Wondered if we could inject a bit of new life into this thread, now that we're only weeks from the TRUE growing season, and the weather is at least going to give the gardens a chance to do their thing.

I for one was pleased to see several snowdrops bursting white this morning- this is the first year the daffs have beaten them to it!

It has been very mild Bert,with hardly any frost,
I have a small pond in my garden that would normally have had a few ice days by now.
I think it might take a while,even with cold weather for this to happen soon as the ground temps are a few degrees above normal.

Same for us Aimsir- my wife has not once had to put the cover over her fish this year. It does mean the sparrows can have a drink still.

Nice to see Grape Hyacinth and violet in flower. Even a buttercup.

We're still waiting for the violets, Art, but the primroses, cowslips and even one oxlip have made it out.

There are new shoots on some of our thyme plants too.

Notice we have two threads now for Gardening...Let's hope we continue with this one for onwards in 2016.

And I hope no-one minds me posting my garden related items in here, even if my climate is akin to that of Southwestern Portugal.

Yesterday I prepared a second bed (image below) as part of my renewed push in the garden. Due to last summer's water shortages, I neglected to plant anything and left my beds fallow for the most part. this meant the ground was rock hard and took some fair amending t get back into chape; I hand turn it down to two feet (usually because of Squash plants in summer).

The only things I maintained last year were were my perennial fruits, but since we've had more rain this winter so far than the whole of last winter, I've decided bite the bullet this year and grow some winter veg and early spring crops, with a view to planting summer veg in March.

One bed, not pictured has root vegetables in it, namely Swiss Chard, Beets, Turnip, Carrots, Parsnips, and radish.  The bed below will be home to peas, carrots, radish, and some mixed salad greens (mustard, Rocket).  I have butter lettuce growing all over my lawn right now as I tend to just let some lettuce bolt in summer and seeds to scatter.

The other beds (three remaining), need some work yet, and next weekend will likely get two more done as it is a long holiday weekend, and the city are giving away 6 burlap sacks of compost to each resident.

As you can see in the above image, yellow strawberries (an Alpine variety) are doing well over there to the left with some flowers. Over to the right I have a few key limes which I never picked and have turned yellow. They are still edible like this and a bit sweeter than a lime (closer to a lemon). On the bottom right is a ragged looking pineapple but it is actually showing renewed vigour and sending out two new centres which I hope will give me further pineapples this year.  The one from this summer was simply the best pineapple I have ever tasted.

I'll hopefully share more pictures as I go along.

Lovely garden shot Lumi; it's as if winter never came there!

There's definitely a feel of winter to the garden for sure, though only relative to how summer looks here.   Have to go plant the pea seeds now but will try and get a couple more shots around the garden if I can tidy up some of the outstanding work going on.

Herbs have done well for time of year .Growing on slowly so always had some to pick this winter. Garlic was taken out of fridge and then planted in a trough and placed in growing room. Had to be taken out into the open air as growing room was to warm for them . The shoots/leaves are about six inches in height.. Lemon trees have liked being in the growing room. Hope the little cold spell has no affect on them though they have always been outside...

The snowdrops are looking good now. It's the grass that I keep worrying about! I topped it on a dry day last month but you would hardly know now. The soil is so saturated I don't like to walk on it and compact it. To add insult to injury, moles are going beserk.

Roger

What I feared when the daffs locally started shining in November: they're all ready for deadheading now, bar a few!

Plenty still to look forward to though. Next door's camellia is in full spate. Another week and pink petals will be pouring over the fence.

Thanks for the reminder, ARTzm.

We brought our lemon tree in today - it has been living happily in the greenhouse up to now.

I noticed today our aconites are flowering well.

Roger

Anemone and cherry laurel in flower

We've got some little wood anemones Dave; are yours the colourful cultivated type?

It's all A-A-Face. The traditional order, since I was a child, was: snowdrops-crocuses-daffodils.

This year it's been daffodil-crocus-snowdrop! What a queer year. Our first snowdrops are showing white at last.

Great thread Bert, thanks for the heads up, I'll keep an eye on it.

Nice to see so many gardeners but we have two gardening threads and the other one is stickied so it might be a good idea if a mod could merge both threads to prevent duplication and confusion.

If we do not get a proper winter then I shall have to get my raspberry canes sorted and replanted into new container. Garlic is growing well.   

Yeah, sorry Caz; it went a bit quiet on the other one & I obviously didn't know the protocols/ mechanics for doing what Dougie does daily, for example, with the cc thread.

Glad the family's rallying a bit.

Yes it's hard to know what to do Art. I'm glad those couple of frosts set in before the blackcurrant buds had truly broken, though. It's also finished off the slugs on my crocuses!

The daffodils that haven't already grown seed heads are now drooping after a few frosts!

This has stopped the plum from blossoming early.

Until 3 days ago I was marvelling at last year's green hazel leaves still hanging from the trees.

The sun is just high enough to get to our back (north-facing) garden and the crocuses have opened for the first time. They looked so shiny!

Daisies in flower on the lawn!

"Summer is here when a maid can put her foot on seven daisies at once" - not there yet, but at this rate, summer could start in March!

Or a man 12! (I think that came from Carl Tyler, a former TVS weather man). Should we put a snowshoe on and cheat?