My Spring Garden

We've spent a lot of time and money in the house since we came back with a new kitchen and extension and the garden and out door space has been ignored other than a new shed, mowing the lawn and piling up gravel, bricks, sand and soil.

We're having to wait for the builders to return to sort out the drainage from the roof as they haven't connected the down pipe into the drains, so when we have heavy rain the patio area floods and we can't finish it as they need to dig the area up.

I've got space now to hang the washing outside again.

The two sheds on the left will be coming down soon and then we can start building raised beds. The table and chairs are under the covered area and we've eaten outside a couple of times.

I've started doing some work in the front garden with planting a new hedge. The bougainvillea may have survived the winter under cover.

I've planted a variety of herbs both inside and out, the basil is doing really well.

Last years Chard

Potatoes

Lettuce

Peas

I tend to spend more time tidying up than I do actual gardening.

The wreath is back on the front door.

After all the rain the lawn is looking really green, there's little grass there, mainly weeds and moss.

We also visited the Three Counties Show to get some ideas and with the 3 bank holidays and nicer weather I've been enjoying being outside. It's half term next week and I'm hoping for quite a transformation in the back garden.

Deadly Nightshade in the garden

Back last year I was given a packet of Organic seeds, I had to register on a website and sign to declare I was an organic gardener. There were no instructions other than 'do not use chemicals' and no list of the contents.

I sowed the seeds, stood back and watched them grow.

At first I thought I'd planted potatoes, the leaves and white flowers looked familiar, then after 2 weeks away the plant had shot up over 3 ft and the good people on the internet declared they were chillies.

2 weeks later berries had appeared, so a whole new google search took place and here's what I discovered.

Deadly nightshade is the popular name for Atropa belladonna and as it's name indicated it can kill. It only takes 3-10 berries to cause a hallucinogenic reaction and 10-20 berries can kill an adult. The leaves and stem are also poisonous, and the deadliest part of the plant is the roots. 

Potatoes, tomatoes and aubergines are part of the deadly nightshade family, hence why I originally confused the seedlings for potatoes.

What I've actually cultivated is Solanum nigrum or Black nightshade, which produces edible berries and is used as animal fodder around the world.

Solanum produces white flowers before the berries appear, belladonna produces purple flowers before it fruits.

But then someone told me different.

Scroll to the last picture to see what I did next?

Putting on gloves, long sleeve top and trousers, I ripped it all up and chucked it in the bin.

I'm not prepared to take the risk....would you?

In the night garden Week 116 My Sunday Photo and HDYGG? G is for Gardening

Raised sandpit at the front of the house.

We have outside access all round our villa, the front part is mostly block paved, but it features a raised sandpit. To the right of the villa there is a larger sandpit, at the end of the block paving. The back of the villa, is again block paved and it's where the washing gets hung out. To the left of the villa there is a small lawn and further block paving.

Larger sandpit to the right of the villa.

The villa is painted white and the gardens are walled around 5-6ft tall, there were only bougainvillaea planted in the garden when we moved in and little else.

The first year we were here I decided to experiment with the weather and growing plants directly into the sand and I managed to germinate and grow marigolds, tomatoes and a variety of other plants and vegetables.

Last year I didn't experiment as much, as I was working, but I did grow basil from seed and nasturtiums.

This year I've been more adventurous and I'm growing accidental potatoes. I attended a gardening demonstration and organic seeds were being handed out, I managed to germinate them, as well as squash and aubergines. I say 'accidental' as I had no idea what was in the packet I received. So far we've harvested 2 aubergines and had them for dinner on Friday night in a curry.

I've also grown this year, from seed, the following:

Tomatoes, peas, chillies, more basil, parsley, peppers, mint, nasturtiums, sweet peas and sunflowers.

March in Dubai is Plantation and Park month, celebrating the opening of 5 new public parks in Dubai and green spaces. To mark the 33rd year of this scheme, free plants were being handed out around parks in Dubai. I now have several trees, 2 of which will yield lemons, several shrubs, some strawberry plants, bedding and ground cover.

I spent Saturday from midday till 10.30pm levelling sand, digging, planting and watering. 

 Digging a hole in the sand was actually harder than you'd imagine, the sand is so fine it just kept refilling the hole.

I have no idea if what I've planted will take, I am unable to identify the trees but I was told that they each produce a different colour flower, red, yellow and white.

There was a lot of cleaning up to do afterwards, which I'm ashamed to say I left mainly to the gardener, well you can see from the 'before' pictures there really wasn't much for him to garden anyway. I washed the patio, walls, windows and got all the garden furniture set up as I intend to spend most of my week sitting in the garden, as it will be too hot to enjoy very soon.

This is the end result, I will be in the UK at the end of the week, so I'm hoping that between Peter and the gardener they will water the plants for me twice a day and I look forward to seeing the progress on my return at the end of April.

Left of the villa.

 Right of the villa.

Front of the villa.

Beans and chili

Rosemary, parsley and Lemon tree.

Do you have a garden or an allotment? What do you grow in it? Have you faced the challenge of gardening in the desert and planting directly into the sand?

January and February in Dubai with HDYGG?

As you may know by now I'm back in work full time and I no longer have the time to explore Dubai, but I have taken some pictures in January when the kids were visiting and realised I had quite a few that are worthy of a HDYGG post along with a couple taken out and about and in the garden in February.

The new Dragon Mart 2. This is the restaurant area.

 The end of the public beach on 'The Beach' 

 Lovely display of cacti leading from 'The Beach' to 'The Walk' at Jumeria Beach Residence.

Over looking 'The Beach' for lunch.

Spotted this plant in the desert, no idea what it is yet.

Saw another one outside school, I need to do some more research to find out what it is.

Fresh cut flowers don't last long indoors in Dubai, they are also expensive to buy as they are imported the small bunch of 6 tulips costs £6, they lasted 3 days max. The hyacinths smelt gorgeous and lasted over a week at the same price.

We've had our annual storm for January, we will get occasional short drizzles of rain until the end of March, but nothing to write home about. The sand storms are coming soon and they will cause more damage as the wind is salt laden which defoliates plants, water to trees and shrubs should be reduced now as they will lie dormant. The temperatures are ideal now to germinate seeds and I've a supply of zinnia and petunia seeds already sown.

For February I've been spending my Fridays as usual out in the desert, with Bob. It is lovely to see a bit of colour out there now it is winter, it won't be long before it is too hot to venture out there. The scenery is stunning once, but it's already a 40 minute drive to get here from home and one must drive a lot further inland to escape signs of life.

The area we visit is Al Quadra lakes which are man made, a pump oxygenates the water and drip feeds the irrigation system.

This photo is alongside the Sheik Zayed Road, we live the 1km over the 14 lane highway to the right, near the beach. The municipality keep Dubai very clean and tidy and there are flowers along all the roadside junctions.

 We had a trip to IKEA last weekend to buy garden furniture, we hadn't even parked the car before we had a row and apart from a few pots, we left empty handed.

This is the entrance to IKEA.

A few new plants were purchased from this garden centre.

 Finally I has strawberries in the garden, they aren't as sweet as I had hoped but went down well after cheese and home grown tomatoes on toast for supper.

 The sweet peas are doing well.

 And finally, the nasturtium has flowered, it's quite an achievement in Dubai for this to occur.