Canine ballet & empty gardens

The garden is looking bare now! Mr TG helped me to move most of the pots into the polytunnel over the weekend, though I'm wondering now if I was a bit premature as some of the plants still had plenty of green growth on them and this Clematis is even still producing flowers

Never before have I seen the seed pods burst open on the Flag Iris so I was quite pleased to spy one. I have no idea how easily Iris are to grow from seed but I harvested the seeds anyway - just in case.

I lifted the last of the Lilys at the weekend too and made a start on the Gladioli. I'm a newbie to Glads as I gave up on them a few years back when 'Spic n Span' didn't survive the winter outside. I planted some corms in the polytunnel this year, I wasn't sure what they were either so I was quite chuffed to see Glads pop up that look suspiciously like 'Spic n Span'. I don't remember digging them up last year but I did plant them nest to Montbretia and may have thought that's what these bulbs were - I really should keep a better diary of my actions and stop relying on my ever fading memory.
Anyways i have some bulbs lifted and they're covered in little bulbils, what's the chances of these making decent plants in the future? How do I pull em off the parent bulb - do they need a root attached? and then what do I do - store em for winter or plant them into pots?

The entertainment outside over the last day or so has been quite amusing, we could choose between Huntly and his rope escape trick

or Huntly practicing his ballet and facial poses

Lily bulbs

It doesn't seem to matter how much I promise myself that I'm going to post here everyday something always happens to get in the way and so here I am a whole week after my last post!
The weather here in Caithness has been really cold this past week but the wind has been non existent and even the rain has held off - in fact we've had some very sunny days.

One job this week was one I've been putting off because I wasn't sure how my back would cope with the bending but those Lily bulbs needed uplifting for winter storage. I would have left them in the bed over winter because it's in the polytunnel but I need to sort that bed out this winter ready to include a Grape vine next year - so those bulbs had to come up.

I've done this many times before (before I realised that Lily bulbs will survive winter outside here) and though I'm not sure of the correct way to store them, here's what I do.
First I lift them, then I trim the roots, brush off the majority dirt on them and then leave them in a tray for a few days turned upside down so that any water can drain away from inside the stems.
After a few days I clean them even further with a toothbrush and leave them in the tray covered with newspaper - I used to store them in sawdust but I found newspaper works just as well.

Some of these bulbs really grew huge over this year, look at the size of this smacker

I can't believe that I actually used to dispose of the tiny bulbils that I'd find attached to the main bulbs. I used to figure they'd take too long to produce anything but I was pleasantly surprised with the results when I gave them a try so now I keep all the little uns and grow them on in separate pots for a wee while.

I've been wondering why every time I go to the polytunnel a couple of Blackbirds seem to come flying out and while I was lifting the Lily bulbs the birds returned and showed me what was luring them

I wondered where all the apples in the polytunnel had gone, there was no sign of any on the floor - mystery solved.

Talking about trees, I'm not really one for appreciating the wonders of tree bark - to me it's just tree bark but we have this tree right next to my greenhouse and today I was actually drawn to the bark. I haven't a clue what the tree is but the bark was a lovely red colour

Summer Damson

A whole week since my last post - that's baaaaad! Problem is I feel that I have nothing of any use to say because the gardening is so slow right now and lets face it, who wants to hear me ramble on about stacking wood? Which seems to be what I've spent the last week doing - all my precious pallet wood.
It will soon be time to start taking the garden pots into the PT though and storing those bulbs, planting others and getting the garden ready to cope with winter so at least I'll have something interesting to say. Then there'll be all the building projects I have accumulated while I've been recovering from a slipped disc - including an extension to my greenhouse/workshop using pallets and windows we sourced for free, can't wait to get started on that one.
I've become quite addicted to Pinterest of late and spend a few minutes on it most days adding to my board. I found this sculpture which I would love for the garden (but could never afford). I'm not sure what it is about this particular sculpture but it seriously mesmerizes me, it reminds me of that film where a guy keeps going through time and can't control when it happens - it kind of looks like him when he's either just going or is just coming back.

I love this sculpture I found on Pinterest.

 

 

I managed to get round to giving that Adirondack chair and leg rest a coat of paint - I chose Cuprinol Garden Shades colour 'Summer Damson'.
Loving how it turned out and it's sooooo comfortable.