Gardening in March: confessions of a seed hoarder

I love this time of year. The first hints of Spring are starting to appear. The sun feels warmer on your face, new shoots are appearing and I get a chance to rummage through seed packets.

My trusty Mr Men tin sits on the shelf for most of the Winter. It's only in late February, early March that I dust it down and have a look at the masses of packets I've gathered over the years. There's all sorts in there, including sunflowers, cucumbers, salad crops and wildflower mixes to attract the bees. There's also lots of home-dried seeds from plants I like the look of when I'm out and about. I dry them in paper bags over the Winter. If I'm feeling particularly organised, I might even label the bags with what's inside.

I 'borrowed' this tin from Magoo a while ago and she seems happy for me to use it for my seeds. I think it reflects my serious attitude towards gardening...or maybe that should be 'winging it' attitude towards gardening. I'm not Little Miss Perfect...in fact I'm almost definitely Little Miss Busy, which leads me to be Little Miss Scatterbrain most of the time.

Anyway, I'm nothing if not ambitious when it comes to seed planting. The Spring always makes me want to grow tons of different things. In reality, come June or July, I'm usually growing my favourites. Things I know will survive on semi-neglect.

These include flowers such as:

- Nastursiums

- Calendula

- Petunias

- Cosmos

- Geraniums

On the allotment we usually stick to:

- Masses of potatoes

- Wig-wams covered in runner and french beans

- Beetroot

- Garlic

- Onions

- Parsnips

- Courgettes and squashes

- Strawberries

As per usual I've ordered loads of seed catalogues and this year I'd like to grow something new. Hence the carrot seeds. I'm hoping to grow them with Magoo in a pot at home. I've always been put off growing carrots because of the fly they attract. I hate using chemicals, so only like to grow things that are pretty pest free. Anyway, we're going to give the carrots a whirl and see what happens.

Magoo also wanted a homegrown pumpkin for Halloween. Last year we started growing them too late and had nothing to carve in Autumn. This year we'll try and be more organised. Famous last words...

We found a small local nursery that sells strips of vegetable seedlings last year. They worked really well on the allotment. I don't have a large greenhouse so I can't grow loads of things from seed. I'm happy to let someone else do the tricky germination bit and buy the seedlings to save on time and space on our crowded windowsills.

Wish us luck with the carrots...

I'm linking up with 'How Does Your Garden Grow' over on the beautiful mammasaurus.co.uk

'The List' over on youbabymemummy.com

'Making Home' over on www.mrscraftyb.co.uk

Calendula in July

I am a new convert to the joy of Calendulas. I only started growing them last Summer & fell in love straight away. They are one of the hardest working plants in the garden. As long as you deadhead them, they flower all Summer long from about June onwards. They have the sunniest flowers you're likely to find, the ones in my garden range from egg-yolk yellow through to sunset orange.

On top of all that, they have amazing medicinal properties. Calendula oil is used as an anti-inflammatory and a remedy for healing wounds. It can be used for burns, cuts and infections due to it's natural anti-septic and anti-fungal properties. It's well worth keeping a tube of Calendula Cream in your medicine cabinet.


The Calendulas growing in my garden are from seeds I saved from last year. They've been drying in a cup all through the Winter and I planted them in March. I'm really pleased with how vibrant they are this year. The only thing I've noticed is the seed heads from this year's plants have hardly got any seeds on them. I'm not sure if second generation Calendulas lose the ability to produce an abundance of seeds.

I'm linking up with the wonderful How Does Your Garden Grow #HDYGG over on mammasaurus.co.uk

spring, sunshine and seeds

The past couple of weeks have been glorious here in the UK. Sunshine nearly everyday, above average temperatures and loads of time to get out & about in the garden. Spring has to be one of the most magical times, everything is bursting back into life. I adore seeing the blossom arrive on the trees and planning the seeds I'm going to plant.

I've been planting out calendula, nasturtium and some other 'purple flower' I grew last year. The calendula came out of packet of mixed seeds last year & I fell in love with them. With regular dead-heading, they flowered all Summer long. I saved a heap of seeds from last year's plants & they've been drying in a cup all through the Winter.

Our apple tree was really unhappy last year. It didn't fruit at all & the leaves turned brown. I gave the tree a prune for the first time & so far, it looks much happier this year. It's starting to bud with blossom and the leaves look much better.

I also love nasturtium. I'm a big fan of easy plants that look after themselves and churn out heaps of flowers. I've planted a couple of seeds per fibre pot. The good thing about fibre pots is you can put them into the ground & not disturb the seedlings roots. I bought mine from Wilko, they are only 80 pence for 12 so definitely worth buying a few for your seedlings. I also go around pushing nasturtium seeds in here & there around the garden & wait to see what pops up later in the Summer.


The unidentified 'purple flower' has already started to sprout & I will need to pot them on soon. They also came out of the packet of mixed seeds last year & once again I saved lots of seedpods from the plants & dried them over the Winter.

I think possibly one of the best Spring-time treats is seeing the cherry blossom appear. It's so fleeting, gone after a few days, but it is utterly beautiful whilst it is around. We have two cherry trees, so I get to see plenty of my favourite blossom.


This week I'm linking up with 'How Does Your Garden Grow' #HDYGG over on www.mammasaurus.co.uk

Spring!

Spring is definitely on the way in the UK and it is such a fantastic time of the year. My thoughts always turn to gardening and veg growing, but now I am a new mum it's hard to know if I will have the time! I'm hoping once our baby is old enough I will get her interested in gardening, but at a few months old, I think that would be a bit ambitious for the 2010 growing season!



I have started chitting some potatoes and hopefully I will be able to grow some tomatoes. I need my annual homegrown tomato fix every year, the ones in the shops just aren't the same. I'm also planning on growing lots of herbs and salad leaves, possibly some beetroot and maybe some spinach. As our baby will be starting on solid foods soon, it would be fantastic to give her some homegrown produce. I'll see how it goes.


I spotted my first bee of the season yesterday. I'm not very good at identifying them, but it was very fat, so maybe a bumble bee? I know that honey bees are endangered, so I have started following "Help Save Bees" on Twitter, they also have a website. You can find out how to make a home for bees and help with the dwindling population by building a Bee Hotel over on the RHS website.



I have recently discovered the new Royal Horticultural Society gardening forum, it's called "My Garden". It's a great place to find gardening advice from other gardeners. There's lots of photos and tips and plenty of information for anyone stuck with a gardening query.

If you want to see some beautiful RHS gardens, take a look at the garden finder. The RHS are also on Twitter, you can find them here.