Gardening Tips
Your fortnightly gardening tips for indoors and outdoors |
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Use manure for heating.
Every gardener values the power of manure, but few exploit it as a source of heat. Yet in
the past it was recognised that one of the best ways to create heat to grow early crops
was to make a hot bed, fuelled by the warmth released by manure as it decomposes. Horse
manure in straw is best, but any manure mixed with fallen leaves is suitable. The bed will
stay warm for several months, depending on the materials used.
Traditionally, the hot bed was made in a permanent frame, but it is much easier to make
one by digging a hole at least 18in (45cm) deep and at least as wide. Put the manure and
leaves or straw into the hole. If there is little manure available, put in plenty of green
garden waste and a little activator or fertiliser to help feed the bacteria. The manure
should be moist - water if necessary before covering with 6 in (15cm) of soil. Then cover
the bed with a cloche or polythene until needed for sowing or planting.
Winter Baskets
Keep baskets watered to prevent them drying out in windy weather. Pick dead flowers off
pansies and check them for aphids, which infest plants that are dry.
Houseplants
Move delicate plants away from windows on very cold nights and bring them into the warmth
of the room.
Ponds
Keep a patch of the surface free of ice to give fish a ''breathing hole'' and to allow
noxious gases to escape from the water.
Digging
Continue to dig the vegetable plot. Where carrots and long root crops will be sown, take
out a trench and fork over the lower spit to increase the depth of soil and produce
straighter roots. Lime areas earmarked for growing your brassicas.
Herbaceous Plants
If soil is not too wet, some herbaceous plants can be divided. Pot up small pieces and
keep them in a cold frame for planting out in the spring. |
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| Embarrassing
Stories |
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A friend of mine used to work as a receptionist in a busy
hotel. She was dealing with a few people at the same time, so as not to appear rude and
admit she forgot one particular customer's name, she asked him to spell his name out as
she was filling in a form.
'S-M-I-T-H' he replied! |
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The Parent Teacher Association at Sheringham High School
organises a Christmas party for 80 local elderly citizens every year. The meal was held on
Monday 15th December with excellent entertainment laid on by the pupils, including their
rendition of A Christmas Carol, which I thoroughly enjoyed! |
| The children made a Christmas card for every pensioner who
attended and served the tea and mince pies themselves. Each also received a gift delivered
by a very pretty Santa and her helpers, a Christmas cracker, afternoon tea and mince pies,
served by the young adults. |
| Transport for the pensioners to the school was also
provided, some parents of pupils acted as taxis, the school buses collected some people.
Hearty thanks go to Chris Lemon, Age Concern, Dial- a-Ride without whom it could not be
done. Kate Davis a librarian at the school was resplendent in her Fairy Godmother outfit. |
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