A cold, snowy start to March

A cold, snowy start to March

What a week it was starting on the last day of February & lasting most of the first week of March. Although we got off rather lightly compared to some, we still had a lot of snow, ice & a terribly cold wind from the East, all the way from Siberia! My wife & I were virtual prisoners in our own home for 3 or 4 days! We dared not go out because of the wind & snow & our food supplies were practically out by Monday 5th March! To top it all the supermarkets wouldn’t deliver either! My wife tried to do some shopping online (March 1st) but they weren’t taking orders. At last we were able to go shopping & restock some of the things we had become very short of. We had only food for just one more day so the thaw & rise in temps came just at the right time!

I took some photos of the balcony & the street where we live but not being able to get out I haven’t been able to get any more photos of the town here.

Snow on Mayfield Road seen from the balcony:

Seagulls & snow seen from the side of Suffolk House:

I got a great 40 seconds of video of these gulls wheeling around in the air & even coming down to pick up some bread from the grass at the back of the building! Shame I can’t put it on here!

Snow covering plants & Tulips on the balcony:

Snow covering plants in trough on the balcony:

Snow on troughs on balcony floor:

Enough of snowy pictures, lets see some plants!

I have a couple of Marguerite standards on the balcony which my friend, Dick, from church gave me last summer. I feared they would die with such low temps as we had even though I had I wrapped them up with some thick plastic & put them on the balcony table behind the mini-greenhouse. I even put some fleece over the plants themselves inside the plastic. It seems the 3 measures saved them as when I took it all off of them on Sunday, (4th) they seemed to be alive still!

Marguerite standard on balcony table still flowering:

That is the most sheltered corner on the balcony & it’s where I normally keep any plants that might not resist the frosts of winter.

I also have some Fuchsia standards from Dick. Two of them fit inside the mini-green house but there was no room for the third one. It has had to take its luck on the balcony floor. Later though I did put it with the Marguerite standards on the table behind the mini-greenhouse. I scratched a tiny bit of bark off of a thickish stem & it seemed to be green underneath so perhaps it will survive after all! The two Fuchsias in the greenhouse should have no problem with surviving, even though one may look completely dead. With them there are a couple of Geraniums & a few other more delicate plants.

Fuchsia standards in mini-greenhouse on balcony table:

Fuchsias in tub partly under table on balcony:

Since taking this photo the plants have lost practically all their leaves & one plant in the front right hand corner may not make it through. A few days ago I scratched off a little bark on a branch & it looked green still – so there’s hope yet!

These are my own plants from previous years. I put 4 of my own Fuchsia cutting that rooted at the end of 2016 in this tub last year & the ‘Lady Boothby’ cutting in the centre which has astounded me by growing over 2m (6ft) in just one season!

Marguerite cutting rooted in mini greenhouse on balcony table:

The rooted cutting of a Marguerite sharing their accommodation has also survived!

Marguerite cuttings just taken:

I took a few cutting of the Marguerites before the “Beast from the East” arrived even though it’s not the right time of year.

I thought they may root but even if they don’t the ones outside on the balcony will probably be killed by the extreme cold. So I’ve nothing to lose. The cuttings indoors seem to be alright so I may end up with more plants than I bargained on! But that doesn’t matter as they flower so well all summer!

Today (7th) I had to remove a plant of Tradescantia fluminensis that couldn’t survive the -6C we had on March 1st in a tub on the balcony. In its place I broke up & sprinkled the contents of a seedhead from the Marguerites on the surface of the soil. Now to await their germination – if there were any seeds in it & if they can survive the cold from the next few weeks.

I will let you know if they germinate.

Fuchsias on balcony

Fuchsias on balcony

I bought about a dozen plants last year from the Society for the Blind shop in town, unfortunately they weren’t named. :-(( They flowered very well during the summer then I dug them up, cut them back & put them in pots in the autumn. They were kept pretty dry in the mini-greenhouse in the most sheltered corner of the balcony. The majority of them survived the winter even though they were outside.

I planted them up in the centre of 9 hanging baskets in late May, they were making good progress till we went to Spain, to attend to my wife’s mother, for 3 weeks in July.

During that time our son looked after them but unfortunately when we got back home I saw they had, for the most part, dried up!

Obviously my son hadn’t given the baskets enough water! He is new to gardening never having grown anything other than a Pothos in his flat in Spain. He now has his own garden & often asks his father for help!

I cut them back very drastically, leaving no more than an inch of stem on the plants in the hope they will grow back again.

The little plants that surround the dead stems of the Fuchsias are Busy Lizzie (Impatiens) seedlings that I put in the baskets about a week ago. As the baskets have next to no flowers after the Fuchsias died I thought these would make a good show to compensate.

Unfortunately it wasn’t to be & only one has survived the drastic cut back. (In the circle)

Hanging wicker basket with Fuchsia & trailing Begonia on balcony:

Fuchsia flowering in green pot on balcony floor:

Fuchsia flowering in strawberry planter on balcony:

Fuchsia ‘Lady Boothby’ on balcony:

‘Lady Boothby’ is supposed to be a “climbing” Fuchsia but with me it’s never got higher than about a metre (3ft).

And to finish this blog here is a photo of our balcony taken from outside:

Brilliant Fuchsias

Brilliant Fuchsias

The Fuchsias growing on our balcony are doing brilliantly! It’s been several years since I last grew Fuchsias on the balcony & then I had them in the 5 hanging baskets, I’d like to show at least one photo from then but they are all locked away on the HDD of my old computer & I have no access to them for the moment.

This time I bought 3 trays, 4 to a tray, of small plants from the ‘Society For The Blind’ charity shop in town.

Bush Fuchsias just bought for balcony:

I have no idea of what varieties they might be but they have been flowering brilliantly for some months.

I planted them in 3 small troughs, 3 to a trough, on the centre bar around the middle of the balcony railings. As I had 3 left over I put them in in other pots on the balcony floor.

I like Fuchsias very much but it can be difficult to keep them over winter as we live in a small flat & there’s not sufficient room to keep them inside during the coldest periods of the winter. I just keep them dry & in their pots on a big, round table in the most sheltered corner of the balcony. I also keep other borderline hardy plants there as well, like Geraniums (Zonal) & Pelargoniums. The 3 types of plant can survive the cold of winter if they are kept dry & protected from the winds. So I will try to keep these alive for next year there as well.

1: Fuchsias & Lobelias on the balcony railings from outside:

2: Fuchsias & Miniature roses in trough on balcony railings seen from outside:

3: Close up of Fuchsia in hanging basket on balcony:

This particular Fuchsia came in this small basket which my brother gave me. Neither he nor I realised the “dead twigs” were a Fuchsia when he gave me it. In fact the basket was full of what I thought might be herbs but as they were practically dead I put a couple of trailing Begonias in it & they have done extremely well!

4: Fuchsia flowering in strawberry planter on balcony:

5: Fuchsias flowering in green pot on balcony:

6: Fuchsias on balcony from outside:

7: Fuchsias flowering in trough on balcony railings:

These are the very latest photos which I took on 29th August 2015:

8: Fuchsias on balcony railings:

9: Fuchsias on balcony railings :

10: Fuchsias on balcony railings with Geranium ‘Black Prince’:

11: I even have a “climbing” Fuchsia ‘Lady Boothby’ on the balcony:

Although I’ve had it 3 or 4 years it has never done very well – in fact I think this year it’s doing better than the previous years yet it is only now starting to flower for the first time this year & we’re almost into September!

12: Last but not least, a photo of the strawberry planter with a Fuchsia growing in the top:

Fuchsia ‘Lady Boothby’

Fuchsia ‘Lady Boothby’

The Fuchsia ‘Lady Boothby’ that Tralamander sent me back in January …

… I took a few cutting & it …

… was put out on the balcony in March …

together with a couple of pots of cuttings I took from it:

It had spent several months in a pot on the table in a corner of the balcony while it grew bigger & while I waited for the weather to warm up but finally I planted it in a big pot where I have a shrub rose ‘Fred Loads’. As this rose has been getting worse every year – it hasn’t even flowered this year & the only bud that was forming was burnt off by the days of strong winds we had during late May – early June:

The growing tips of the Fuchsia were also burnt off a couple of weeks ago so I turned the pot around so that the plant is now pointing into the balcony which I hope will give it a little extra protection from the winds.

I noticed this morning that it is now growing again. The plant is about 40-50 cm high now but as soon as it can get going again I’ve no doubt it will take off & in a few months time will be taller than me:

I don’t know the eventual height but it is probably several metres. I don’t expect it to reach that sort of height this year though.