Back home after a fortnight's holiday to find a cobweb festooned greenhouse, cuttings that have got on with their business silently sending out roots, the first piles of discarded leaves and gleaming red berries which have appeared out of nowhere. The allotment remains undiscovered terrain until tomorrow and goodness knows what has been going on there whilst my back has been turned. New seed catalogues have landed on the doormat along with some gardening magazines. There seems to be a myriad of jobs to catch up on but for once the weather looks as if it is going to oblige with predictions of the warmest spell of early autumn weather for some twenty five years! What an unexpected surprise. So this week feeling reinvigorated after breathing in both sea and country air I am going to :
- sort out the cold frame and make sure that all pots are labeled before the onset of winter. No more guessing games next spring.
- make sure that I sort out and send off my spring bulb orders. This year I am going to be restrained and not bite off more than I can chew.
- get my order off for some garlic cloves.
- start making some inroad into eating some of the potatoes which I harvested from the allotment before we went away.
- make a list of what will need sheltering in the greenhouse 'ere the winter storms begin.'
- start making inroads into clearing one of the raised beds at the allotment which has had permanent planting in up to now.
- check to see whether there are any seeds that can be saved.
- gently brush away those cobwebs as they can prevent overwintering butterfly chrysalis from emerging in the spring.
Think that's enough for one week. What are your plans for early autumn?
Your holiday spot looks lovely but I can't guess where it is - the beach reminds me of Pevensey Bay on the Sussex Coast. My autumn plans are similar to yours but include sowing some salad leaves, spinach and pak choi. Garlic and onions have to be ordered but somehow whenever I go near the computer I get distracted!
ReplyDeleteWow, I think that would be a list for the next month for me. I'll just be happy if I can get some clearing of beds and digging done at the allotment.
ReplyDeleteGlad you had a lovely holiday! Not sure if your newfound ambition makes me feel inspired - or guilty. lol
ReplyDeleteI have been panicking about how much I need to do but the good weather forecast and no plans for next weekend means my panic has subsided a little.
ReplyDeleteI did laugh at the must label stuff in cold frame job - I have so many times wished I had done that when presented with a pot of earth in the spring.
Good luck glad to hear you sounding reinvigorated
Your list sounds a lot like mine - I too have just come back from my hols - but today the weather has been good and I have made a reasonable start in tidying up the garden - hopefully I can tick off quite a few jobs by the end of the week.
ReplyDeleteTo give the greenhouse a proper clean out once the chillies and tomatoes have finished. I skipped this job last autumn and all this year have never quite managed to shake off the guilty feeling.
ReplyDeleteAnd to start sowing some hardy annuals - although I say that every year...
Goodness, that must have been a good holiday to have generated that list! I need to check the "plant nursery" for unlabelled plants too, and I suspect a lot of them would like a larger pots, but then again, is it worth it given we are heading for their downtime?
ReplyDeleteLots of preparing the allotment and garden for winter. I hate saying the 'W' word and its hard to believe that its October tomorrow with weather like this. I've just been up to the plot with my shears and gone around the edges to tidy them up. It would be nice to have a strimmer but its just another thing to store somewhere and the exercise does me good.
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