Gardening Tips

I can hear you all saying to yourselves "Oh the hubris of the woman, she's only been at it a year!!" But for what it's worth here are a few tips I would like to share. You probably know these things already...

Tip #1 -About 35 years ago, a friend gave me a bulb planter and a bag of daffodil bulbs. I have just realised that this gadget is ideal for planting runner beans. I've grown them in loo roll tubes, as per Huw's guidance. This will make a perfect hole of the right depth

- I can pop the tube in, without disturbing roots etc, then fill up round the sides with compost.I now have 7 little bean plants and 2 larger ones round my teepee.

Tip #2 - walking to the Village Post Office before Christmas, I noticed a child's fireguard going begging. I had fancy ideas about a "fruit cage" and raspberries etc. I dismantled the panels so it would store tidily - but I have found another use for the narrow side panels. This makes a lovely little trellis for my new jasmine to climb. This sweet smelling plant was a birthday gift from my neighbour, who is encouraging my gardening endeavours, and wants to broaden my interest beyond vegetables!

Tip #3 - from my wonderful SIL Denise. I started my broad beans on the kitchen windowsill, then I moved them out to the greenhouse. But they seemed beset by little flies.

"Help!" I cried. She suggested that rather than spray the actual seedlings, I should put some flyspray onto a few cotton wool balls and leave them on the shelf between the plants. Brilliant - within 24 hours the flies had all goner, and they never came back! Thanks Denise.

Finally a NON tip, if there is such a thing...In March, Bob spotted a wasp in the carriage house [the side of the Lathe Palace where the Skoda is parked] A couple of days later, he noticed the tiny beginnings of a wasp nest.

We did some internet research, and discovered we needed to spray and remove the next before it got any bigger. A number of sites said "You can deter wasps by putting old fashioned mothballs in places where they are flying"

So he sprayed the nest, then removed it [it was tiny, smaller than an orange] and lined up mothballs all round the inner edge of the roofspace. Bob has been vigilant in checking, and last week he spotted another tiny nest - and what is worse, a couple of wasps flying around up there, and actually landing on the mothballs!

We have concluded that this tip about them being a deterrent is "a load of old cobblers" if you'll pardon the vulgar expression.