Alas, poor Mike!

  My bay tree has died.  I did all I could but the roots were too far gone.  I'm still determined to have a potted bay in my garden however, so my next Laurus project (next Spring) will be Stan.  Are you keeping up with the cinematic references here?  Stan will be a cluster of baby laurels in a large Dutch planter with a bunch of bamboo arranged in a cone.

Poor sod :(

  I love a functional garden, utility is a beautiful thing, but sometimes the beauty of a thing can extend beyond mere usefulness; a thing which has both aesthetic value and practical value is truly a joy in so small a garden.  I set out to use part of my garden to help feed my family while still providing recreational space - so far so good - but the more I look at it the more I think it'd be even better if I worked a few flourishes in.  So I'll add a frame of jasmine here, a dash of gravel or bark there.  Maybe work in some bright ground cover plants between the fruit, maybe plants that nourish the soil, some borage, some marigolds.

  So as part of the works on the house and grounds the housing association plan to change the front fence and rip out the buddleia stump and remaining brambles.  Grand, grand, but I grow Rosemary by the front gate, so I've dug it out and potted it for now.  That's Rosmarinus officinalis.  You gotta get the officinal stuff, made by kids in the officinal Indonesian sweatshop, else you could end up with any old crap that falls apart.  You might even be sold a baby Tarragon!  Never buy herbs in a poke.  Or I might possibly be thinking of trainers...

Lastly then, I'm starting work on the North border.  It'll take up the last foot of the lawn, but grass doesn't grow there anyway.  I'll be growing things like Tarragon, Bergamot and Jasmine, but also Ericas to encourage pollinators.  Maybe some Rosemary at the edges to shrub it out and gently discourage pets from legging it across the bed.  Ah well.  Here are the first nineteen plants to go in:

Yes, that's half a dozen Coleus in there.  They don't do anything but look pretty and cover ground, but this Summer I have a lot of time for things which look pretty and cover ground.  But for now, we dig!

The State of the Garden Address

Here's where we are just now.  I've put in the sage bed, clockwise from back left: purple sage, common sage, tricolour sage, Icterina sage.  

My lemon thyme turned out to be common thyme.  I got it from amidst the lemon thyme and the label said 
"[£1.99]mon Thyme", so I assumed it to be like its neighbours.  Ah well.  I picked up a variegated lemon thyme today and put it in the centre of the thyme bed.  

That'll teach me to not buy a pig in a poke!  

I've planted up bed 3.  There's two frames of bamboo and wire in there.  The one nearest the trellis is growing runner beans (Wisley Magic) and the one nearest the lawn is growing sugar snap peas (Sugar Ann).  

And the lawn is thickening up a treat.  It'll need a mowing and a third seeding to make it ready for the Summer, but imperfect as it is it's still a joy to walk barefoot on after all those stones and nettles.

Approved by Bill!  

In other news: at the bar last night we had a gap between doors and the first DJ showing up, so I got up and DJed for half an hour.  When I DJ I tend to write my set down as I go along.  I got near the end, looked back over what I'd played and realised "shit, I've been watching too much of the news!"  Take a look and see if you can see what I mean:  

Jam - Eton Rifles, 
REM - End Of The World As We Know It, 
Cranberries - Zombie, 
Prodigy - Firestarter, 
Manics - If You Tolerate This, 
Clash - Rock The Casbah, 
Chumbawumba - Tubthumping, 
Alice Cooper - Poison, 
Skunk Anansie - I went to play Hedonism but the disc was bad, so I played Weak.

Dude!

And I reckon I'm starting college in October, if I can get this bloody paperwork squared away.  

Later :)

Effort and sunshine and water and soil.

So my thyme bed's planted!  It already smells beautiful, and that'll only get better as Spring gives way to Summer.

Clockwise from back left: orange thyme, lemon thyme, golden thyme, silver thyme.  

This weekend I'll be sorting out the sage :)

Repotting, reseeding and Georgeproofing

Mike got sick again.  Mature leaves turned red, new leaves turned black.  Bit of a disaster really, and fearing fungus I decided that a windowsill was no place for a tree.  I moved him to an outdoor pot and as I took him out of the existing pot I was met with an almighty reek.  The compost in his pot was rotting around the roots!  Aaaargh!  So I scraped as much away as I dared and binned it.  I took off some diseased roots, patted the rootball dry with a towel and applied mycorrhizal fungus.  He's been potted in fresh compost in a bigger pot with a bed of stones and a topdressing of further stones.  I've pruned all affected leaves and moved Mike out front, where he looks thoroughly forlorn.

I've mentioned previously that George is in the habit of climbing into the Strawbrary while he barks into the dark.  Well, I think I've got him foiled:

If he gets through a trellis with a bush behind it then he's some kind of Houdini dog!

Lastly then, the lawn has been reseeded.  This is it now, and fingers crossed it'll be thicker than thick in a month's time.  

Feels like for the past few days I've done little but grafting, eating and sleeping.  With emphasis on the eating and sleeping.  I've even set Skyrim aside!  Tonight then I'm going to get squared away and make some time for me.  I'll knock together a Baileys hot chocolate, colonise the couch and put a game on.  I haven't played Dragon Age in a while...

Mike got sick :(

Mike - my Laurus nobilis - has come down with a case of powdery mildew; a common disease of bay trees.  The treatment was severe.  Mike has two parts to him, a long one and a short one.  I don't know if the shorter part is a second trunk or if it's a branch of the main trunk which budded below the soil.  Whatever it is, the affected leaves were all on that part, that branch, so I took the entire branch.  Effectively I took a third of him.  By isolating the infected part from the healthy plant I should've prevented further deterioration; fingers crossed.  Mike looks sad now.

I've gotten photos, of course.  The classic grey patches of powdery mildew are visible, as are the brown leaf margins which suggest the mildew has damaged the leaves internally.

Hopefully this'll put a stop to it. Poor Mike :(