Have Azada Can Dig.

 "Fool In The Rain" by Led Zeppelin began to play in my mental jukebox.

I had been allocated another hedge to plant and  it was a typical Irish mizzle day.

 I went over to a friendsWest Cork farm and set about clearing vegetation and digging holes and planting more Griselinia hedging that I grew from cuttings and planted in homemade compost filled plant pots last year.

The You Tube videos and gardening books and gardening  posts online tell you to get a mini digger and clear the vegetation with a mini digger.  

Not me though I use my shovel and trusty Azada clearing hoe.  I have always been good with shovels and mattocks.  If you have an overgrown allotment or garden invest in an Azada.  Apparently it means " hoe" in Spanish.  They are that clever in Spain.  Even the kids can speak Spanish.  That's an old one!

When I worked on a golf course in England many moons ago.   My work colleague and beer  supping friend would say to me: "Dig Minotaur".  I would dig ferociously with my shovel or mattock swinging in the air.  I was half man half bull with a mattock or shovel!

 Here Is my trusty Azada having a rest:

Azada having a rest while I took the photo with my mobile phone camera.

Perhaps I should call my blog: Azada Dave?

I planted 87 plants in the rain.  "November Rain" by Guns N Roses started playing in my head.

Do you have songs playing in your mental jukebox when your grafting in the garden?

My back is aching after my hedge planting toils.  Here's a picture of a piece of the hedge I planted:

New hedging planted and my Azada is having a lie down.

Now is a good time to plant hedging.  I grow mine in pots but you can buy it bare rooted and plant it from now until March while the plants are dormant.

Anyone else make their own hedging or planning to plant one?  

Anyone got a gardener  vacancy somewhere warm like the Algarve for the winter? I am very reasonably priced and hard working and a  organic gardening anorak.  My favourite is bringing up compost in conversation with the younger generation.  You have heard of the "pub bore" well I am the "gardener bore".

Beautiful Prog Music On A Thursday.

 I found the following You Tube video yesterday featuring David Gilmour and his daughter Romany.  I can't stop playing the track over and over again.

I have seen Roger Waters live performing the Wall.  Snowy White was his guitarist who I saw way back in 1981 with Thin Lizzy on their Renegade tour.  I wish I had seen Pink Floyd in their prime.

David Gilmour discovered Kate Bush and recorded her magical voice.  All these years later I think he's found another Prog Rock star in his daughter.  Superlative words like masterpiece  and Magnum Opus (Kansas  song title) come to my mind.  I would love to see them at a festival like A New Day or Cropredy next year.  Enjoy:

Did I see you playing your "air guitar" or was it the house brush🎸?

Fava Beans Planting And More Leaf Mulching.

 At this time of year I find it a problem sourcing seeds.  My German garden centre and food and beer providers seem to have put gardening stuff away for the winter.

Luckily my other cheap gardening supplier: The Range still continue selling gardening supplies like bulbs and seeds...

Now Fava or Broad Beans are the last thing to sow before winter.

I bought a packet of them for just 75 Cents and I sowed two fish boxes of them in the polytunnel today:

Broad Beans or Fava Beans originate in China and the Himalayas.  They were probably brought to our shores thousands of years ago.

It will be good to see something growing through the winter.  Beans are Legumes and the extract nitrogen from the air and release it through their root nodules.  Instead of taking out goodness they add goodness to the soil.  Like the banana, beans are full of potassium.  Which is very good for your blood pressure and your heart.

Have you planted any Broad Beans yet?

I am always weeding my raised veg beds and I scattered to big buckets of leaves around my leeks.  Hopefully they will suppress the weeds and feed the soil when they break down?

Any once else mulch with leaves?  I also mulch with straw.  With the leaves I am imitating the rich  leaf blanket of the Autumn floor and feeding the worms, beneficial anaerobic bacteria and much needed plant food like carbon.

Newly mulched oil tank (repurposed) raised bed.

MY Hydrangea Cuttings Are Flying It.

 French Botanist Philibert Commerson first discovered the Hydrangea in China in 1761.

If his ghost visited my West Cork polytunnel.  He would find over fifty newly rooted cuttings like this one:

I grew my shrub cuttings in homemade compost in plant pots covered with  plastic bottle cloches.

I will eventually pot them on into bigger plant pots and I will eventually plant some in the garden and sell them at a carboot sale next summer. 

 That's if old Jack Frost and his wife don't get them of course.  I think they will be OK residing in the polytunnel.

I only have to wait two years for them to flower. I have seen them for sale in Lidl for 10 Euros.  Mine cost me nothing!

Any one else busy propagating shrubs?

Retail Therapy At The Carboot Sale.

 I know how to give our lass a good time.  We put some motion lotion in the van and J, Bronte the Golden Retriever and me went for a spin to a carboot sale.

We were not going selling this week.  We wanted to buy stuff.  It was very busy and well attended.  What a difference a dry day makes.  Here's some of our purchases:

New bar stools for the breakfast bar.  The ones we have a lovely rusty speckled patina on them.  Muzz Muss seems to have taken a liking to them.  We paid ten Euros for both of them.  I know.  But you have to put the boat out sometimes!

A brand new pair of wellingtons or the " rubber boots" that they call them here in West Cork.

My steel toe capped wellingtons split a hole in them when I was planting that hedge the other day. On Saturday I donned a carrier bag tied on my leg inside the wellington boot.  On Sunday I treated myself to a new pair.

The bar stools costs 10 Euros and the wellingtons 25 Euros.

Anyone else been car boot shopping recently?

A Beautiful Birthday Card From Vietnam.

 It was a birthday for J the other day.

One of her birthday cards came all the way from Vietnam and bought by a relative on a visit there this summer.

 It's incredibly beautiful and the Vietnamese lady is a hand  paper cut and it stands up in the middle of the card:

It's a card that will not be placed in the stove to keep us warm.  It will go in a drawer no doubt.

Wouldn't it be good if you could buy hand cut cards where we live?

Hedge Planting.

 I spent Friday morning digging holes and planting forty Griselinia hedge plants I grew last year from cuttings for a friend:

They will (hopefully) eventually camouflage a concrete panel fence.

The best thing about planting the hedge is that I was able to bring the plant pots home.  I will spend a few hours soon filling them and making more cuttings.  

It's good to have a propagating hobby which eventually financially rewards.  

Do you grow hedging or plants for an hobby?