My back garden

[katemonkey]

Most of my back garden is concrete, and in-between leaving space for the bins (trash, recycling and compost) and the clotheslines (so that my clothes don't get covered in pollen or anything), I don't really have much room for large plants or large items.

But I've been working with what I have, and with the room I have, and I'm mostly growing vegetables. I like flowers, but the sheer joy I get from picking something that's grown in my own garden is far more delightful than flowers.

Plus, we both have pretty awful hayfever, and why tempt fate?

Pumpkin Island. Protected by my Easter Island head, my pumpkin sprouts were just planted today. I'm hoping they survive, since I know slugs love them. Last year, I grew one pumpkin and it was too late for Halloween, so I have hope for this year.

Peas in their planter with their guardian. I had fantastic pea seedlings, but then I rather stupidly didn't water them for a few days and they started drying up. I'm hoping there's still enough green on them to thrive in their new planter, though. And hoping this little dude I bought for around 20p also helps them.

I also assembled the planter (purchased from Lidl, of all places) and rubbed it down with teak oil to make it a little more weatherproof.

Potatoes and strawberries. I love growing strawberries, I always have, but it's such a bitch to try and get them before the birds or bugs do. I have a lot of hope for this year, because it's just growing crazy.

Potatoes are so easy to grow and so much fun. Just take any sprouting potato, stick it in the ground, and keep on putting more dirt on top so that you're covering up the stems as it grows. After around six months, you dig it up, and there are potatoes! Hurray!

The cat statue is from Wilkinsons. I bought it in the fall, when they sell off all their gardening stuff -- best time for garden décor.

I also use a lot of aquarium décor in my garden. My husband gets them at his work, and they're too rough to use in my fishtank (the stupid fish rubs up against them and loses scales), so they go into the plant pots, which makes for nice little additions.

And, finally, some of the few flowers I actually do like having. Some lovely purple-black tulips. I need to read up on having tulips, because I need to know when to trim them down and dry them out and everything so that I can keep on having them.

So that's my garden. I'll probably take more photos over the next few months, to point out developments. I have a gorgeous cedar planter that's going to be my herb garden, but the herbs are sitting in the greenhouse sprouting. And there's corn by the pumpkins, and eventually okra, and then maybe even cotton, if I can get it to grow...

I am such a garden bore.