Just a deadheading visit – which included snipping the scapes off the silly garlic.

Another round of feeding today. There’s been good rain, so no need to worry about that. Beds 1, 4, 9, the sunflowers and the perovskias were given general feed.  The cosmos have started flowering, so they got tomato food.

The cosmos I bought was all mixed, but so far all but one are dark pink.

I went back at the end of the day to mow and was stalked from the very beginning by the baby robin, fairly unfazed by the sound of the mower.

There was a brown lump in the middle of the track today when we went down to do some errands. I feel like I might have driven over the same thing the other day, but this time I got out and discovered a sleeping hedgehog. He was just about responsive, so I scooped him up and put him in the car. His spines were incredibly sharp. In the afternoon I took him to the wildlife hospital, so we’ll see if he recovers.

In other news, one freesia from the new bulbs is out, but being completely squished by daffodil foliage. No sign of any others.

An exemplary non-weekend watering visit. The water forget me not has just begun to flower and the first ocas has just started to come up between the garlic.

New life spotted: it looks like I have a new cucumber up. Though I didn’t actually lift the lid to see if it was a borage instead. And in the pond a bit of weed clearing brought up a bunch of wildlife. I now have to be careful when netting. There were lots of water lice in the net, along with other unknowns.

The last day of my week’s holiday was marked by a flyover from 3 DC-3 Dakotas – a few times in fact.

I had finally managed to germinate some cucumber seeds with a second round in the airing cupboard. So I’ve put those in at the 3 empty canes, plus the last one between two canes as backup.

I’ve fed my struggling perovskias. Both plants were beautiful last year when I bought them. Where have they gone?

Doing the first round of deadheading and some weeding, I discovered that some interesting seeds are coming up at the back of the beds, so maybe late summer will be a little better than usual?

I now have at least two big beetles in the pond. While one came up to see me, there was at least one other further away.

I’ve planted the remaining crappy nasturtiums into Bed 6 to help fill it up. 3 zinnias have gone into Bed 7. I’ve potted on the 4 smaller ones for later pinching and hopefully colour that could be used in a late summer hole.

All the calendula has gone into Bed 1, with one by the shed and one in the triangle. They too need to buck up.

I discovered that the mad clover that I’d seen before had spread into about a 3 foot circle. So I’ve pulled it all up from the grass and cut through its roots, before covering the patch with grass seed.

I’ve put all the lobelia into Bed 9. Just as well I put them in a slightly bigger tray at home; they never would have survived otherwise and they’re noticeably larger. I fed Bed 9 with half-power feed (1 cap per 4 litres) and gave some to the sunflowers too. The tomatoes and cosmos got full strength feed.

I deadheaded the pond irises and cleared the pond, though there wasn’t all that much weed to gather. The forget me nots have their first flower buds.

I added a bunch of corn cockles around the sunflower and borage in Bed 7. They might help each other stand up. The courgette had been pulled out and was dead. Although I have a spare at home, I think I’ll just fill this space with the zinnias.

The marigolds that I grew at home have gone in near the cucumber (and site of possible other cucumbers!) and a few more in Bed 1 too.

There’s not much more to do in my big week off now. Beds 2, 3, 4, 5, 8, 9, 10, 11 are all done. Bed 1 needs calendula, Bed 6 needs more nasturtiums, Bed 7 needs zinnias and some more cucumbers if they can play ball. If I magically have time, I do still want to dig under the beach of the pond and make it a gentler slope.

It was windy and rainy today, but I will still out there, working with my mac on. I planted out all the Roma tomatoes along with their marigolds and I’ve added marigolds to Bed 1 too.

Three sunflowers have gone into Bed 6 and one into centre of Bed 7.

The baby robin visited again and was feeding from the spilled food. His front is just starting to turn red. I’ve now added some old pumpkin seeds from photography days, along with mealworms to the mix.

Below the feeder the woodland bed the lungwort has really picked up. Today I added a few small clumps of violet from home in among all the other seedlings. I keep working on picking out the biggest weeds as they become obvious. This first year is a formative one for self-seeding later and seeing where the gaps are.

I didn’t put any protection around the sweet peas last night, but happily nothing had been eaten.

I did a full strim before Suzy visited to admire my work and then mowed once she’d gone. If I’m lucky I’ll catch the grass for a level 1 in the next few days. It looks so much better when it’s neat. I’ve now put some grass seed around the pond slabs. I look forward to constantly maintaining that in a few months.

Suzy and I put up the tomato frame for the Romas together and put the netting frame over the beetroot too. It won’t stop slugs, but should stop the birds pulling out new seedlings.

A beautiful pink poppy has appeared in the bug hotel. There are all kinds of poppy and flowers in the top of the planters now as well as a lovely little foxglove. I hope that my various foxgloves will self seed all over the place. They’re biennials, which is a bit boring, but maybe some are already underway.

I’ve finally got my hands on a teasel. All the wildlife literature keeps mentioning them as being good for the birds, so I’m pleased to have one. It’s another biennial, so it’ll come up next year. They also self- seed. Morning glory seedlings are coming up where I dropped them. Let’s see if they climb or trail at all.

It rained too much yesterday for it to be worth making a trip to the plot. Today I was firing on all cylinders and planted all the cosmos into Bed 2. My seedlings were so awful this year that I had to go the garden centre.

I put in all my RHS sweet peas against the other end of the netting. They’re very little, but have pinched and I hope some food and water will help them along.

The blackbird accompanied me again and clearly remembered where to find the ants. Later on, I saw it bathing in the pond for the first time. The sparrows are eating well at the feeder and are nothing like as nervous of me now. I saw a party starting to clear up their ground spill too. Over in the woodland bed, the lungwort looks better now.

I’ve sown more carrot and beetroot – including fillers in the original beetroot row. The carrots are doing really well, but some of the beetroot have been bitten and some have been pulled out.

Five Red Alerts have gone into Bed 1. I’ve left some borage, which will stay or be dug out later according to how it goes/grows. I think this will be a borage-heavy year, which will be great for the bees.

I’ve put 17 marigolds along the back of Bed 9. Very little candytuft is coming up along the front so far.

The Summer Carousel nasturtium plants have gone into Bed 5. I’ve put the Trailing nasturtiums into Bed 6 – though I think the plants coming up from seed now are actually Summer Carousel. I’ve added some morning glory seeds to the bed. It looks like only one cornflower has come up so far. 

I’ve settled the slabs in by the pond and have improved the end ones that have some concrete on, by giving them a preliminary clean with the wire brush. They need more working, but now have colour when wet, which is pleasing. A bit more top soil is needed, but the landscaping of sloping the ground is almost complete. 

The majority of the plot is still just beginning to wake up, but the ledge is looking fab, thanks mostly to the fleabane and the sweet william.