I bought a new little growhouse yesterday. I had two but the smaller, older one was getting past it with holes in the plastic cover and a few rusty bits on the struts. Anyway I got an almost identical one (£19.99 at the Home Base) except its cover is not clear, it's sort of checkered with green plastic, but lets plenty of light in.
My cactus collection is in there now, along with the 4 baby tomato plants and 3 baby cucumbers. The slightly bigger growhouse is housing tiny geraniums and petunias and now, also, seed trays containing sweet pepper, cabbage and sweetcorn seeds all sown today.
The cacti are interesting. One pot has a couple of opuntia (flat-ish, look like rabbit ears) and I grew them from seeds of a prickly pear I brought back from Malta. They grow like weeds there. There's also one I grew from a dragon fruit seed but, to be honest, it's a very dull looking thing. I have another 8 plants, 2 of which flower every year, and I'm always on the look out for more.
The lettuce seedlings are outside now, hardening off. They are going in tubs in the next few days and can compete with the carrots which are all coming up in their ex-waste-paper-collection bin. I have a feeling we're going to be fed up with lettuce and carrots by about September.
My real baby, my potential pride and joy, is on the breakfast room window sill. It has 2 true leaves and it's nearly 6" tall. No sign of it flopping over, yet, but it probably will soon. It looks healthy and vigorous, though its sibling didn't germinate, and it needs to be if it's going to do what I want. It will be fed with Miracle Grow and tomato feed, while it sits in a growbag with manure mixed into the compost, on the sunniest edge of the patio. When it starts to flower, about July, I will be out there before 7 a.m. to do my Lord Winston thing and when we get an obvious fertilisation that infant will be cosseted.
The biggest pumpkin I've grown, so far, was a 20 pounder that came 2nd in Laura's school's competition. They were a variety with yellow skin (supplied by a parent who runs a plant nursery) that grew well but I have no idea what the variety was. This year I'm growing "Atlantic Giant", they are the ones that some Americans grow as big as small cars and, given that we don't have the U S climate, I'm hoping for at least the size of a Tonka truck.
My cactus collection is in there now, along with the 4 baby tomato plants and 3 baby cucumbers. The slightly bigger growhouse is housing tiny geraniums and petunias and now, also, seed trays containing sweet pepper, cabbage and sweetcorn seeds all sown today.
The cacti are interesting. One pot has a couple of opuntia (flat-ish, look like rabbit ears) and I grew them from seeds of a prickly pear I brought back from Malta. They grow like weeds there. There's also one I grew from a dragon fruit seed but, to be honest, it's a very dull looking thing. I have another 8 plants, 2 of which flower every year, and I'm always on the look out for more.
The lettuce seedlings are outside now, hardening off. They are going in tubs in the next few days and can compete with the carrots which are all coming up in their ex-waste-paper-collection bin. I have a feeling we're going to be fed up with lettuce and carrots by about September.
My real baby, my potential pride and joy, is on the breakfast room window sill. It has 2 true leaves and it's nearly 6" tall. No sign of it flopping over, yet, but it probably will soon. It looks healthy and vigorous, though its sibling didn't germinate, and it needs to be if it's going to do what I want. It will be fed with Miracle Grow and tomato feed, while it sits in a growbag with manure mixed into the compost, on the sunniest edge of the patio. When it starts to flower, about July, I will be out there before 7 a.m. to do my Lord Winston thing and when we get an obvious fertilisation that infant will be cosseted.
The biggest pumpkin I've grown, so far, was a 20 pounder that came 2nd in Laura's school's competition. They were a variety with yellow skin (supplied by a parent who runs a plant nursery) that grew well but I have no idea what the variety was. This year I'm growing "Atlantic Giant", they are the ones that some Americans grow as big as small cars and, given that we don't have the U S climate, I'm hoping for at least the size of a Tonka truck.
Gardening's my hobby, as you've probably guessed, not to say my passion. 
