Month: April 2020

Growing vegetables, fruit and flowers, Why I garden3 Comments

Twenty- six vegetables

Reclaiming Paradise

We’ve been wondering about doing something to support the #2.6challenge with various ideas about 26 thises and 2.6 thats to raise money for struggling charities. ‘I bet I’ve got 26 different vegetables growing in the garden right now’, I boasted. Reader, I do (if you include fruit). I pondered the best way to list them and decided on alphabetical order. 1. Apples – Howgate Wonder – just coming into bud – for more about these beauties see here 2. Apples – Red Falstaff – flowers just opening 3. Apples – Sunset – in full bloom 4. Blackcurrants – tiny buds … Continue reading Twenty- six vegetables

Growing vegetables, fruit and flowers8 Comments

There will be peas

Reclaiming Paradise

Today has been the big pea planting day. Following last week’s runaway success with following the #SixOnSaturday gang I’ve had another go. So there will be six peas, or six pea related stories. Here goes. You’ll remember that a few weeks ago I experimented with sowing peas in egg boxes (of course you do, but if not you can find out more here). Well, that seems to have worked really well, as lots of different peas have germinated beautifully this way. Here are the ‘Salmon Pink’ peas, growing happily in their egg box 2. And here is how they look … Continue reading There will be peas

Why I garden18 Comments

Joining the six on Saturday crew

Reclaiming Paradise

My Saturdays are usually taken up with ‘stuff’ so I don’t usually do #SixOnSaturday , the weekly garden bloggers’ ritual – for more see here – But we are living in unusual times, and I’ve got the Easter public holiday weekend away from the day job for the first time in living memory. The reason for this is very boring but it means I woke up this morning without the usual Saturday list of stuff and have time instead just to enjoy the flowers, so here they are. Here’s a camellia in full bloom. This plant was a gift from … Continue reading Joining the six on Saturday crew

Growing vegetables, fruit and flowers4 Comments

Seedlings and potatoes

Reclaiming Paradise

This weekend the vegetable growing really got going. First of all, though, please admire this amaryllis which has been sitting on the bathroom windowsill for about ten years, doing absolutely nothing. Well that’s not entirely true. It has produced green leaves every year but no flowers for a very long time. This was the year it chose to flower. We may have to wait another ten years for the next flower but I am patient. Back to the vegetables. The seedlings on my windowsill have been romping away Cucumbers, tomatoes and huge mass of out of date basil seeds which … Continue reading Seedlings and potatoes