Rhododendron is a nice flower

"let us cultivate our garden"

Voltaire: Candide

I was back to the terra incognita of horticulture yesterday afternoon.

I mowed the lawn in the back garden, then discovered from discarded labels that I have Rhododendron and Hardy Lily to go with the similarly identified Red Dragon in the front. The plant in the photo is to the left of the Red Dragon. Does anyone know what it is? I think that the bush on its left is lavender with yellow flowers. Again, any clues?

I cut back the overgrown rose bush because I had permission from http://www.rhs.org.uk/advice/profiles1204/pruning_overgrown_roses.asp.

Finally I gave up on the wormery and emptied its disgusting contents for digging in later. For all that it wouldn't drain through the tap there was a fair amount of liquid in it and I seem to have killed off all the worms somehow.

Country Matters

I never do anything in the garden apart from mowing the lawn and cutting back the foiliage. Yesterday I found a label "PERSICARIA Red Dragon" that had been stuck in the ground next to one of the plants when it was planted yesterday. This post is an attempt to recruit my obsessive compulsive tendencies by writing and see if I can't learn more about the great outdoors and green my fingers.

(PS The wormery has been a bit of a disaster as well. It's generating flies and I think all the worms may be dead as I put all the lime mix in at once.)

Vermiculture

I knocked up some coq au vin with mustard mashed potatoes for dinner last night, and as the pile of potato peelings and onion skins etc. grew, and as I pushed it into the bin, I remembered that Dave Wooding used to feed the family's kitchen waste into a wormery that converted it into compost and plant feed.

I've dug up some details of a baby one on the internet this morning. It is too late to get it for this weekend, but I'll order one in time for the first weekend in Feb as it will be fun - and educashional - to set it up with the New Ninja Bomber. Unless I miss my guess just the name of the red tiger worms that power it will be enough to pique a six year old boy's interest.