Late Summer

Just a few photos from this week.

All &copy Ian 2017

Malvern Autumn

We've had a weekend away, visiting Ludlow, and spending Sunday with Liz's grandmother at the Malvern autumn show, which we've not been to before.

It's less of a garden show than, say, Tatton Park, with only a few gardens, and a lot of 'country living' stallholders. However, there was a very good apple pavilion, with an impressive display of apples from RV Roger (who supplied all of the maiden trees for our apple walk earlier this year). We watched a very entertaining, and pertinent, 'conversation' between Joe Swift and Monty Don in the Good Life theatre, and spent a lot of the afternoon browsing the plant nursery stalls, and wondering over the size of the mammoth veg. The prize-winning pumpkin was 472kg, which was, frankly, astonishing, but only slightly more so than the 152kg cabbage, or the 6.3(ish)m beetroot and parsnip, each, apparently, world records. How one digs up a 6m parsnip root, I know not.

(Why, I know not, either.)

Anyway, we managed to fill grandma's not insignificant boot, with thirty-five plants of our own, and a number of hers, and we added a few from her garden to take home, meaning our little Corsa was well loaded for the return journey.

• Two Crocosmia 'Sunglow', and two 'Buttercup'
• a 'Twyning's After Eight' dahlia
• Three white Japanese anemones, 'Honorine Jobert'
• Two giant scabious
• Three new heucheras, 'Fire Chief', 'xxx' and 'xxx'
• A pair of variegated sedums, 'Frosty Morn'
• A painted fern, 'Burgundy Lace'
• Three Panicum grasses, 'Squaw'
• An astrantia, A. major 'Lars'
• And a tray of obscenely cheap Cyclamen hederifolium; fifteen at a pound apiece.

We finally, definitively, learnt the reason for the riduculously low end-of-show prices. Apparently, the nurseries want to offload the last of their stock at almost any price, because for the quantity involved, the cost of transporting them back to the nursery exceeds the market value—hence selling things at a pound/pot is actually financially better than transporting the stock 'home', and selling it at market value later. I'm happy to help.

We got home about five, and I nipped out to pick up the rest of our pig, having collected the bucket of blood last Wednesday, before planting everything out.

RHS Wisley

After a very long day yesterday, we got away from Ludlow as soon as we could (eleven), and made the long journey down to Surrey over lunch. We'd resolved to visit RHS Wisley, as we were in the area without Katie and Dan (staying elsewhere, though we're all using their house for two nights).

It's an impressive garden, though, actually, I think Harlow Carr compares well, and has the advantage of being a more locally representative climate.

The orchard, particularly, we enjoyed: there are hundreds of decades-old apples, which give a beautiful impression of what, eventually, we hope our orchard will come to be like.

Flower Arranging

[placeholder entry: awaiting photos]

Wall Insulation

We've had a long and rather tiring weekend, making a start on the internal wall insulation. Although we'd hoped to get started straight away (which would have meant we got further), we suspect that our potatoes have been hit by blight, so we actually started by digging up the remaining earlies (a few Royal Jerseys, the British Queen, and the main crop Lady Balfour). Especially in the case of the maincrop, it's several weeks earlier than one would ideally harvest them, but the haulms have collapsed, and so the tubers won't get any bigger. If it is blight, too, the sooner we get the tubers out, the more likely they are to store and be usable.

The yield, however, is somewhat lamentable.

We're going to rethink potato growing, I suspect, and decide whether, in light of a couple of poor years, it's worth the space and effort, for a crop that isn't actually expensive to buy. We might decide to grow a couple of packs of Lady Christl, say, which come out early (leaving useful later space), taste really good, and have been very reliable; but ditch the maincrop. Instead, we'll have a think about some alternatives, possibly including Jerusalem artichokes (possibly in the back corner, where perennials might do better than annuals, and where their height would help), oca, and maybe dahlias. We'll have to see. I'm also going to consider whether we should turn off the automatic irrigation, as this might be exacerbating blight—it's not been a damp summer, so blight is a little unexpected. Certainly, we need to continue our plan of heavy mulching.

While out there, I also watered the vegetable garden with chafer grub/wireworm nematodes, Heterorhabditis megidis.

Having made it back inside, we only started work inside at about three, and had to stop at six because Cath and Jason were round for dinner. In that time, we managed to make a complete mess of the master bedroom and ensuite, ripping the old plaster off the external walls, including the plain white floor-to-ceiling tiles of the bedroom. Quite the mess.

The master bedroom before IWI work (© Ian 2014)

The dressing room before work (© Ian 2014)

En suite before work (© Ian 2014)

The en suite before work (the most tasteful of the three, a blue floral pattern) (© Ian 2014)

Today, we got an early start, and having moved the bidet and toilet out of the way, finished the de-plastering. Then we battened, insulation foil, and plasterboarded the bedroom, taking the oppportunity to move the single socket on the left of the room to a more useful position, while making it a double, and added a second double to the right of the room, using a previously 'lost' socket hidden behind the radiator.

The master bedroom's wall stripped back to stone (© Ian 2014)

Horizontal battens in place (© Ian 2014)

The master bedroom with vertical battens, and one of the plasterboards (© Ian 2014)

The end/gable wall of the en suite stripped back to plaster, and with the 'missing' wall on left under the window (© Ian 2014)

We still need to do the same in the bathroom, as well as sort out the window reveals and windowsill, which may actually be rather later. We need, really, to get the walls proper done as soon as we can, because the radiators will be impossible to work round once the heating's on: we can do the other tidying up bits in more leisure in later autumn and winter.

In taking down the tiles in the bathroom, I was very surprised to find that the wall under one of the windows is a single stone skin, with a timber frame, which explains why that wall was always cold: it's even less insulating that the rest of the (500mm sandstone) walls, as it's only about 200mm thick. We'll replace the timber frame, but I'll fill it with glass wool slab, which will really help.

Windows

I've made the most of decent weather today (it looks a bit dodgy for the next week), and painted the window frames in the garage. For the same reason, I mowed the lawn last night: very little growth, because it's been dry, but that did make it easier).

The windows look a lot neater now, although this photo's from the (unpainted) inside.

'Garage' interior (© Ian 2014)

I spent a bit of time messing around getting ready for installing an outside tap near the back door (near the greenhouse): there's only an internal tap, which isn't ideal, so I'm going to add a pair of external ones. Hole duly drilled in thick stone wall, and parts ordered for completing the job on some later date.

Other than that, I wasted a lot of time resolving a botched delivery that should have brought us plasterboard, plaster, and battening timber for the wall insulation, which tried to arrive on a 22t lorry, in clear contrast to my clear instruction to bring nothing bigger than 7t. Irritating, as they'll now have to deliver on Saturday morning, which, hopefully, won't badly delay getting started. I did manage to start getting the shelves up in the bedroom, though, and they're rather nice. We ordered planed oak boards from our friendly local timber merchant (ages ago, in January): I'm very fond of oak. I'll be finishing them tomorrow night, hopefully, but it might spill into Friday.

Planting and Plastering

The first jobs for today were planting out the plants we bought at Tatton Park yesterday. Apart from the carniverous plants (kitchen and sitting room), and the brunnera (copse bed), the rest have gone into the long border. I need to add proper labels before we lose track of them, as they all came from show gardens as they were dismantled, and thus without labels.

This afternoon, we've stripped the wall paper from the side wall of our bedroom, and from the main wall of the dressing room, and re-plastered both. That's in preparation for putting up the new shelves on both these walls that we've had planned for several months, which I hope to do on Wednesday, all being well. That gets the shelf boards out of the way, along with everything that will go on these shelves, and should make installing the wall insulation easier: that starts next weekend, we plan.

Customary 'before' photo (© Ian 2014)

And gratuitous sleepy/supervisory cat photo (© Ian 2014)

RHS Tatton Park 2014

This morning, at about 0815, we set off for Tatton Park, as we have the last couple of years, to the RHS flower show. It takes about an hour, and having parked and walked to the showground, we were in the queue at about 0940, giving us a quarter hour to start looking at the show catalogue (and map) before being let in at just before 10. I've been impressed, this year and last, at how quickly they scan the bar-coded tickets and get you in.

There were some really good show gardens, this year. We particularly liked a heritage/allotment fruit and veg stall from a group of local allotmenteers, and were struck by a scarlet mountain spinach (orache) that we've never seen in the flesh before. It's a possible potager plant next year.Grasses were much in evidence, as well as chocolate cosmos, sanguisorba, crocosmia, and brunnera. That suited us nicely, as we've many grasses that could be used in combination. We have one sanguisorba, 'Tanna', and a brunnera, 'Jack Frost', both bought at Tatton last year, and came looking for more brunnera. We have a few crocosmia, but one caught our eye today that is apparently a fairly new introduction; Twilight Fairy 'Gold'. It has lovely bronzed foliage, but sadly wasn't for sale from the show garden (the Young Designer of the Year garden by Sam Ovens).

We saw a couple of water features we liked, which might inform later plans.

(© Ian 2014)

(© Ian 2014)

This garden had a rebar construction for its runner beans: apparently I'm not the only one using rebar to construct supports! It also had a rather good green wall, one of which Liz still wants to find a space for.

These garden seats were very good, and next door we saw some very weather resistant swing seats by the well-named Yorkshire Swingseat Company.

(© Ian 2014)

(© Ian 2014)

One feature that we enjoyed was a collection of eight vignette gardens that encapsulated larger gardens' feel in small plots. They're all from Cheshire, and included Arley Hall, which is actually just down the road from Tatton Park, and we thought looked worth a real visit, based on their 'taster' garden.

(© Ian 2014)

The floral marquee was, as ever, phenomenally stocked by nurseries, and although we only bought two plants, the other displays were excellent, and gave us contact details for a number of specialist nurseries. One, near Cambridge, might be a good source of alpines, if we do decide to put a green roof on the mini-sheds. There were a couple of hosta specialists, too, for when we dig the bog garden.

(© Ian 2014)

The two plants we bought were both from the Hampshire Carnivorous Plants: one was a Sarracenia hybrid (a North American Pitcher Plant), which suited us because it actively requires a good cold winter spell, probably in the unheated greenhouse. The other is a dangling/hanging sort of plant, a Monkey Cup called 'Linda' (a hybrid, Nepenthes cv 'Linda') despite being a dioecious male. It now hangs, slightly threateningly, in the sitting room.

For us, though, the Young Designer Gardens were the best. We felt that the television coverage (Thursday and Friday evening) actually let these down, and all three, but particularly Alex Schofield's, were much better in the flesh. In fact, everything else we purchased came from these three gardens.

(© Ian 2014)

Acquisitions were:

• From Alex Schofield's garden:
• Brunnera; I need to check the cultivar
• Astrantia 'Gill Richardson'
• Sanguisorba (S. officionalis)'Tanna'
• Sedum (S. spectabile) 'Matrona'
• From Clare Broadbent's garden:
• Echinacea 'Secret Love'
• Eupatorium, I think E. purpureum
• From Sam Ovens' garden:
• Scabious 'Pink Mist'

(© Ian 2014)

Brassicas

On Friday evening, we lifted the Red Duke of York, the Lady Christl, and some of the International Kidney/Jersey Royal potatoes, as the haulms were clearly going over. They're being washed and bagged up, slowly.

This has created some space, particularly where the earlies were, in the bottom bed, and allowed us to plant out a number of brassicas there yesterday evening: Romanescu cauliflowers, January King savoy cabbages, Mystique cauliflowers, and Rudolph purple sprouting broccoli. We've also sown two rows of Golden Ball turnips, between these and the Defender courgettes. They, incidentally, are just getting into full speed, and producing almost daily courgettes. They seem more upright plants than our previous courgettes, as well as generating better textured (less prone to disintegrating in the pan) courgettes, and I'm rather pleased. I reckon we'll be into a glut in a couple of weeks.

Tonight's been less exciting, as I've mown the lawn—whereas Liz has collected enough sweet peas for eight vases. We're definitely into 'glut' for them.

Sweetpea Centrepiece (© Ian 2014)

Punting

We've enjoyed a weekend in Cambridge, doing nostalgic things like picnicking on the backs, going punting, and wandering round college gardens. I'll cut straight to the photos.

The Cam, from Garret Hostel Bridge (the back of Trinity Hall) (© Ian 2014)

The University Library (© Ian 2014)

The History Faculty (© Ian 2014)

Clare Bridge, and the back of King's (© Ian 2014)

Topiary in King's (© Ian 2014)

King's College Gatehouse (© Ian 2014)

Liz, Philip and Katherine (© Ian 2014)

Clare College Gardens (© Ian 2014)

Clare College Gardens (© Ian 2014)

Clare College Gardens (© Ian 2014)

Flower Arrangements

For which Liz must take the credit.

26th July (photo © Ian 2014)

2nd August (photo © Ian 2014)

9th August (photo © Ian 2014)

And three more window decorations from 9th (all photos © Ian 2014):

Last Few Jobs

I'm astonished to say that, of our list of jobs we made on Saturday for the past five days, we've actually done them all. Today, I've turned the compost heaps (decomposing beautifully); replaced the satellite cable and LNB (finally we have two signals to the box, reducing recording conflicts); we've painted the bike shelter (it'll need another coat or two, but there you go); installed the loft hatch in the garage (still so named!); and hung ladder hooks in the same (necessitated by putting a hatch in the hole they poked up through). Liz has done a thorough weed of the long border over the last couple of days, and it's looking loads better. We've also managed to move all the stone (and turf) that we put on the septic tank two years ago when digging the beds on either side. This is because, having transformed the garage, we want to get some of the garden tools out; but, lacking a shed, this is tricky. Our solution (long planned) will be a set of storage cupboards along the septic tank, within the living willow structure we're growing over it. Ideally, these will each have a little green roof, probably planted with alpines (which have their interest mostly in the spring, before the willow gets into full leaf). They arrive on Friday, so in order to assemble them this weekend, the tank top needs to be clear.

Having uncovered it, I've been reminded that two of the five manhole covers don't fit at all well. By which I mean they're alarmingly unstable, and seem too small. The concrete lid sections have also 'drifted' towards the bottom end of the tank. We've pushed them back together, but the covers are irredeemably too small. I shall buy a couple of new ones, and mortar them in, which will make it all rather safer.

While we've been working, the cats have kept us company. Chess found somewhere shady to nap (I don't know how he got through the latticework).

Chess sleeping inside a sweet-pea pyramid (© Ian 2014)

We're almost, but not quite, at the point of enough sweet-peas for every downstairs room.

Liz's sweet-pea (and berberis and alchemilla) flower display for the week (© Ian 2014)

Leeks and Bouquets

One thing we didn't manage to squeeze into an already busy weekend was planting out the leeks, which have really been ready for a couple of weeks. They've had a space planned, of course, in the kitchen garden, although it's meant taking out the over-wintered cabbages, 'Frostie', which were late to heart up. We're going to be eating a lot of cabbage, I predict, over the next couple of weeks. They should stand for a while with their roots in water, hopefully.

Anyway: the leeks. We sowed a couple of pots of Porbello, which we grew last year. With a lot of the seeds this year, I sowed the seeds in seed compost (sterile and fine, but low in nutrients), but with most of the pot pre-filled with normal compost (not sterile, as it's home made, and a bit lumpy, but able to sustain for a lot longer). This has meant that the seeds can germinate in something fine, and with fewer weeds coming up around them, but their roots quickly hit the fertile compost beneath, so they don't get checked in growing. It's also meant that seedlings have been much happier growing on in their pots, and are bigger when we prick them out.

Planting leeks is quite fun, by my reckoning: I have a sturdy plastic dibber, which makes a nice hole about 1½" across, and 5" deep, or so. I push a row of holes (about 6" apart), and drop the separated seedling in. They're tall enough that they poke out a good few inches, and the soil will settle loosely around them when watered in. Some people seem to advocate trimming the roots somewhat (to encourage strong new growth), and correspondingly reducing the leaves (to maintain root:leaf balance), but I haven't ever tried this.

While I did this, and collected what might be the last rhubarb harvest of the year, Liz picked another tub of strawberries (the fifth, I think: they've done well), and flowers. This is the third lot of sweet peas, and the first significant crop: the first two batches were just enough for a small jug. Soon, though, we'll get to the point where up to a hundred new flowers are opening every day; probably in about 4–5 weeks time.

Liz's flower arrangement in brass bowl: sweet peas, Lady's Mantle (alchemilla), and grasses ( Ian 2014)

Patio Doors

Over the last week, we've had the picture window in the dining room taken out, the wall lowered, and folding patio doors installed instead. (At the same time, the big windows in the kitchen and sitting room have been replaced, as the timber frames of both were rotting slowly away, and needed annual maintenance.)

The view before was fine enough. But from most of the room, what you saw was mostly the borrowed landscape, not the garden.

Picture window in dining room, pre-work (frame on left; doors propped on table, right; dustsheets everywhere!) (© Ian 2014)

With the folding doors, you now have more of a sense of the garden, and with them open, you really feel in the garden from inside the room.

New folding doors into knot garden (© Ian 2014)

The doors are really good; smooth action, good locking, and they fold away to one side (right, above) very neatly. The 'access' door, on the left, opens independently, and the drop bolts (silver, between the right pair) hold the others in place while you do so.

It's still a bit of a mess outside, and I need to build steps to them, as there's a nearly two-foot drop at the moment.

The cats seem to like the extra entrance, at least.

Chess examining the new view (© Ian 2014)

Task List

I've had today off, though Liz has been working: that made it an ideal day to get a number of little jobs done, and I've had a pleasingly productive day.

It's the time of year when I start trying to get the window frames painted. Last week, two of the last wooden windows on the back of the house were replaced with uPVC, which (in addition to looking rather good, especially for uPVC) means I have two fewer frames to worry about. Of course, the time-consuming Georgian-barred windows on the front are no fewer, and it's those which have always taken the time.

However, before embarking on this year's painting, I decided to install some eye bolts on the front wall, in order to tie down the ladder while using it. I've had enough of bouncing on an unsteady ladder, and don't enjoy working on one at the best of time. The window at the end of the study has always needed a rather extended ladder, as the ground drops off in that direction, and the path has stepped down towards the level of the garage. It's always, therefore, been the worst climb.

To combat this, I've installed two M12 shield anchor bolts (18mm holes, which aren't for the faint of heart, or drill), one on either side of the window, at about 180cm height. Using a ratchet strap passed around each stile and angled down through the bolt, the ladder can now be tightly held in place. The result is revelatory: I felt much more secure, and less conscious of the drop...

That window, and two dining room ones, are now done: I'm only planning to chip away at the painting, with the aim of getting about half done over the next couple of months.

Next, I strimmed the half of the orchard I didn't manage to do eleven days ago. I'm hoping I'll only have to do this regularly for another 12-15 months, and that we can think about a couple of sheep by then.

I've painted some of the remaining legume/sweet pea supports, which means their bituminous feet (the underground bit) are done, and as many of their above-ground elements as I could get to (given that the tarry feet were drying).

I shan't dwell on unblocking the kitchen drain.

The work on the garage has been going on since the end of last week; sorting the foundations took a little while, but the builder started the actual walls yesterday, and has finished them today. The uneven-ness of the walls has complicated things slightly, and none of the windows are going to be quite the same height. The joiner will be along on Monday to measure up, and hopefully the building work will otherwise be done tomorrow. Next up will be the replacement of the dining room window with a set of patio doors.

After lunch, I took the time to do a wander of the garden with camera in hand. It's been a while, but here's where things are up to.

Bees foraging in the wallflower in the front garden (© Ian 2014)

The dining room windows, for now, until the patio doors go in (© Ian 2014)

The sweet pea supports (© Ian 2014)

One of the sweet peas is flowering; several more are on the verge of doing so (© Ian 2014)

The heuchera bed; not sure whether the quince has set fruit (© Ian 2014)

One of the astrantias in the copse bed (© Ian 2014)

The long border in front of the dining room (© Ian 2014)

The mess of the pond aside, the bed next to the septic tank has filled out well, and needs pruning (© Ian 2014)

The aquilegia here has gone slightly mad this year (© Ian 2014)

Astrantia flower (© Ian 2014)

Mostly-planted vegetable garden (© Ian 2014)

Red Duke of York potato (© Ian 2014)

Green roof wild flowers, with foraging bees (© Ian 2014)

Green roof on wood store (© Ian 2014)

Day lily which we didn't know was there (© Ian 2014)

Weed-membraned knot garden (© Ian 2014)

Inside the garage before work on the wall/windows (© Ian 2014)

New garage front (© Ian 2014)

Stone cills & jambs being supported while curing (© Ian 2014)

Window apertures ready for windows (© Ian 2014)