Last month I joined a local gardening swap group on Facebook and it’s been a great source of information from more experienced gardeners, particularly on what grows well locally, and, of course, opportunities to get or trade free goodies for the garden. Tonight I picked up some seed Jerusalem artichokes from another member. I have heard about them, but never seen them in shops either to eat or grow, so when someone offered some up, I leaped.
Here is my cat inspecting a few before they’re planted
I initially thought about planting them in hessian sacks, but apparently they don’t need to be so deep, so I might leave those for something deeper rooted, and plant these in one of the mostly-vacant beds instead. I’m really looking forward to seeing how they look as they grow – apparently the flowers are much like sunflowers – and of course to taste the spuds once they’re ready for harvest!
i admired the woman’s garden while I was visiting – at the back of this photo it curves through to a vegetable section, about 6 low beds, and it just all looked so established & sweet. It was certainly inspiring. Mine has a way to go…
I had to pick up some more netting & stakes from the garden centre today to get the strawberries all tucked in out of the birds’ reach, and couldn’t help but check out the rose display they had. Someone else on that gardening swap group had posted photos of their own roses, one of which was so beautiful and prolific – a Dublin Bay, she said. And there was one on this pallet display, so after only the slightest hesitation, I picked it up. At the front of the house I have a couple of white & peachy/yellow roses – Sanders’ White, Ghislane de Feligonde, and Alberic Barbier – but there’s a perfect sized gap for this lovely red rose. With any luck, I’ll train them all to climb against the fence & front of the house, something like in this photo…
The windows on the ground level are for the laundry and storage area, so they won’t block any light coming into the lounge, but should look pretty spectacular from the road in a few years. Fingers crossed!
between my teeth 