Try French climbers for a change.  The variety I bought are Cobra and they produce lots of long tender beans quite quickly. I thought I’d left them too long as they were so big but I got a thumbs up from the neighbours. They freeze well too.  

Good luck with the runners. 

---

Thanks Caz. Actually I'm so excited to see clean green beans this year I'm harvesting them and cooking them straight away, but it is good to know the French beans freeze well, as I've wasted bumper crops in the past.

---

5 packs of Runner Beans sliced and parboiled. Cooled, then placed in Freezer.  Scarlet Runner has now been taken down.

---

Tomatoes are being harvested this week before the wind blows them from the plants.

---

Are they growing well inside the green house I assumed?  Tomatoes hate cold and wet weather which I want to grow some when i get a green house.

I grow them every year outside in a sheltered, sunny border, plus tumbling toms in a hanging basket.  They don’t crop as heavily as they would in a greenhouse but three or four plants are enough to keep us going.

---

Autumn's arrived because the Bishop of Llandaff's been toppled after last nights strong winds.

 

---

Glad I got the nasturtiums cleared before tonight's frost - they go really unpleasantly slimy

---

Well, all the walnut leaves have made Earth and most are bagged/ have been whisked off; couldn't resist a few handfuls in the brazier for atmosphere. Surprising number of flowers blooming.

---

Looking at the garden today, Bertie. The grass appears to be growing still! Not surprising, given the rain and surprisingly high temperatures. Happily it is too wet to be tempted to mow.

Roger

---

Yes, our grass is growing slowly but it’s going to need a cut in February if it stays mild. But it’s also like a swamp in places again after the copious amounts of rain recently.

On walnut leaves, I cleared the last of them earlier this month. If I don’t then they just blow all over the place.

 

---

Evening Roger. Quite right about the growing season extension- and the next few days look to promise max temps around 15C and minima between 10 and 14- akin to early May; quite remarkable but a sign of the times I suppose. Goodness knows what poor roots will be triggered into shooting!

As for the lawn, ours is a sorry sight (ref to Gandalf's post- a bog in places), not helped by the frantic scurrying of the daschund trying to get out, deliver and get in before he gets wet!

---

Snowdrops in bloom now, daffodils in yellow bud

---

Snowdrops noted in the village churchyard today! There have been a few earlier ones in local gardens.

Honeybees working Mahonia flowers in sunny spells.

Is winter over and done with?

Roger

---

Regardless, what lovely pictures that creates, Roger and DEW; I am just about at the point where garden depression is shifting!

Although the local fire station daffs are blooming as in all years, the snowdrops are just candling and there is a solitary purple crocus next the veg beds. We have failed this year to clear the woodland bank and front garden of dead debris. Looks grim. I just hope the new growth does what the Met might do to the Gray report- a bit of 'political scrubbing!'

Sorry - this thread should remain free of this stuff!

---

And the first lesser celandine aka pilewort out today

---

We're in the betwixt and between stage, Bertie. Storm Malik redistributed a lot of old sycamore leaves  from somewhere. I can't imagine where, but they are here now!  We had a good rattling last night - so I'm hoping Storm Corrie will have moved them on to save me a job.

Roger

---

Hi All!

I hope the northern contingent didn't suffer too much damage at the weekend!

Definite activity in the garden now which has prompted me to focus my attention on planting strategy for this season - Always such an optimistic time of year if you can catch a calm sunny day like we had here IMBY on saturday (we even managed to enjoy a bottle of wine in the sun, albeit in full winter garb!)

Its curious that the bulbs seem a bit later this year as its not been particularly cold. Daffs are emergent spears here but nothing more. In certain years i've noticed them as early as late Nov!

Lesser celendine leaves are out now which is always a welcome sight. I must remember to spread them about a bit more this year...

Honeybees noted by a colleague swarming around a food source at the weekend which was a curious thing to be told (vacant hive - perhaps they'll move in?!)

I'm optimistic for my Echium Pininana which have been riding it out in giant pots in my greenhouse. They've been a challenge in recent years but i'm hopeful for big things this season if the spring starts out on a warm note.

All eyes on the Robin box i constructed last year after the local mog destroyed their low level nest site.

 

 

 

 

---

Greetings MRazzell and welcome to the gardening thread. Sounds like you have a busy, busy gardening life already!

Does seem early for lots of honeybees now- although my knowledge is very limited. Roger P is the one to ask about that!

Well done for looking after your robins- good luck with that. 

Clearing the winter 'fluff' from our beds revealed one little shiny celandine flower on sunny Saturday. What a day that was- gave me loan of my pulse for the day!

---

 

Hi Bertie,

Yes, I try to keep busy outside whenever possible so this recent spell of settled weather in the south is most welcome (although no doubt we'll be bemoaning the lack of rain soon...but not quite yet).

My focus in the garden is very much on naturalisation of species (mostly native but some ornamental) and also habitat creation. Its not a big plot but i've seeded a perennial wildflower meadow in lieu of the front lawn and the majority of my borders are now being turned over to the organised chaos of self seeded natives and curios (e.g. the echiums and a few non-native verbascums - all bee magnets).

I'm a commercial landscaper by trade so its very much to opposite of what i do for a living, which is construct rather sterile, ornamental 'paint by numbers' gardens, usually on the rooftops of London.

My hope is that the Robins pay their due by keeping some of the pests at bay. The slugs last year were the most destructive i can remember - i even had to buy them a drink for their troubles, although the beer traps did keep the numbers down a little.

The celandine was a favourite of Wordsworth's apparenty...i've suddenly come over all poetic...

 

 

 

---

Quite a few people have commented to me about bees they have seen working recently. It's not unusual  for honeybees to come out on mild winter days for what beekeepers delicately call "cleansing flights". Their sticky blobs of bee poo can sometimes be "spotted" on cars and windows and take some shifting! Honey bees, being proper colonial super-organisms, have a bit of a specialist life style. The workers will fly at temperatures above 13°C with real action starting at 19°C. You would not expect them to fly below 10°C. If you look at Feb temperatures over the next few weeks you will see it's unlikely to see them out much. Given that their purpose, after pooing, is to find a bit of food, you will appreciate that is not easy at this time of year. There are few sources of pollen or nectar, i.e. proteins and carbohydrates. You will find them working snowdrops on warm days. I frequently see them on Mahonia and we are considering adding one of these to our garden.

Here's  the London Beekeepers Association useful webpage of what's in flower month by month.

https://lbka.org.uk/flowers_month.html

Roger

 

 

---

Following on from that bee-centered comment, here's a phenolgical take on it:

Climate change: UK plants now flowering a month earlier
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-60220661 

Roger

---

 

Very interesting Roger, and the bee poo has been noted too! I've often wondered what that is (if i've identified it correctly) and now you mention it, I recall having seen them deposit droppings whilst they go about their business - funny the things you notice when staring out into the garden .

 

Noted one of my Camellia making a rather bold but pitiful attempt at flowering today. Also came across a milk thistle that has so far perserevered the mild winter!

---

I'm hoping for a few days of hard frost to freeze the multiple dog poos that have accumulated on my [artificial] lawn over the 'winter'. Makes clearing them up far easier  

---

And my favourite poet of all time, Edward Thomas.

http://ww1lit.nsms.ox.ac.uk/ww1lit/items/show/3730

He's part of what I call the 'Selborne trio', along with Gilbert White and Richard Jefferies (another one to ask Roger about!!)

---