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Mick's Drivel


mick
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cleanerg6e said:

...For the green house Mick did you think of getting the one from Will's, or was it just a bit too small...

I did consider the Will's greenhouse Roy but when I enquired I was informed that it wasn't toughened glass - that's 4mm scale for you! I do believe that Chris purchased a Will's greenhouse for Amblethorpe - matching cold frames too if I'm not mistaken.

The white gravel around the greenhouse is just limestone chippings and I wouldn't think it will stay that colour for long.

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cleanerg6e said:

In the photo of the pathway with the blue plastic I think we can see you in shadow

Yeah, that's me smoking my pipe whilst trying to pat my head and rub my belly - and there's Pam out of sight just to the left wielding an axe wondering what I've done to the blooming garden!

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  • 3 weeks later...

Now that the weather's beginning to warm up a little and the days are lengthening I find myself having a hard time trying to decide what I should do first. I've got my new greenhouse but it's still unheated and so it's not really suitable for protecting any seedlings or delicate plants at this time. I've got a few mature plants sheltering in there along with my first potato plantings but only today have I sown a few seeds which can stand indoors until they germinate, by which time the weather should hopefully be mild enough for them to go into the greenhouse. My first potatoes were planted on the 1st March but they haven't emerged yet - wakey, wakey, Mr Potatoes!!

Around the garden I've got some more walls to build and a patio to complete. I've got plans for a new pond but that might just have to wait a while longer. I've been meaning to put up some additional lighting for security and there's another gate to construct. My fencing could do with a good coat of preservative.

Indoors we've done nothing since all the work shortly after we moved in. That means there's the hallway to decorate and the bathroom to renovate. It's never ending.

And of course there's a railway to complete..... I hope we have a decent summer!

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I'm for planting first and then railroad stuff. I would think you could try something in the green house as it won't freeze in there. I've got some sacrificial items started in two if my plant beds all in the hopes that it'll do ok. I think parsley and spinach is next to go in the beds.

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I too have been in the greenhouse yesterday and today. It really was quite tropical in there this afternoon from the sunshine. I have taken a chance with some seeds and the unheated greenhouse will probably slow them down a bit, but once the compost warms with the sun, hopefully they will be OK. Got some spuds chitting and they will be grown in buckets as I did last year.

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I've had a heated propagator for goodness knows how many years - it's been so long that I couldn't tell you where or when I got it. Every so often I get it out and use it and this week it's in full swing. I've got tomatoes, peppers, and green beans in there now and they'll go in the greenhouse once they emerge, by which time I'm hoping the cold nights will be nothing but a memory.

roddy said:

...Got some spuds chitting and they will be grown in buckets as I did last year.

My potatoes I've had chitting on the windowsill for a few weeks. I think they were delivered in early January. I'll be growing mine in bags and dustbins as usual but there's still no sign of those first ones planted coming through.. :( I'm sure this bit of sun will tempt them into making an appearance.

Speaking of the sun, we just had our best day so far with the solar panel electricity generation. Actually produced more than 22Kw hours today which would have been more than sufficient for our whole days useage.

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traingeekboy said:

I won't mention sun as to not make you jealous. We get soooo much of it though.

Please post pics of your plants when they come up.

Is solar energy a big thing in Colorado? Do you have any solar panels?

I imagine you can get too much sun - I wouldn't like that. A nice balanced mix of sun and rain, hot and cold, would suit me just fine. I like to see lush green vegetation and not the ground cracking open because it's so dry. Over here though we just go from one extreme to another - woolly jumper & top coat one day and t-shirt & shorts the next.

I'll post photos of the seedlings/plants if you think they'd be of interest.

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I don't have solar panels but a friend of mine and his wife solarized their entire roof and now their yearly bill is actually negative. I wish I could afford it but it's a bit much right now.

There's wind power as well. We also get some hellish winds up near the mountains. I got caught in gale force winds once and could barely stand to make it home when I lived in Boulder. It would lighten up so I would stand upright, then it would slam me with 90 mile per hours and I'd be nearly bowled over before leaning into it. This would be followed by almost falling over when it let up. And the sound is terrifying.

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Solar panel performance in my part of the UK isn't good in winter time - at least it hasn't been this past winter. Some days we wouldn't produce enough to power the lights for more than a couple of hours and when they're covered in snow they just don't work at all. Four times I went up the ladder (only a bungalow remember) to clear the snow off them. Our average over winter was between 4-5 Kwh meaning we could power a 1kw appliance for between 4 and 5 hours. However, this is our first year with the panels and I'm glad that we started off in the winter term and discovered how bad they can be before seeing how much better they can perform with some bright sunshine and additional daylight hours. They look like being a good investment.

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The only solar panels for generating energy that I'll be seeing for some time are the green leafy variety. I've been watching a lot of videos on you tube about gardening in small spaces.

This is a larger space, but his idea of using compost to heat his green house is very clever. I also like this vertical gardening concept. Seems like even on a small scale some of these ideas might help a bit.

 

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The Victorians often used farmyard manure to heat greeenhouses. A more modern use (if you have a farm or horses at home) is to run loops of water pipe through the muck heap and gain advantage of the heat transfer. You don't have to dig far into a heap to find a much higher heat than you couldd imagine.

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I was reading up on a number of similar methods of transferring heat in an effort to find something reliable enough for adding a bit of heat to my pond water. There's several methods that might work but none I could think of that would work reliably at the time it would be most needed - i.e. winter. It all makes interesting reading though.

We've had a glorious day today. It started out a bit chilly and I went out in the garden with three layers of clothing on but it got so warm that I was soon down to just a t-shirt. This past couple of weeks I've been doing little bits here and there. Sometimes I've been at it with the railway, others with the fish, and also in the garden generally. Yesterday I finally moved my two larger fish into a bigger tank and they're clearly much happier now. The old tank was 100 gallons and the new one holds 350 gallons so they've got additional space to swim around. I've still got a filter to plumb in but I'm waiting for some connectors. Today I've been digging out and laying foundations in order to continue the wall along the front of the patio. I want to get this done so that I can build a proper walk over with the railway track going beneath so that it doesn't get damaged any more than it already has. I've also been pottering about in the greenhouse trying to see what plants I could salvage from some of last years disasters. There's rain forecast for next week so I'll retire to the shed and recommence work on the platform then.

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As Roddy mentions the heat in a muckheap is incredible, even through the last few winters which have been down to minus 12 or so it never freezes just steams away in the coldest of weathers - hence the Bull-terrier makes a beeline for it every morning due to the warmth or the fact the local deer bed down on it. The downside is having the 2 or 3 horses required to generate the base product along with the associated cost of food and bedding.

Vic

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I was having a good day yesterday. Started off by laying some more bricks for the patio wall. I'm not a brickie so it takes me a while to get them laid and I only mix enough cement for about 10 bricks at a time :oops: otherwise it starts drying before I get round to using it. I did as far as I can go, which, at the rate of 10 per mix isn't that far, and I'm now out of bricks but at least I've got as far as where I need to construct the tunnel over the railway. What I'm going to do next I don't know yet.

With the cement put away again I decided to start plumbing in the filter for the large fibreglass fish tank. There's a 4 inch bottom drain from beneath the tank which I've connected using standard 4 inch drainage pipe to the filter itself. I'm now on to the outlet pipe from the filter but the rubber connector I purchased doesn't fit so that was as far as I could go there too.

So, I headed to the shed with the intention of sanding down the plaster platform but then went over on my ankle. Bloody painful. I fell and ended up with a long graze down my right wrist. I limped indoors and that was as far as I could go with that one.

I half expected being awake all night with my ankle (previous experience) but thankfully it was okay. This morning it's swollen but otherwise I should be up for doing something if I can get some footwear on my foot.

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Glorious day today apart from a sore ankle. By early afternoon it was t-shirt weather and we ate dinner on the patio among all the sand, gravel, cement and bricks. I had a trip to the DIY in the morning for more stocks so I've got enough to keep me going a while longer. I managed to get another section of footings down ready to extend the patio wall a bit more.

Finally managed to get my new filter plumbed in for the large fish tank and everything is now connected up. There might not be a lot to see for it but I've got through a load of jobs this past couple of weeks - quite pleased about that. They say it's going to rain tomorrow so it looks like I'll be sanding down the platforms inside the shed.

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  • 4 weeks later...

Lots of things going on in my garden over recent days/weeks. The better weather has certainly helped with progress and motivation.

I'm still not in a position to be able to make full use of the greenhouse (too many things going on at once) but I've got a selection of plants and seedlings on the go now and I'm delighted to be able to report that my potatoes have finally made an appearance and are now almost to the top of their container. A second batch, planted five weeks after the first lot, are also in a similar situation so it remains to be seen how they compare in final yields. I'll be planting additional lots over this weekend.

There's a few finishing touches to make to the patio wall I've been working on but I'm waiting to see how everything looks once I have some decking down before deciding on it's final height.

Now that I've moved the large pile of rocks from the middle of the garden my thoughts are turning to the construction of a larger Koi pond. It's something I've been thinking about for some time but it has to fit in with everything else I'm doing at the moment. The smaller pond will be replaced and filled in with some of the soil excavated from the larger one. I think it's amazing how one small piece of land can accommodate so much interest and enjoyment. I enjoy gardening, my garden railway, and keeping fish and it can all be enjoyed just by stepping a few yards from my back door.

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