had put the plastic back in a temporary sort of way, this time I cleaned up all the old fixings and hinges and made an open box that fitted the hole. I screwed the plastic firmly to the top of the box and put two strips one either side to stop it going right through. It won't open of course, but it is such an old and leaky house that does not matter most of the time, and if we get a real heatwave I can take it right out.
Watered greenhouses.
Sieved a bag of the mown rubbish from the hedge and got a couple of buckets full of small stuff. I watered and mulched a couple of young ornamental currants with it, they are in pretty solid clay that is starting to crack.
Tidied up a little, picked half a dozen tomatoes, some chilies and a cucumber. All fairly easy, back friendly stuff.

 

[Sheal]

I started scarifying one of my lawns today. I don't think they've been touched since the house was built more than twenty years ago.

 

[Oliver Buckle]

I started scarifying one of my lawns today. I don't think they've been touched since the house was built more than twenty years ago.

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Tomorrow you are starting a new compost heap?

 

[Sean Regan]

Bit of a pain today.
Dug out the grass in the rockery.
Had to drag away the rose pots to get at it, then it was a hands and knees job.
Had to try to dig out the grass and not the phlox at the same time.

Mowed the lawn, first time in a week. Some moss patches down the left hand border where the grass is shaded by the fence and planting.
I'll give it a dose of iron sulphate tomorrow.

Pruned off the new growth on the quince along the side fence where it is above the height of the top of it, as this adds to the shade on the grass.

Had to add another support wire to a lower branch on this sorbus, as the berries were dragging it down. It will also stop the fat wood pigeons from damaging it when they go for the berries when they ripen.

Two hours was enough for the day, as it started to rain.

Front garden to do tomorrow morning, clean the car and my golf gear. Then watch the football in the afternoon.

 

[Oliver Buckle]

Looking at your pagoda reminded me, there was a programme with a section about the pagoda in Kew gardens. Apparently it is very much a European 'interpretation' of a pagoda. Not just things like the roof decorations, European rather than Chinese dragons, but real basics, like an inauspicious number of storeys to it. Seems they are re-opening it.

Watered, got a lot of cardboard from all the boxes our new bathroom came in and put it down on the paths through the fruit section, Watered, picked three ordinary tomatoes, three yellow plums and a cherry tomato, that's about right for the two of us each day. Don't really want to get into preserves. Tidied up and tied up the tomato and chili plants. Planted some Basil seed for progression. Stuff.

 

[Sean Regan]

The kew pagoda built in the 18th century was based on the one in Nanjing China, destroyed many decades ago and then rebuilt more recently.


I did quite a bit of research before making mine. Japanese pagodas tend to have either three, five, seven or nine roofs.

Mine's based on one like this photo in Japan. There are many like it.

It's as close as I could get it in concrete. I even tried to replicate the pin joints that support the corners of the roof.

It has different types of hardwood beading for the balustrades, they are set into the concrete.

The sorin (that thing on the top) was hard to make. It has a central steel rod, with a cap off a shaving gel cannister at the bottom.
Seven drilled through brass cupboard door knobs, some 4pt milk carton caps, wooden curtain rings, wooden beads and a garden plastic solar lighting stake which I shaped and in which I drilled holes. It's all as correct as I could get it. Otherwise it'd look naff.

It's 35 years old now and has worn pretty well, it suffers a bit from weathering, although it gets a re-paint every few years. The sorin is all gold now.
Occasiobally, I accidently knock off one or two of the 36 finials on the corners of the roofs if I brush past them when weeding, but they are just bits of dowel and I keep a few spares for when needed.

Pagodas fascinate people.

This is one I found in a book nearly forty years ago. A seven storey one built by an old guy in a cuboard he made for it, in his tiny garden in Japan. Using miniature tools he made himself.
He used the correct wood, Hinoki. a Japanese cypress, from which all antique Japanese pagodas are built, that doesn't rot and retains it's original shape.

 

[Sheal]

Tomorrow you are starting a new compost heap?

I have a large composter, a 'plastic' coal bunker that I cut the bottom out of but there's not enough room in it. I've been burning it.

 

[Sean Regan]

Last job last night was watering the pots.
When I got to the hebe on the steps outside the French windows (old photo). It's the second green pot from the left.
As I sprayed water on it a large frog jumped out.

We've always had frogs in our garden from before and after we had the koi pool. I think one or two may live in the phlox on the rockery. The phlox is quite dense in places. I always leave a shallow bowl of water near it for them.

 

[Oliver Buckle]

When I say I see frogs and toads in my garden people often say I should put water out for them, but they only really go near it when they are mating and spawning and the rest of the year travel quite long distances from ponds and pools.

 

[Black_Thumb]

Hello, friends. I haven't posted lately because I've been camping all week. One more week to go here in Pennsylvania, and then I'll be home. My wife said there has been a lot of rain since I left, and so the grass is VERY long. She mowed it once, but has had problems with refueling the tractor, so it's waiting for me to return. LOL I return home Friday or Saturday of this week, and then I'll have to tend to the yard work. I hope everyone is well and had a great weekend!!

 

[Lmbauer2017]

I was planting flowers in the front yard of a newly built home (newly built neighborhood actually), and I saw some flat wood 6 inches deep... So I dug... and dug... and finally yanked out a 10ft 1x8 board!! I've been finding all kinds of bricks and trash, which I kind of get. But a massive board like this? Like, they saw it lying there, then covered it with mulch and began planting bushes

Glad I found it though! Also gave me an excuse to amend the clay soil in the area which I had been putting off lol.

 

[Sheal]

Burying rubbish in new build gardens tends to be par for the course in Britain now. Builders shouldn't be allowed to do it.

Scalped! I finished scarifying one of my lawns today, it's amazing the amount of moss that was in it.

 

[Oliver Buckle]

The view is pretty good too.