Friday 21 March 2014

Seeds and bulbs

I am terrible at growing plants from seed because I can be a lazy gardener when it comes to checking on the propagator and making sure they're watered and that the heat is just right. I tend to get all excited about sowing the seeds and am quite vigilant until they start to sprout, after that I tend to get lazy or simply forget about them for a couple of days. It's quite a common occurence for me to suddenly remember they need attention, go to the greenhouse and find all the little seedlings have keeled over and shrivelled up.
The same thing happened this year with my Tomato seedlings - some came up, I forgot about them and they shrivelled up. Of course I doused them with water in the hope that some miracle may prevail and my efforts at seed growing weren't entirely ruined however there was no saving them.
The water did start the remaining seeds into action though and I now have healthy Tomato seedlings romping away - no need to buy plants this year hopefully.
Tomato plants aside I'd been watering some Thalictrum seeds in the same propagator even though I had no real belief that they would sprout so I was very surprised and very pleased when I saw this yesterday

Thalictrum seeds

Now I just have to be vigilant and keep them alive.

This may be strange coming from a "gardener" but I've never really grown spring bulbs. I remember trying to grow Tulips in the lawn once but they never once flowered so I kind of gave up trying - I'm really not that tenacious am I!
However I have recieved so many bulbs this year that I figured I should at least give them all a fighting chance. The Allium bulbs are all up and showing signs of life (only those in the PT though. The garden ones are not doing much at all) but the ones I'm really chuffed with at the moment are the Hyacinths and the Crocus - I honestly believed that growing these plants was beyond my patience so I claimed I didn't like them enough to even try.
I have now changed my mind, how can I not like these

Crocus

Hyacinths bought for me last year and I've actually managed not to kill.


The willow cutting I took earlier in the year are romping away with plenty of roots and leaf. The problem I now have is that the land isn't quite ready for these to be planted so I may end up having to plant them in temporary beds which is not something I want to do. I have neither the time nor inclination to plant these whips temporarily just to have dig them back up and plant again later, they are so much easier to plant before the roots have stretched out and taken hold and they'll do that very quickly once they're in the ground.

Willow whips
The first sign of Spring for me is the call of the Curlews as they return to the field behind us and they've been calling for a week or so now. Alongside the Curlew is the return of the neighbours in the same field although this year Mr Farmer appears to have delved into a different breed of sheep. I have no clue as to what they are but they're certainly different to the normal ones I see.


3 comments:

  1. Are those brown sheep zwartbles. We once stayed in a cottage in North Yorkshire that had then in the field next door.

    I've never grown alliums but I think they are summer bulbs so plenty of time yet!

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  2. I think the dark one is a Torwen.....welsh badger faced sheep but I could be wrong, I too am rubbish at seeds but needs must the amount we need to grow now

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  3. Ah, Linda, you will have to be very tenacious to get your Thalictrum to reach flowering size. What about those folk who can name sheep, now that is impressive.

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