25th April - Measuring and marking out the new raised beds

Today we worked out where our new raised beds would go.

We decided that we would try and save a bit of time and firstly measured how long a piece of decking board was - this will save us having to cut them up or having to join two together.  We also measured how big our paving slabs are as we would like a path in between each raised bed.

The length of our raised bed will be exactly the same as the length of a piece of decking board, the width will be the same as half a piece of decking board.  We used a tape measure to measure the length and width, we then marked out the shape with wooden pegs and string.

We then had a go at costing the materials that we will need to buy.  We looked on the computer to find out how much decking boards are, we also found out how much decking screws, pegs and nails are too.  This afternoon we also marked out the area of our poly-tunnel and we estimated how much   post-crete we will need to buy for the foundations of our poly-tunnel.

23rd April - Planting our fruit trees

We have been waiting for some time to be able to plant our fruit bushes and trees which we have had in pots waiting for the garden site to be cleared after the demolition of the temporary classrooms.  Today under the supervision of Sarah from the RHS we managed to get our trees into the soil.

Sarah was able to give us lots of advice about choosing the best position for the trees on our site.

The students used garden canes to work out how to space the trees so that they have enough room to grow.

We bought the trees about a year ago and have had them in large plastic pots.  We have been surprised how much they have grown in the past year.

Some of the trees were quite difficult to extract from the pots.  We used some of the soil from the pots to put around the roots and then packed the hole with more soil.

We have made some signs so that we will be able to tell which tree is which.  We have two apple trees, a pear, a plum and a cherry tree.

Two of our students are busy digging a trench to put raspberry canes in - we have had a few raspberry canes growing in containers for a while.  A local allotment association also kindly gave us a few more.

One of our students is giving the new trees a good water.

Moving one of our currant bushes.

Deciding how much space to give the raspberry canes.

Packing the soil around the raspberries.

Our finished raspberry bushes in their new location.

Now for the currant bushes, we had a blackcurrant bush and a redcurrant bush.  Sarah was able to help us split the plants as we had not realised that we had several plants growing in one large pot.  Sarah showed us how to split the plants up and was able to tell us how to space the bushes so that they will have enough room once they are established.

We ordered four wild strawberry plants through the Morrisons 'Let's Grow' Scheme - they arrived a couple of weeks ago.  We planted them out underneath our new trees.  

One more currant bush to divide and plant next week.  We also plan to sow lots of wildflowers around the trees next week - which should encourage bees and insects into our new garden.

                                                       

We recently received our sunflower seeds which we planted today as part of the celebrations of 50 years of the RHS Britain in bloom campaign.  

We have planted the seeds in trays which will go inside our cold frame or greenhouse if there is room.  We will then transplant the seedlings once they have sprouted.  We plan to put them either in pots or in a sunny place along one of our fences.

22nd April - Spring in the garden

Our potatoes planted in tyres are just started to sprout through the soil.

We planted some of the sweet peas around the bottom of the new willow dome, the plan is that they will grow up the willow whips and produce flowers inside the dome so it will smell lovely in there later on in the year.

We had to give the pond a bit of a top up with a hose pipe during the Easter Holidays.

Sweetcorn plants which will be ready for planting soon.

Some seedlings growing in the greenhouse.

Tomato plants in our home-made newspaper plant pots.

Sweet peas and baby strawberry plants

More seedlings in the greenhouse.

Baby bean plants again growing in our home-made newspaper plant pots.

Our artichoke plants seem to be doing okay so far - we hear they grow quite big, so hopefully we have not planted them to close together?

 A few of our lovely spring flowers which have 

appeared over the Easter holidays.

The ducks have been spreading the word about how nice the new pond is - another drake arrived and today we spotted a huge seagull on the side of the pond.

A lovely magnolia tree which has just started to flower around the back of our building.

Today we harvested a bit of our purple sprouting broccoli.

We weighed it and divided it into equal quantities, put it into bags and we will sell it tomorrow.

15th April - Visiting the new site for the garden

Today we visited the site of what will be our new garden.  We hope to be putting up a poly-tunnel and constructing more raised beds.  We plan to finally be able to plant our fruit trees and fruit bushes too.

Our pond has suffered a bit from the demolition of the surrounding buildings - there are a few bits of wood and insulation floating around in the water, but we will give it a clean.  The plants are all starting to grow and will do their bit to keep the water clean.

We spotted some frog-spawn in the pond - so the frogs we put in the pond a few weeks ago must still be around.

Some more of the bulbs we planted last year have come out.

Purple sprouting broccoli, which looks about ready to pick and cook with.

Potatoes are starting to put shoots through the soil and will need to be earthed up.

Our Comfrey is starting to grow again.

Japanese Onions.

Signs of life in our wildflower bed - I think this is a little Nasturtium?

Some more little seedlings growing in the wildflower bed - we are not really sure what these are?

Summer bulbs are starting to make an appearance.

Our new flower bed is looking very nice, we noticed lots of bees buzzing around the flowers.

 A selection of some of the flowers we have in the garden at the moment.

Our young fruit trees are starting to blossom - I think that this one might be a pear tree?