MRTGY 2023 02 March 27th to April 2nd

March 27th to April 2nd – MrT’s Gardening Year – Episode 2023 02

In ‘March 27th to April 2nd’ we join MrT  in his garden as Spring marches forward rapidly.

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Monday, March 27th:

MrT starts his day by going into the greenhouse because he wants to see how things are progressing. The trailing lobelia seeds are now germinating, however it will be a few weeks before they can be pricked out.

The first of the Amarylis (Hippeastrum) bulbs is starting to show a flower head. A quick clean up to remove any snails and it can go indoors to flower. I have three – two are children of the first one!

Tuesday, 28th March:

Its drizzling however MrT continues with weeding his main border. Luckily most of the soil is sandy so it drains quickly. Sandy soil is not particularly fertile so each year MrT adds a significant amount of well rotted compost to the bed.

The bed suffers from ‘ground elder‘ which, if not controlled, gets out of hand and is very invasive. Because of this MrT regularly has to dig up plants that are mature to pick the ground elder roots out.

A few weeks ago I put a frame on the raised bed where we grow salad and green vegetables because this helps warm the soil. Today I’m sowing lettuce seeds in it.

Friday, 31st March:

The daffodils are at their peak but I need to deadhead the ones that have flowered to stop them setting seed. If they set seed all their energy will go into the seed rather than the bulb and that can reduce next year’s flowers.

Saturday, 1st April:

Time to pot on the fuchsia cuttings that I took last Autumn when putting the fuchsias into the greenhouse. They’ve got good roots and so I need to be careful as I put each one into it’s own pot.

They’ll look good when they flower in the summer.

Sunday, 2nd April:

My last task for the week is to cut back a rosemary bush because it has suffered badly during the winter. The suggestion (from the experts) is that it has suffered from a fungal infection – all I know is that it died back in the very cold weather.

Lets hope it starts to grow again!

Next up:

I hope that you’ve enjoyed joining me in the garden. Please keep your eyes open for my next gardening week.

Links:

Many resources to help you in the garden can be found on the RHS website. You’ll find information on all aspects of gardening and news about their five wonderful gardens at Wisley (Surrey), Bridgewater (Salford), Harlow Carr (Harrogate), Hyde Hall (Essex) and Rosemoor (Devon).

This podcast is also available through Amazon Music, Apple Podcasts, Castbox , Deezer, Podchaser, Spotify, Stitcher and Vurbl and others.

Music:

AKM Music licenses the theme Horticulture for use in this podcast.

© The MrT Podcast Studio 2023

Author: Tim D

In the early 1970s Mr Timothy & his Phonograph was a popular mobile disco around Leeds University and Tim was known as MrT. Tim also spent 9 years broadcasting a weekly programme on Hospital Radio in Wakefield. He worked for more than 40 years for large industrial organisations and spent his last 15 years in global commercial management roles. Following retirement he started making podcasts in 2017.