Mini-Daffs & Tulips in pots on the balcony railings

Mini-Daffs & Tulips in pots on the balcony railings

I planted some Mini-Daffs & Tulips in pots on the balcony railings in mid-October after removing the Begonias that had grown in them all summer a few days before.

I had bought some packets of small Narcissi bulbs & dwarf Tulips precisely to put in these :

but I also put some in the troughs on the bar that goes around the middle of the balcony railings.

As I have 3 troughs I planted them all exactly the same so I’ve added photos of all 3 troughs showing how I put short stemmed Tulips, mini-Daffs &, finally, Crocuses on top but only one of each trough:

I have planted up the 8 clay pots I have, 2 of them new, as well as 2 plastic pots & have put them in the aluminium rings I bought & used many years ago in Spain when we used to live over there:

At the present moment I don’t have any Pansies or Violas to overplant them with as I do every year. I hope to get some soon from the open air market in town.

Other years I’ve bought them there & they have done pretty well though I’ve had little success with them for the last few years. Several years they were infested with a heavy plague of tiny, itsy bitsy grey-white aphids that cover every green surface & suck the life out of the plants.

I mentioned this last year to the lady on the stall, when I was buying last year’s plants, & she assured me it wouldn’t happen again this year as all their plants are treated with a systematic insecticide before leaving the greenhouse.

In effect they didn’t become infested but they died mysteriously in the spring before they had chance to flower but I’ve absolutely have no idea of the cause! They just collapsed as if their roots had been eaten away or they had rotted away. On removing them I broke open the rootballs but they weren’t rotting nor did I find any sign of anything eating their roots, the rootballs were chock a block of roots. The only symptom I noticed was that they collapsed & turned brown. I hope that doesn’t happen again. They had been planted in new compost: I’d renewed the compost in all my pots & troughs last year before autumn planting.

I also planted up the 3 big, white troughs on the balcony floor, up against the railings. I put long stemmed Tulips & Daffodils in them & overplanted them with a few Crocuses from the last 2 years that had survived. Many of the Daffs will be quite small I think as many of them didn’t appear to be of flowering size. I’ll have to wait & see what happens.

When I get some plants to put in I’ll post a last photo here.

Pansies for winter flowering on balcony

Pansies for winter flowering on balcony

My wife & I went to a nearby town, St Ives, Cambs (not the more famous one in Cornwall!), 8km-5miles away today, 13th October 2014, to see if we could get some winter plants to put on the balcony. I was looking for the usual Pansies &/or Violas. We found a street stall selling plants & bought 4 packs of Pansies (Mixed colours), each pack holds 20 plants, giving me 80 plants in all.

Trying to work out just how many I needed I calculated 15 plants (3 rows of five, staggered) in each of the 3 long white troughs on the balcony floor =45. Then 2 plants in each of the 10 pots along the top of the balcony railings = 20. Then at least another five in each of the small troughs that sit of the rail that goes all around the middle of the railings =15. So 45+20+15=80! Pure coincidence as I didn’t know how many I wanted before arriving at the stall because, as I told my wife, it depended on the size of the plants. If they had been very small plants I’d need more, big plants & I’d need less!

I still need another pack of 20 though for my 5 hanging baskets on the balcony! Though that would be the bare minimum & double that amount would be F-A-R better!

When we arrived at the town, St Ives, we were somewhat dismayed to find we had made the trip in vain on what was a horrible morning – cold, raining & a strong North-West wind making it feel even colder though the thermometer read 12ºC! :-(( The traditional Monday street market had been cancelled to make way for the ‘Michaelmas Fair’! The main street where the market is normally held was chock-a-block with fairground amusements & attractions! We walked down to the far end thinking the market had been temporarily relocated down there & was hidden from our sight by the fairground. But there was nothing but more attractions down there.

Convinced there was no market at all we started to wander about the street & looked into some shop windows while we made our way back to the bus station to catch the next bus back home. When we reached the station we saw the next bus was 10 minutes away from arriving. As there are two different companies that both have buses between the two towns we went over to the stop when the 2nd one left from. As we were nearing the stop I couldn’t believe my eyes – over the far side of the bus station I could see plant stalls! Although the market itself had been cancelled the two plant stalls had turned up & were installed just outside of the bus station itself! We hurried over, forgetting all about the bus times, to have a look around. We very soon found they both had a very similar array of Pansies of differing sizes & prices. At the 2nd stall they had an offer of 2 boxes of 20 plants in each for just £8! We snapped up 4 boxes immediately & would have got another couple if we’d been able to manage them!

As we made our way back to the bus stop a bus we were hoping to catch arrived, some people got off & others got on which gave me the opportunity to get alongside it but the driver closed the doors & pulled out not taking any notice of my trying to signal him to wait a moment longer so we could get on! I don’t know of course if he really saw me but couldn’t be bothered to stop or if he genuinely didn’t see me. They are on a very tight timetable & have very little leeway. Anyway there are 4 buses an hour so it only meant a wait of 15 minutes. It it had been the first of the two it would have meant a 2 hour wait for the next!

We got home & the window of three hours with none, or very little rain, continued open so we only got a little wet while waiting for the bus to take us to St Ives. Now I will have to wait a day or two before I can plant them out. I may garden on a balcony but I’m as subject to the vulgarities of the weather as well as any other gardener who has to work outside. The prevailing wind direction (SW) means the rain is blown directly into our faces, so to speak, as the balcony faces SW! So I have to wait for a dry day before I can go out & plant them!

Allotments during April – May 2012

Allotments during April – May 2012

I had a nasty experience on the plot the other week! I was shifting compost from the heap to the bed I was making up for beans in a few weeks time. On the 2nd or 3rd trip with the barrow chock-a-block with compost I found it was impossible to push it! After struggling for a few minutes I looked at the wheel – I had a puncture! Fortunately a fellow allotmenteer lets us use his barrow so I had to go over & get it & transfer the compost from one to the other! As his barrow is smaller than ours I had to make two trips!

On one of the previous trips – now I think about it that was when it must have happened – I found a pane of glass from the greenhouse had fallen out & I’d had to stop & pick up all the broken pieces.

Around about that time also I had a third accident I stepped on a piece of iron with rusty nails in it & one nail went through my shoe into my foot! Fortunately it was at a point where I have quite a thick callous & when I checked my foot I didn’t find any blood on my sock, (I was wearing white sports socks), nor when I took them off to go to bed later that night. I was worried about Tetanus at first but, seeing as there was no blood, there should be no danger. I had my last booster about 5 years ago so I should be alright.

My brother, who has been helping me out for the last few weeks, wasn’t there at the time. But his work has been invaluable! He really has been a Godsend!

Gerry’s Broad Beans

Just planted out …

A fortnight later …

Another 3 weeks have gone by …

Daffodils & Tulips:

Gerry’s Daffodils & Tulips looked fantastic at the end of March & they have continued through all of April though they had finished at the start of May:

Daffodils & Tulips beside our shed with Rhubarb plants:

Here you can see the Tulips in full flower in front of our shed:

Onion sets ‘Sturon’:

These were planted by my brother, Ken & myself …

Here they are 5-6 weeks later:

Early potatoes

Gerry got 2 green pots full of seed potatoes which I calculated to weigh about 3kg each but we don’t know what variety they are.

Here is the ‘Unknown variety’ (from the green pot) now sprouting as well as my ‘Arran Pilot’ …

He also brought down a couple of bags of 1st Early ‘Rocket’ which Ken planted for him on St Patrick’s Day! Last year I discovered that St Patrick’s Day was the traditional day for putting in the first seed potatoes. It was just sheer coincidence that we planted them that day as it was a beautifully sunny, warm Saturday morning & many of our fellow allotmenteers took advantage of the day to plant theirs as well!

This photo is of ‘Rocket’ at the bottom of the 1/2 allotment Gerry has …

Here are the same spuds a few weeks later …

This photo is of ‘Rocket’ at the top part of the 1/2 allotment Gerry has …

Here are the same spuds a few weeks later …

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My own allotment – Plot 12A

These Beetroot ‘Bolthardy’ were planted out in early autumn & have been there all winter …

Here is the result of the Beetroot once harvested …

The only problem is that they had started to ‘bolt’! I took them home & cooked them but they were, for the most part, totally & absolutely tasteless! UGH!!! I had to throw the majority away! I’d been looking forward to eating my first Beets of the year as well!

Beetroot ‘Bolthardy’ seedlings:

These Beetroot ‘Bolthardy’ seedlings were put into the ground at the beginning of April …

Here they are just a few weeks later …

These are the same plants a few weeks later …

Lettuce Paris Island Cos:

I’ll show you more photos very shortly.