Going Undercover: Part One

Due to our being continually thwarted by the good old British weather our greenhouse plans have been turbo charged and it's been all systems go at the minion household! Of course, it wasn't as easy as just popping down our local supplier, picking a greenhouse we like the look of...... and Bob's your uncle. No, there has been a lot to consider and a LOT of prep work, some of which has already been documented here. But after choosing a location and clearing the area...it was time to SHOP! We started by checking out a good sturdy modern aluminium design on www.greenhousesdirect.co.uk which is a company reasonably local to us. The Rhino caught our eye.

The Rhino

These greenhouses are tough and long lasting and you don't even have to have a concrete base. They can sit right onto levelled soil. This was the sensible choice, practical, durable, by far where the smart money would go.......and that's why we opted for this:

The Swallow Kingfisher

What can we say, we went with our hearts.....you see, we want our greenhouse to not only be a place to hide when the heaven's have opened but to also be a thing of beauty that adds to the view from our living room window...and let's face it, the Swallow Kingfisher is sooo pretty :-).

The upshot of this choice meant we needed a good solid base. So, it was time to lay a patio. We enlisted the help of our long-suffering friend Christine H and Minion 1 was called back from University for the weekend...we needed a full minion mobilisation.  Charlie went to a local builder's merchant with the stats of the base and they were very helpful. He returned with an order of hardcore, sharp sand, cement and patio slabs. We also hired a thump thump machine (I'm sure that's the technical term for them) and a cement mixer to make life a little easier. Sounds pretty straightforward huh. Yeah right. It was a really hard couple of days. Here's how it went......

Charlie's wooden frame for the base

Christine and I do battle with the last beech tree stump. It took us about 40 minutes to shift it!

Minion 1 and Chris then did battle with a couple of hundred roots!
and 15 wheelbarrow loads of heavy clay soil.

Chris was very grateful for 'Foreman' Charlies advice and guidance 'ahem!'.

Minion 5 lends a hand shifting hardcore. 

Kate has a quick, supervised go on the thumpy thumpy machine. 

Charlie lays the slabs on a sharp sand and cement mix 10:1 if you're interested.
He also found these great spacers to help him put even gaps between the slabs.

Chris takes a moment to wonder if our friendship is worth it :-)

We did feed poor Chris after this...and we gave her alcohol!

Voila...One Greenhouse base ready for action.

 We were all very sore after two days of hard slogging but it's going to be worth it when our beautiful greenhouse arrives. The order is in now....watch this space for Part Two.

A Little Soul Food

Even though our garden has been given over to the production of food, there are a few quiet corners where I am starting to sneak some flowers in. After all, it's not just our bodies that need nourishing. So, this weekend I hit the garden centre and finally got some alpines to fill my doulton sink. Minion 5 was my helper on this little project as Charlie was thoroughly uninterested. 

We started off by mixing a good alpine planting mix. They like lots of drainage so we mixed  1 part eco grit with 2 parts of John Innes No. 2 (a potting on mix of compost). Then we planted up the small pots. Minion 5 took charge of this. She was fantastic!

After two lovely Armerias were potted up we turned our attention to that Doulton sink that Charlie was so rude about. Firstly, we covered up the sink hole with some crocks. Then we half filled the sink with our mix. Then we placed the plants in their planting positions:

This is the arrangement we decided on. With the trailing plants at the front and the clump forming ones at the back. Then Minion 5 filled the container nearly to within 2.5 cm from the brim and we topped it off with some white and red decorative gravel. Lovely!

 We were very pleased with the result and the display will only get better when the flowers become established.

From Bottom Left: Phlox subulata 'Marjorie', Achillea 'Huteri', Phlox stolonifera 'Pink Ridge'.
From Top Right: No label (I just liked the colour), Semperivium 'Red Tips', Semperivium 'Lawrenece'.

Armeria Maritima Vestivisus

Lovely...

Charlie 1, Slugs 0

On a previous post I shared the saga of Charlie v The Slugs...well, I have an update. For the first time ever, it appears that my tireless husband has won the upper hand...

 After the freezing cold downpours of March and early April we were starting to get really worried that we wouldn't be enjoying any veg from our garden this year. We are sowing everything direct and that means we needed warm soil, but the brass monkeys weather meant time was tick tick ticking and there were still no bloody seeds in the ground. Still, the sun poked his head out at last and we charged into the garden with our little brown packets of 'Real Seed' and seeded up all our raised beds. Trouble was...wet weather and clay soils = slugs, and lots of 'em!..and we inwardly groaned at the thought of the slimy black  swines eating their way through our seedlings. But then my intrepid husband found 'Nemaslug' on the internet. 

http://www.wigglywigglers.co.uk/wildlife-garden/natural-pest-control.html

I'd heard of them before but never tried it. It all sounded deeply suspicious to me. Strange little nematodes that kill slugs and don't harm anything else!?!? And if you believe that I've got a nice bridge I can sell you! Charlie, however, was desperate to protect out little seedlings. He ordered a pack and watered it in.....and.....well, nothing......everything is growing. There's no slug damage....anywhere. The peas are sprouting away unmolested. Everything in the garden is happy. I stand corrected, I eat my hat along with my words....they only bloomin' work!

Rising Above It

After our disaster with the potatoes last year we decided we really needed another raised bed to minimise the damage from surface flooding. I'm good with words and plants but not so good with the whole DIY thing, so in steps my better half to take over. I asked Charlie to write this blog entry as  but he's a bit shy on the blog front he respectfully declined so I've done my best. You understand that I was merely the supplier of coffee and the occasional 'That's looking great my love', so I may be a bit sketchy on the technical side of the construction of the bed....

Charlie saws the wood to the appropriate length with a chopping whirligig machine
that looks like it will take your thumb off soon as look at you.

These are the lengths of wood. Charlie informs me there were 2 x 8' and 2 x 7 '.

He clamped them together with these clampy thingimawhatsits and screwed them together.

Job Done!!

Sorry I can't be more specific. He made it look very simple and the bed was up in less than an hour. We used soil from another part of the garden to fill in and mixed in some multipurpose compost and that was that. So we're all systems go with Bed A, and not before time as the sun has finally come out.. By the way we found an ingenious way of keeping Minion 6 amused while all this was going on. She is now 15 months and is nicknamed 'Baby Dragon' because she roars at people and generally causes destruction and mayhem wherever she goes....but not, it seems, when she's zipped into a trampoline with a few toys and Charlie's fishing umbrella to keep the sun off us (don't call the authorities. We are generally good and loving parents and she really enjoyed the trampoline).

So all the beds are now up and running. We have sown seed in all of them and are waiting for our seedlings to pop out.  Charlie came up with a great plan to assist with seed sowing. He got an old length of wood and cut it to the width of our raised beds. Then he drilled holes 1" apart all along the wood (see right). I used this when I was putting the seed in the ground and it was brilliant to help get the spacing right. I used a pencil poked through the wood to make the sowing holes....easy! I still haven't managed to plant my Alpine trough yet but the garden is looking good and we're hoping for some good weather to help our little seedings in the next few weeks.