Just went out to do a photo shoot for #mygardenrightnow, and I think I may be in the winter end of the gardening spectrum of all those participating. The temperature is -13C, with windchill it's -23C. Luckily we are sheltered so there's not much windchill here. But it's not exactly gardening weather yet.
I checked on the raspberry canes, which are all tied in and looking great. Behind me is the vegetable plot with tomato cages and dead kale. Up to the right in the photo are two cordoned apple trees and there's a cold frame behind them - a frozen frame at the moment. Not a lot in there as yet. Behind the vegetable plot is a lilac hedge, and the flowers are on the other side of that. Nothing on show at the present but snow.
I have some of my winter-sown seeds on the deck, and some down on a table in front of the poly tunnel. When I put them out, last month, I stuck them into a snowbank on the table. Now,
that snow is gone. See, spring
will come! It's lovely and warm in the poly tunnel at the moment, but I don't dare put anything out there as it will freeze tonight. All the regularly-sown seeds (vegetables, etc.) are indoors for quite a while yet. The winter-sown ones are all hardy annuals or perennials which would happily self-sow if they had a chance. Nothing happening in there at the moment! It's tempting to put them in the cold frame but they need the snow and rain to water them - my hose can't be outdoors in this weather either so I can't water them.
Luckily I have a few bulbs indoors to cheer me up on days like this! This is Amaryllis
'black pearl', bought at the Veseys bulb sale last fall. I potted it up at Christmas. It took quite a while to develop roots but my long wait has been rewarded!
I have a lot of seedlings in the office and the den - the two rooms with the best southern exposure, and it's where I also have my attempt at growing a standard fuchsia. I had five slips, taken late in the fall, which I discovered had rooted, so I potted them up and started tying them in to sticks. I have to confess that I didn't
think they would make it to the top of the sticks I could find at the time I was potting them - now I wish I'd had longer ones. All five are doing well - they
do get aphids from time to time but I've been taking them in to the bathroom for a shower every now and then and that seems to work to clean them off, at least temporarily.
The aphids love the new side shoots, also, and as I have to pinch
those off, I take great pleasure in pinching the aphids to death at the
same time. I believe these are a white fuchsia (both flower parts are white) which
might be '
Annabel', though I'm not sure. It is really hardy and easy to propagate for me, and it tends to have long branches, so I hope that they will make an interesting statement in the flower garden this summer.
