Sunday, August 17

Garden greenhouse - August update

This post is especially for Snowbird who I know likes to have a peek inside greenhouses.

So first a view from the doorway - firstly to the right:
and now to the left:
Now let's pop inside for a closer look - starting at the left and moving round in a clockwise direction.

Just inside the door are the cyclamen raised from seed collected from a cyclamen growing in the house. They have really healthy looking leaves. One is starting to flower. Mixed in with them are cyclamen coum which I still need to find a space for outside in the garden.
Moving round we come across the rather straggly cucamelon which has neither earned its place inside the greenhouse nor outside either on the basis of edible production or ornamental value. If ever their was a plant that didn't live up to all the hype surrounding it - it was this one.

The staging here is home to small growing aubergine plants - Jackpot - that have been flowering for a while but only recently have I noticed any fruit setting. I did wonder whether the conditions were too dry for pollen flow of aubergines and whether the recent rainy weather had got things moving. Now the fruit just need to swell
Moving along the shelf there are more aubergines and you may be able to spot the odd sweet pepper. The jacaranda was grown from a seed by our ex-plot neighbour. It had been on a window sill in the house but began to suffer badly form aphid attack and was relegated. It looked very sickly and so was cut down almost completely and popped into a larger pot to take its chance. It has certainly surprised us as after a period of inactivity it started to grow strongly and is now about four times as big as it was. We now need to find out where it can live over winter.
If we cast our eyes down to the floor you can see where the morning glory shown on the far right of the photo above is growing from. It is producing lots of healthy growth but no flowers. This is the only surviving seedling from the packet of seeds sown.

Other than the aubergine that wouldn't fit alongside the others, this area is mainly used for cuttings and seedlings. My new variety of indoor cyclamen are growing well and on the left of the aubergine is one plant that has produced flower buds and so has been potted individually
There is some overlap between the above photo and the next one but on the far right are the alpine strawberries that a ready to be planted out and lavender cuttings that have already rooted and so been potted up.
Now looking upwards to the high shelf - the small elephant garlic hang alongside the remains of our autumn planted onions and hanging from the shelf is the ordinary garlic. 
Moving clockwise the workbench at the far end of the greenhouse is home to our sweet peppers. Here we have a mixture of Orange Bell and King of the North. All the peppers are growing far better than bell peppers have done for us previously. We think maybe growing fewer tomatoes has meant they have had better conditions to grow in and also have been given more attention.
Swinging round clockwise we now have our nine tomato plants. This year there has been no sign of blossom end rot in this greenhouse, although there is a fair bit of ripening to be done.
Then just inside the door are our figs - now minus any fruit and the osteospernums minus flowers.
Lording it above all the other plants is grapevine - Himrod - laden with nearly ready to eat grapes, It's just a matter of keeping up with the taste test to determine when they are sweet enough to pick.
The vine is making a determined attempt to escape the confines of the greenhouse and explore the great outdoors. It's attempt to escape through the roof window is thwarted by the netting that was put in place to stop birds getting in and consequently becoming trapped inside unto we spotted them and coaxed them out. But where there is a vine they will find a way. It has even found a small gap in the roof. This escape attempt will need dealing with before damage is done.
I guess my next update will be quite a different picture.


39 comments:

  1. I need to up my game! Bar the drying garlic ours is completely empty. Sue it would be great if you'd do some posts on how to do the cuttings for cyclamen etc.

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    1. The cyclamen on the staging are raised from seed that I collected from a plant initially grown from seed. Victoria See this post. and those on the floor are from seeds bought this year See this post. I do have a cuttings post planned for later though.

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  2. Thanks for this little tour, Sue. It's fascinating to see what you've got growing. I totally agree about cucamelons. My seeds germinated well but despite nurturing, they're now about 15" high and I've had only TWO tiny fruits from them. Maybe they'll suddenly come into their own in the autumn but I won't hold my breath. My tomatoes, as well, have yet to ripen. They're outdoor grown but even so, I've been reading about other peoples ripe tomatoes and massive harvests for weeks!! There we go, at least I've got beans and courgettes, hahaha!

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    1. We do tend to sow our tomato seeds fairly late compared to many people Caro so ripening is always a bit behind but gets there in the end. We had to stop growing them outdoors because of blight. We've had about six cucamelons but having tasted them I'm not too disappointed.

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  3. It's funny how our tastes differ as I've read other posts where people are raving about their cucamelons, each to their own I suppose. You certainly put your greenhouse to good use, you've got such a variety of plants growing in there.

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    1. Maybe its down to how efficient our taste buds are, Jo. Maybe mine lack the taste highlights.

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  4. Lovely tour. Those grapes looks delicious. I'm not growing any at this house. At my last one the spiders that lived inside the clusters always freaked me out. I'm such a wimp when it comes to spiders.

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    1. Shame that those spiders bullied you into giving up on grapes, Daphne.

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  5. Your grapes and sweet peppers are so bountiful! You've reminded me to sow sweet pepper seeds for the next patch.

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    1. It's our best sweet pepper year yet, Endah

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  6. The amount of plants you have in the greenhouse is great - the grapes look delicious. It looks like you've put the greenhouse to really good use.

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    1. The grapes were delicious, Kelli and lots more to come.

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  7. You're very well organised. It's a shame about the cucamelons, they sounded intriguing.

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    1. They did some intriguing, Jessica - I wonder whether the kiwi berries will be equally disappointing.

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  8. Your greenhouse is still packed with plants and so many varieties. Your sweet peppers doing so well and so many Cyclamens grown from seed. Love the Jacaranda, did you grow this from seed as well? I enjoyed the tour very much, thank you.

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    1. A friend grew the jacaranda from seed collected on holiday, Janneke. I need to decide what to do with it over winter.

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  9. Very impressive use of your glasshouse Sue, will your Sweet Rocket and Sweet Williams be planted out this year? I grow Sweet Rocket every year from my own seed treating it as a biennial, but mine are already outside growing on in 3' pots ready for planting out in September and I would be interested to know how you deal with yours.

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    1. I've already planted out most of the sweet rocket and sweet Williams Rick. Seeds were sown in trays on 23 June. They were then 'pricked out' as small clumps into cell trays 5x3 and planted out about a week ago. The trays in the greenhoiue are leftovers really

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  10. Your plants always look fresh and healthy.
    I like the view of your vine trying to escape :)

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    1. The vine will soon be stopped from heading out Dewberry. It has been known to escape from a roof window and head up a nearby tree

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  11. Awesome update lovely post thank you for sharing lovely post Sue God bless

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  12. Oh it's lovely in your greenhouse. The cyclamen leaves are some of my favourite. I'm intrigued by your passion fruit cutting, it's something I've been thinking about growing. Can you grow it outside, and does it fruit and ripen? I really love passion fruit, it would be great if we could grow them here. The tomatoes look healthy, with some fruit coming along, hopefully you'll get a reasonable harvest.

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    1. The passion flower is really only ornamental CJ
      See this post The plant is now at least twice as big as in that post and this year was covered in flowers - it's very vigorous. I'm trying to get one going for my sister's garden. It does produce fruits See this post bit not the kind sold as edible fruit. There are lots of varieties of passion flower but this one is the most hardy

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    2. Thanks for that Sue, I don't know how I missed the post where you opened the fruit. The seeds look right, but maybe it just needed to ripen a bit more and go brown. Maybe they don't in this country. I shall consult Bob Flowerdew, if it can be done, he will have done it.

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  13. Oh I enjoyed peeking into your greenhouse too Sue. Interesting to note your verdict on the cucamelon. I got one seed to germinate last year and it gave up the ghost long before producing a crop. Sounds as if I did not miss much. My vine has escaped this year! It has more bunches than I have ever seen on it before and I'm wondering whether that is down to the mild and wet winter. Thanks for your comment on my blog which sent me in the direction of your courgette links. I will definitely give the crumble recipe a go :)

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    1. Apparently, Anna - result of a Twitter conversation - it is too early for cucamelons Victoriana Nurseries say that "late September, October and even Nov is their true season in UK" so I'll try them again later if we get any more fruit.

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  14. Thanks for the mention and my greenhouse fix! I You certainly use yours to the max don't you....such a wonderful huge one as well, I do wish mine was bigger. I'm amazed how much you have going on in there, they are such value for money aren't they. I love the garlic and what to say about those grapes....I'm as green as they are!xxx

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    1. A greenhouse is loke kitchen cupboards - never big enough, Snow

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  15. Lovely greenhouse. You have so many plants inside. Jacaranda is grown from seed or you bought a seedling?

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    1. A friend grew the jacaranda from seed, Leanan

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  16. I could not imagine so many plants you're growing in your green house when I read about it, new on your plot, made of metal and glass. Lovely flower seedlings especially cyclamen,I never could grow them from seeds:((
    The grape surprised me as well Sue!

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    1. The vine is very old Nadezda and was originally on a smaller greenhouse. This was taken down and the larger one built whilst the vibe stayed in place. This one is a wooden construction

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  17. You've packed so much into your greenhouse you put ours to shame. Note to self GROW MORE.


    Jean x

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    1. And this is our emptyish phase Jean :D

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  18. Thanks very productive greenhouse! That grape vine is so lush!

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    1. It would be even more lush if allowed ,Malar

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  19. I admire your precission in labelling the plants. I always promise to do that properly and it just doesn't work with me;)

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