I'm Back

Well it was a great week away visiting a friend the kids played to exhaustion and a good time was had by all, I even got to do some gardening for my friend, so didn't have to experience any withdrawal symptoms.

Came back to my own garden with a little trepidation because the weather away and back at home was great lots of sun and warmth and my hubby informed me on Wednesday night that as I didn't give direct orders to water plants he didn't. So all he was doing was opening and closing the greenhouse he didn't even venture inside once to check if all was ok! The greenhouse on inspection had three casualties, my emerging cabbage and brussel sprouts went to the great garden in the sky along with one echinacia seedling. Everything else looked well though.

We arrived home with the sun still shining and the garden looking great, everything have grown so much in a short space of time, new flowers are blooming or in bud such as the violas and the cowslips which were planted last year. The tulips at the back and the wild/alpine strawberries are also blooming and the flower beds are beginning to fill out. The mini meadow area is full of all types of seedlings along with a few differing grass seedlings.

Other developments to greet me was a newly cut and fertilised lawn (thanks mum) it looks really lush and green but there are a few bare patches to resow. The tadpoles were now all over the pond's surface with no signs of spawn jelly anywhere. today on further inspection I found a few of them gobbling up a small patch of algae bloom which must have grown due to all the increased sunshine and warm temperatures of the last week. I'm hoping that their ferocious appetite will halt the algae from overtaking the pond and turning it into green soup (blech!).

The carrots and the parsnips are also up and growing well. Another asparagus plant has produced a spear and this is from one the plants that was dug up this winter. The chillie plants that were pruned and cleaned up have also shown they are still alive with new leaves sprouting on the cut stems, the second early potaoes are up and the first earlies are growing away and will soon need earthing up ie adding more soil.

So today's tasks was to water everything inside the greenhouse and outside as well as the newly transplanted veges in the beds which were all doing very well with no signs of slug damage (yah!!!).

Resowing of the killed off seedlings were also done along with some new sowings of romensco, cauliflower and kale two varieties red Russian and Nero De Tuscany.

Germination of the cornflower seeds and the onions have been observed and new shoots of the autumn sown jerusalem artichokes are beginning to come up.

The vege mini pond finally got cleaned out there were eight pond skater on its surface. I also got the opportunity to remove all the leaves from last autumn from the unpaved area of the vege area, so hopefully if there is any wind tonight none should end up in the pond.

Anyway the rain finally came as was forecasted and I called it a day, not sure if I'll get anything done tomorrow as heavy rainfall if expected, so I'll probably check back in on Monday.