Its Spring!!!!!!!

Well this update is long overdue to say the least but as they say better late than never. I had planned to post this last night but the neighbourhood lost its electricity for all of about 20 seconds and some how it messed up Virgin media’s cable network and their broadband, so with nothing interesting to see on the telly and no internet access, it was an early night for everyone.
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Anyhoo! Enough with the excuses, time to tell you what’s been up this last week, the first week of March which is counted as the beginning of spring in my books but brace yourself this is going to be long post, so you might want to get your self a cup of your favourite brew.

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01/03/2010
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Woke to a lovely sunny day of blue skies and warmer temperatures, there was a touch of frost on the ground but spring had announced its arrival with the blooming of crocuses opening their faces to the warming rays of the bright sunshine.
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This change in the weather gladdened my heart to no end and re lit the spark needed to get myself back into gardening mode. So I spent the day finally!!!! Sorting out my crop rotation plans on paper for the garden (the allotment one has been done already).
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A saunter around the garden revealed:
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More floral elegance…
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Red orache self sown seedlings coming up in a vege bed.

And what appears to be baby water boatmen beetles swimming around in a bucket of water which has a quarantied bulrush plant from my neighbours pond (its guarantied to easily remove all traces of duckweed).

02/03/2010

So with the second day of the month as favourable as the first I donned my wellies and got outside to do a couple of tasks.
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The task I really wanted to get done was the pruning of my living willow bench, which you can see in the picture on the right needed to have all of last years new upright growth trimmed to maintain the original shape of the bench, you can see job all done in the picture below.

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I also removed the containers that normally contain the summer plantings used to decorate the small step used to access the girls playhouse. I replaced them with the containers which contain the spring flowering bulbs. One of the pots which have crocuses in them had signs of crocus seedlings sprouting. I threw a small handful of collected seeds from the garden’s crocuses last summer into the pots because the local squirrels had made off with a number of the bulbs last spring, so it was nice to see the seedlings coming up this year, I assume those will flower next year.
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And the first critter to be photographed for the year was taken.
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A 7 spot lady bug in between some of the stems of the willow bench, it was very much alive as it moved a little when I disturbed it. Its discovery bodes well hopefully for this year in the war between pests and beneficial critters. I also saw the first queen bumblebee for the year as well but she didn’t settle long enough on the crocuses she visited for me to get a shot of her.

Later on I got my sowing mojo on and went a tad bit crazy with the sowing of sweet peppers x 8 varieties. I also sowed three types of aubergines which I plan to grow on in the greenhouse this year. Ochro and French & African marigolds were also sown in earnest.
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03 & 04/ 03/2010 - was spent being a mummy and also working in my loft studio making pieces for the blogshop. The sun was still out, though the wind had returned to its chilly self.

05/03/2010

Woke to continuing sunshine and frosted surfaces.
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The rhubarb is making a show too.

A few weeks ago a neighbour who lives in the other street was having an old oak tree cut down and so I took the opportunity to beg a few logs off of him. Why you are wondering, well I have an allocated area for some mushroom logs which has a grass patch for field mushroom growing (I am yet to sow it with mushroom spawn). Anyway I got 5 logs off of him and ordered a starter kit of three varieties, which arrived on the 5th. So I spent the afternoon drilling holes, hammering treated dowels and sealing with hot wax, on one of the logs. I’ll have two extra logs and so I’ve ordered two more varieties and will hopefully all five inoculated logs in their final resting place by the end of the week.

I also sowed my onion seeds a white variety and a red variety.

06/03/2010 - Mummy duties and shopping errands ruled the day, the wind was bitter but the sun was still shining.

07/03/2010

The sun is still shining but the wind is a not quite yet ready to relent its winter duties. The mornings are still frosty with lots of frozen water as well.
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Today I made it to the allotment and was there for about 3½ hrs. I was able to string up the bed boundaries for half of the plot and dug over one of the beds and proceeded to plant out the poor suffering garlic bulbs, whether I get anything from them is a wait and see outcome.
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When I got home I checked my sown seeds which with the current sunny weather I have been moving to the greenhouse during the daytime hours for them to get lots of warm temperatures and in the evening I move them back into the house. Anyway I found evidence of a sprouting African marigold seedling, yeah!!!
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Well that’s all for now, thanks for sticking around to read my entire ramblings. I hope to get some more sowings done today and hope to update later on this week on any gardening tasks I get done during the next few days.