Old Town Community Gardeners were lured out last Monday afternoon, New Year's Day with the promise we'd meet and plan what we wanted to do in 2024 in our flower beds. I brought along secateurs and trowel, just in case they were needed, but the planning session seemed a more fruitful way to start the year, and so I kept them in their bag.
We started at Mr Cod where we were pleased to see green shoots from daffodils and alliums appearing and Phormiums and Euphorbia looking magnificent, such excellent plants for giving signs of life in January. We already have a water butt collecting water from a nearby roof, but decided we could increase sustainability by making a container for green waste, rather than taking it off site. It's good to have a photographic record, in this case, we started with a photo of all of us because a kind workman having a break on the nearby bench offered to take it.
And here are the magnificent Phormiums, planted at the same time the same size, the one on the left is clearly growing more vigorously
And here are some of the Euphorbia, they are the common variety which seeds itself all over the plot, and put on a fantastic display in the spring
From the Mr Cod bed we walked past the Arts Centre where the geraniums in small pots have suffered in the first frosts and need taking out to see if they can be rescued by bringing them inside. We couldn't get in to lift them because the Arts Centre was closed so left them for another day. Our next stop were the beds on the corner of Newport St and Devizes Road where we found snowdrops flowering and noted we need to pull out the dead bits from Stipa tenuissima
From there we looked at the bed at Station Approach where we have removed the huge Fuchsia hawkshead which was getting in the way of the advertising sign according to the billboard company. We also noted the garlic and broad beans appearing and two of the group volunteered to build a bug hotel at the narrow end of the vegetable bed. We're also planning how to spend the money kindly given by the billboard company to fill the gap left by the Fuchsia
From there we went to the raised planters where the Gazania was flowering well. All three planters need more compost added to the top and drought resistant plants to cope with the drought in summer.
We finished our tour at the Dewell Mews bed which was recently partly refurbished by digging out a thuggish perennial and planting some choice perennials bought with money from now defunct Front Garden group. The person living in the house on the corner by the bed has taken out a large shrub and replaced it with some Hellebores, I'd like to think they were influenced by what we have done to the bed. Is there a name given to infectious planting?
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